Does anyone care about the new UCI Track Champions League?
What will it take to get fans engaged in track cycling?
Throughout the past week, the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) has been pushing the news of its new Track Champions League. The event, set to debut in November 2021, will see Olympic champions, world champions and world record holders competing in a league format: six rounds across six weeks with four riders ultimately emerging as the best male and female sprint riders and the best male and female endurance riders. The format is new and exciting, the prize money is split equally between the men and women and big names such as Chris Hoy and Kristina Vogel are acting as ambassadors to the event. Cycling fans don’t really seem to care.
In theory, track cycling seems super engaging for viewers. Races are super fast paced and feature dynamic events with dramatic twists. Yet viewership and interest is still low, particularly with North American audiences.
At one period in time, Canadian and American track fans were abundant. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the time of American cyclist Major Taylor, racing bikes in velodromes was one of the most popular sports in North America. A host of factors, including outdoor roads becoming more rideable and the rise of automobile racing, eventually led to the sport falling out of favour with the fans. Track racing did continue, helped along by its status as an Olympic sport with numerous medal possibilities, though presently interest in the discipline is not high.
Track fans
Toronto cyclist Pauline Beaupré says she watches all the racing she can. For road cycling, cyclocross and MTB she’ll tune in to races that range from Worlds to smaller, localized events. But when it comes to track, she says she only watches the World Cups and the Olympics, not the “smaller stuff.” She hadn’t heard about the UCI Track Champions League.
These “smaller events” are often overlooked and perhaps one of the reasons the cycling fanbase hasn’t built the habit of tuning in to track events. In Canada Flobikes covers some races, but many are broadcasted live for free on platforms such as Facebook or Youtube, so viewers can pretty easily tune in.
Alex Baird comes from a family of cycling fans from Burlington, On. In the past few years he and his father started driving to the nearby Milton velodrome to watch the UCI World Cup events live. Baird thinks a lack of access to velodromes is the missing link in track cycling fandom. “Because less people can participate, they’re less interested in watching,” he says. “It’s not as accessible as road cycling. To participate you need to go to an indoor or outdoor velodrome, and most countries have very few.” There are only three indoor velodromes in Canada.
“It’s a shame though,” says Baird. “[Track cycling] is more entertaining for in-person spectating than road cycling and events are way easier to facilitate on a track than closing off roads for a road race.” Like Beaupré, he hadn’t heard of the Track Champions League, but he says the name alone catches his interest.
In Europe, where there is a higher concentration of velodromes, the Six Day event series are still relatively successful. This year the non-UCI races shifted to a virtual race series but they will return, live, in October 2021.
New league format
The UCI is clearly aware of the public’s apathy towards the discipline and seems to be trying to push for new fans with the Track Champions League. The event, created through a partnership between the UCI and promoter Eurosport Events with the support of GCN, aims to “get sports audiences invested in the discipline” through “iconic venues, unique audience experiences, ground-breaking technology and world-class broadcasting.”
72 riders will be selected based on track world championships results, performance at the Tokyo Olympics, UCI rankings and a few wild cards. Every one of the six competition rounds will feature the same race program. Some of the most fan-friendly track events were selected: sprinters will race in both sprint and keirin while endurance riders will race both elimination and scratch.
Points will be allocated to the riders based on their performance in each race and leaders will get a leader’s jersey. The overall winner in each of the four categories will be the rider with the most points at the end of the series. There will be equal prize money for men and women.
The cycling boom of 2020 brings many new cycling fans with it. Come November we’ll see if the UCI’s efforts to grow interest in track cycling has paid off with the road cycling crowd or at least with the new cycling fans who many be looking for some accessible and engaging fast paced racing.
