posted Dec 9, 2008

If people retire they retire, that's hardly a new phenomenon, there's always a turnover between Olympic games. Cycling seems to have a number of talented youngsters to move up though.

As for defections to other sports. Why would they bother? Romero is a bit of a one off. Are you expecting to see Hoy in the equestrian and Pendleton in the Judo in London or something?

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posted Dec 9, 2008

I figured he meant defection to other ways of cycling, ie to the road.

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posted Dec 9, 2008

TheGSgirl....Yes that and the fact that cycling does take its competitors from other sports like rowing , just wondered that with all the funding available in diverse sports if some cyclists may be tempted by the cash and a new challenge

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posted Dec 9, 2008

mmm funding. let me see - i'm chris hoy, and i can collect £24k a year in my chosen sport, or any other i switch too. however, if i stay in cycling with my eight recently signed endorsement contracts, i get rich, whereas if i move it's back to basics. BC even had to give his manager a (polite) rollicking this week to get chris to turn the PR down a bit - but who can blame him for cashing in, when the prevailing economic environment or degree of (award) recognition for cyclists in this country is pretty bleak.

also, i do not believe that rowing is a source of cycling talent. cycling is an element of rowing training but this is often reciprocated too by cyclists training on ergs. what the two sports share are the necessity for anaerobic physiological attributes in the athletes....

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posted Dec 9, 2008

Who's talking about Hoy , there have been numerous crossovers between sports , hasnt Romero got Olympic medals in two different sports ??????????

I was thinking more about the younger element the guys with no endorsements

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posted Dec 10, 2008

The younger guys with no endorsements will stay and keep pushing the present team thats how things progress,keep pushing thats how new records broken and champions emerge.

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posted Dec 10, 2008

I really hope so tunnocks

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posted Dec 12, 2008

If you have been to any of the Revolution meetings at the Velodrome in Manchester or the World Cup in November or followed the progress of the team on the web (British Cycling website) you will see there is a whole tide of phenomenally good young adults (Lizzie Armistead, Jess Varnish, Katie Colclough, Jo Rowsell, David Daniel, Jason Kenny...) who are already performing at the top level in the world. Then there is a slew of older teenagers and youths coming through that are posting great times. The sport is now incredibly well structured from the ground-up and the funding is there to identify and nurture more and more (BC membership is now higher than it has ever been) There are competitions and training camps all round the country, two velodromes, a good coaching set-up and a tide of enthusiasm. So the answer is 'no' the team will not be depleted. If you can conceive it the team at 2012 will probably be stronger than the current crop (some of whom will be hitting their prime then anyway)

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posted Dec 17, 2008

with the incredible crop of young talent coming (male and female)through and winning euro & world medals at under 19 & under 23 levels the future does look very bright indeed!.

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posted Dec 28, 2008

When it comes to moving from the track to the road, the sprinters are too specialised to make a success of it anyway (hardly any top track sprinters have had comparable success on the road - only Patrick Sercu comes to mind, and that was a while ago); there has been a healthy amount of traffic between track sprint disciplines and BMX, though. Pursuiters and other distance riders have always moved fairly freely between road and track (Wiggins, Thomas and most obviously Cavendish from the Peking squad have all got road careers). So, basically, no problem (although Cavendish has had enough of the track and is financially far better off on the road).

As far as changing sport entirely goes, there aren't that many obvious candidates: Romero has shown what was already known: that rowing shares a lot of the physiological factors involved; other non-impact endurance disciplines could be speed skating (Romero's next target?) and cross-country skiing, but as they are winter sports there's not a lot stopping anyone who is good enough doing them in 2010 and still riding the track in 2012.

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