• So the regulations around Olympic kit on the track in Tokyo (not road) are pretty stringent this year. In order to use a particular piece of kit under a rider, it has to form part of a registered list of products with the UCI.

    Teams have to inform the UCI using an online system exactly what individual components each rider will be using at the Olympic track events, even down to the pedals/bottom bracket. That has to happen a month out so no changes after that either unless by special approval etc.

    In order to get a piece of equipment on that list, it has to be submitted to the UCI by the federations, and everything has to have been used in international competition either prior to this current season, or by (the absolute latest) Track World Cup number 4 in Brisbane*.

    For that list you have to submit the manufacturer, the product name and serial number, price and also where it can be purchased otherwise it doesn't go on the list - making it quite a departure from years past where no-one cared about the commerciality rules. For example you can now buy the German bikes from here:

    https://fes-sport.de/shop_rad.htm

    Don't buy their aerobars though as they're now UCI illegal and causing them all sorts of headaches.

    The UCI technical commission are right now sat track centre in Minsk with a giant scanner on a crane, scanning bikes and components to make sure they match dimensions, they said they were going to do it but I didn't believe they actually would!

    We have lots of stuff for a variety of different federations (I think 8 feds total) that need approval, not all of it will be left as late as TWC4 as we should be able to spread things out a bit. Some of our larger projects we've been in close communication with the UCI - in fact they invented a stem rule in their clarification document which was just for us. Joy.

    *This was originally Track World Cup 1 in Minsk which is currently ongoing, but it was changed to TWC4 about 8 weeks ago. No-one from British Cycling told Hope though, so they were understandably miffed when I mentioned to a couple of their engineers this week that they had rushed to get the bike ready but still had 5 weeks to play with!

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