December 15, 2010 (Aigle, Switzerland) – The UCI has published its last edition of its VeloWorld newsletter of the year. It includes lots of news from the UCI, including cyclocross info about the upcoming World Championships and TV viewership numbers. There is also lots of information about the UCI’s fight against doping, along with a look at the past decades of growth in the sport of cycling, and a bunch of other interesting stories.

2010 a Year of Success
One of the major events of 2010 has, without doubt, been the creation of the UCI WorldTour. The UCI WorldTour brings together the UCI ProTour and Monument events into a single structure, governed by a single set of regulations (notably concerning the rules for the participation of teams). In terms of the expansion of cycling around the world 2010 represented a considerable step forward. The UCI Road World Championships were held in Oceania for the first time in their history (in Melbourne, Australia 1 ) while two North American races joined the UCI World Calendar: the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec 2 and the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal, both of which took place in Canada in September to the acclaim of the public and media alike. These two events will form part of the UCI WorldTour from 2011. More generally, the UCI World Championships for the various disciplines have offered very convincing evidence of the progress made by cycling in its quest for globalisation: for example, the Mountain Bike and Para-cycling World Championships were held in Canada, the BMX World Championships in South Africa and the Mountain Bike Masters World Championships in Brazil. This development will most certainly continue in 2011; the UCI President recently signed an agreement with executives of the Beijing Sports Bureau in China 3 for the organisation of a new stage race known as the Tour of Beijing (5-9 October) that, subject to the award of a licence by the Licence Commission, will form part of the UCI WorldTour.

A Decade of Growth
– In 2000, with one exception, all first division teams came from Europe.
In 2010, the teams came from three continents.
– In 2000, there were 72 second and third division teams; these came from 19 countries on two continents. In 2010, there were 147 of these teams, from 43 countries over five continents.
– In 2000, Asia only had one continental team. The continent had 19 such teams by 2010.
– In 2000, UCI International Calendar events were held in 48 countries. By 2010, they were held in 68 countries, which represents an increase of some 42%.
– Finally, if we compare the percentage of road events held in each continent in 2004 and 2010, it is clear that the distribution has become more even: from 1.18% of events to 2.96% for Africa; from 6.93% to 7.22% for America; from 3.04% to 7.41% for Asia; from 1.35% to 2.78% for Oceania. At the same time, the proportion of events held in Europe decreased from 87.5% to 79.63%.

Consistency, Rigour, and Serentity
According to a certain person who has a tendency to throw around serious accusations without the slightest evidence to back them up, the UCI protects certain riders from the risk of failing a doping test. Given the impressive progress that has been made in anti-doping programmes and, sadly, the ever-higher number of proceedings we have had to initiate in recent years against some of our sport’s biggest stars, it would be very interesting to know the names of these privileged riders who have enjoyed such favourable treatment. For the time being we must simply look at the source of these insinuations, which seriously tarnish the image of our sport and its leaders: this is a person who lacks all credibility and has no sense of responsibility, who believes he now has free rein, having abused the system himself, having lied to all of us and all of you. Today, as the UCI awaits the Spanish Federation’s conclusions regarding the Contador case, his theory seems all the more absurd. The consistency, rigour and serenity that governed the inquiry, conducted in close cooperation with the World Anti-Doping Agency, into the abnormal test results of the triple Tour de France winner, should offer the most telling guarantee of our commitment to eradicate doping, regardless of the low levels of product detected, regardless of all the possible justifications, regardless of the rider’s impressive record, and regardless of the additional negative consequences for cycling. And even in spite of the slanderous accusations and a habit of being economical with the truth.

Para-Cycling: Collaboration between UCI and Polar
Selected athletes competing in the 2010 UCI Para-cycling Road World Championships were equipped with a Polar heart rate monitor as part of an agreement between the International Cycling Union (UCI) and the Finnish firm. As supplier sponsor for the Championships, Polar provided 15 heart rate monitors for athletes which allowed officials to collect information that can be used for classification purposes (definition of the division in which the riders compete). The UCI’s Para-cycling Coordinator, Chantale Philie welcomed this collaboration: “The equipment provided by Polar helps us collect important athlete information in a competition situation. Polar’s support of this event will help the discipline progress”.

Directeurs Sportifs on Course at WCC
Twenty-five Directeurs Sportifs took part in a specially tailored course at the World Cycling Centre (WCC) in Aigle, from 6 to 10 December. Organised by the WCC, the programme has been created in order to ensure the continued and improved professionalism of Directeur Sportifs. The participants came from 16 different UCI ProTeams and UCI Professional Continental Teams. The course treated numerous themes including the role of a Directeur Sportif, training methodology, anti-doping, equipment and technology, leadership and communication.

Cyclo-Cross: Stybar-Albert Duel Called Off
Zdenek Stybar and Niels Albert were preparing once again to battle it out right up to the final event of the UCI Patrick Cyclo-cross World Cup. Albert began the season with a second in Aigle and went on to win the Koksijde event. Stybar, reigning World Champion from Tabor, won the Swiss opener and the Plzen event, following up with a second in Koksijde, before injury forced him to pull out of the series. With Stybar absent, the Belgian rider 3 conquered an extremely muddy course in Igorre and took first place in the series rankings. Stybar will now have his work cut out to come back in time to defend his trophy. Daphny Van Den Brand of the Netherlands leads the women’s competition, despite not winning any of the first three races of the season. Trailing her are fellow Dutchwoman Sanne Van Paassen, who won in Plzen, and Katherine Compton 4 of the USA who was very visible at the early season races in Aigle and Koksijde. In the Under- 23 and Juniors categories, Belgium is currently calling the shots with Vincent Baestaens and Laurens Sweeck out in front. The great interest shown so far in each leg of the UCI Patrick Cyclo-cross World Cup, which plays an important role in the rich and varied range of cycling events, suggests that the 2010- 11 season will confirm the discipline’s place at the heart of our movement.

TV Audience Record for Cyclo-Cross
At the half-way stage of the 2010-2011 Patrick UCI Cyclocross World Cup, millions of television spectators all over the world have been following the action. Deals struck between the UCI and television channels in numerous countries ensure that images are relayed on the following channels: Sport+ (France), VRT (Belgium), Czech TV (Czech Republic), NOS (the Netherlands), RAI Piu (Italy), TSR (Switzerland), Servus TV (Austria, Germany, Lichtenstein, Luxemburg, Switzerland) and NHK (Japan – on the Web). In addition, Universal Sports broadcasts throughout North America, while Eurosport Asia Pacific ensures that the cyclo-cross World Cup reaches fans in Asia and Africa. Meanwhile Gilette World Sports broadcasts the series worldwide. The Belgian public television channel VRT registered excellent audience figures for the first three rounds in Aigle (SUI), Plzen (CZE) and Koksijde 5 (BEL). More than half a million (509,180) TV viewers tuned in to watch the Elite Men’s competition broadcast live from Aigle. This represented 50.99% of the market share. In Plzen, the live broadcast of the men’s competition was viewed by 540,821 VRT viewers, representing 46.66% of the market share. All records were then broken in Koksijde with a television audience of 560,370, for 62,97% of the market share. VRT also broadcast summaries of the Elite Women’s events, recording audiences of 306,989 (35.04% of the market share) in Aigle and 254,976 (26.8% of the market share) in Plzen. Meanwhile, the Dutch Broadcasting Foundation, NOS, and Swiss TV (TSR2 channel) broadcast the opening leg in Aigle live, registering respectively an audience of 359,000 for a market share of 19.4% and 45,000 TV viewers for a market share of 15%.

Cyclo-Cross World Championships 2011: Return to St. Wendel
The 2011 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships will be the third world-class event to take place in the small German town of St. Wendel. It all began in 2005 when the town welcomed the cyclo-cross worlds for the first time, followed by the Marathon events last August. Being a popular destination for off-road enthusiasts, St. Wendel has also hosted the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup. To hold such a wide variety of toplevel cycling events in just six years is exceptional, and confirms the region’s commitment to our sport. The world’s top riders are always more than happy to return, thanks to the excellent infrastructure and the high standard of the race circuits. The 2011 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships will provide yet another opportunity to witness a head-tohead between the Czech defending champion Zdenek Stybar 6 and the Belgian cohort led by Niels Albert and Sven Nijs, who won the title in 2005. In the women’s event, Hanka Kupfernagel will be hoping the home crowd will cheer her on to a repeat of the achievement that earned her the rainbow jersey when St. Wendel hosted the worlds the first time around.

UCI Signs Agreement with Mummu Media
The International Cycling Union (UCI) has signed an agreement with Mummu Media which will enable cycling fans to buy packages on-line to attend UCI World Championship events. Mummu Media will create packages that it will then undertake to promote and distribute. The offers include accommodation, transport on site, entry to competitions and tickets to special events (for example galas). These packages will be available for UCI World Championships in the following disciplines: road, track, mountain bike and trials, cyclo-cross and BMX. The new initiative, called UCI Travel, offers fans the perfect opportunity to attend the UCI’s most prized events in the best possible conditions and without the need to worry about organisational details. The first package on sale is for the 2011 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships which will take place in St-Wendel, Germany, on January 29th and 30th 2011 and which will attract the world’s best specialists in this spectacular discipline. The cycling packages can be bought at www.uci-travel.com

Read the December 2010 edition of VeloWorld here