posted May 31, 2008

Paul. Any chance of giving Eastenders a summer break to show the Giro ant Vuelta next year?

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posted May 31, 2008

The lack of interest in cycling shown by the British media has been debated on this forum and many more on countless occasions.I think we have to face the fact that despite the success of Cav,Hoy,Wiggins and the like cycling is still a minority sport.The average Brit couldnt care less about cycling.Those of us who have ridden our bikes on the continent will know the difference in attitudes towards our sport.Ask your non cycling mates if thy have ever heard of Tom Boonen or Cancellara,superstars of the sport without question,i dare say the answer will be no.

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posted May 31, 2008

"The lack of interest in cycling shown by the British media...."

But that's not actually the case. The Media shows a great deal of interest in kicking it at every available opportunity. What other sport at which we have had such success gets such a roasting on a regular basis? My question: Why is this the case?

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posted May 31, 2008

I agree with you Puydedome.I should have said positive interest.Most people in this country do not like having their car driving held up in any way at all.Cyclists put up with mindless abuse from idiots in cars all the time just because we are on the road.In their eyes we are a hindrance and the media,with their anti cycling bias just encourage this.A British rider could win the tour,giro and the vuelta in one season and it wouldnt make a blind bit of difference to the great Btitish public.We would still be public enemy number 1.

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posted Jun 2, 2008

The key to understanding this is NOT how many participate, but WHO it is that is participating. If Princes William and Harry were to take up road racing........ You get my drift? Get it into the public schools and we'll be made as a sport!

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posted Jun 2, 2008

It seems to me that the problem with cycling is that for long parts of the day you need to be an officianado to really appreciate what is going on in a race. Team tactics etc make the sport far less accessible than Tennis, tennis is easy points are won every few seconds. It is the accessibility of the sport and the long duration of races that makes it difficult to justify showing it.

Personally I doubt very much that there are more competing cyclists than tennis players in the UK. The clubs local to me would struggle to get 100 cyclists out, meanwhile tennis has 8 active summer leagues and 6 active winter leages all with multiple division. That doesn't even include club competitions.

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posted Jun 2, 2008

BigGut. I understand your point about road racing being inaccessible to all but officianados of the sport. However, even track cycling or BMX where the races last only a short period of time and so should be more easily understood suffer from a lack of coverage.

As an example, this weekend Shanaze Reade retained her World title at BMX. I know it's reported on the BBC website but I don't recall hearing about it on Five Live this morning? I guess she will have to wait till Beijing for any of the publicity she so richly deserves. I might not hold my breath though!

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