Women's Cycling Weekly Issue Five 🚴♀️
A weekly curation of women's cycling news and content straight to your inbox 📧
🎄 Hello! Welcome to Women’s Cycling Weekly issue five.
This week’s WCW might* be the last edition of 2020 given that next Friday is Christmas Day and - while reading about women’s cycling over your sprouts might sound like a great way to pass the day to some - I’ll be spending quality time with my dogs whilst eating my weight in chocolate. So, to offset that (the lack of newsletter not the chocolate) I’ve tried to make this edition a bit of a bumper one - luckily there’s plenty to report this week. So, settle in.
*Depending on whether I can get one done in the week after Christmas whilst simultaneously trying to navigate the UK’s Covid testing/Brexit maze as I attempt to fly back home to Spain before the new year.
News
An in no way exhaustive summary of the latest news and content from the past week.
Transfers Keep Coming ↔️
After a dry spell last week the transfer news has been coming thick and fast.
Canyon//SRAM have at long last started to announce riders after reporting nothing since the clanger that Chloe Dygert turned out to be. Today, they revealed that newly-crowned Swiss national champion, Elise Chabbey (one of the last remaining Paule Ka riders without a contract) will join the team until 2022 and current riders Alice Barnes, Lisa Klein and Alexis Ryan have extended - also up to 2022.
About 10 minutes after I pressed send on last week’s WCW - in which I had to settle for including their teaser Tweet about the impending announcement - Drops revealed that British rider Dani Christmas will round of their 2021 roster. More on the team later.
Alé BTC Ljubljana announced the extension of eight riders to complete their 2021 roster in a post on their website. Marta Bastianelli, Maaike Boogaard, Eugenia Bujak, Anastasiia Chursina, Mavi Garcia, Tatiana Guderzo, Urska Pintar will continue with the team.
Spanish Continental squad Bizkaia-Durango announced the signing of 21 year-old Canadian, Emilie Fortin off the back of her stint with the team at the Ceratizit Madrid Challenge by La Vuelta this year.
From one Spanish Conti team to another: Sopela Women’s Team have also completed their roster including new additions in the form of Spanish youngsters Paula Llacer Soler, Adriana San Roman Villalba, Natalia Saiz, Carla Pruñonosa, alongside 25 year-old British rider, Molly Patch.
The artist formerly known as Astana - A.R. Monex Women's Pro Cycling Team - have completed their international roster with the addition of Mexican riders Andrea Ramirez and Ariadna Gutierrez, French youngster Jade Teolis, Costa Rican Maria Jose Vargas, two Russian Mariias; Miliaeva and Novolodskaia, and Spanish climber Eider Merino.
Team News
An exciting development for Drops this week as they revealed their clothing sponsor - Le Col - have stepped up to become a title sponsor alongside mattress company Tempur. A press release from the team said:
“DROPS LE COL, supported by TEMPUR, will be a team that strives to compete at the very highest level, but also a team that wins. The intention is to take the team to the UCI Women’s World Tour by 2022, the very highest level of Women’s professional cycling.”
Bingoal-Wallonie-Bruxelles (who currently manage three men’s teams) announced on Tuesday that they have launched a women’s team for 2021 with a focus on development which will include experienced Belgian, Ann-Sophie Duyck. There has been some confusion, however, as Duyck is listed on the roster for a different Belgian squad: Multum Accountants - LSK Ladies Cycling Team
With copious wins to her name including multiple world championships, Annemiek Van Vleuten clearly had her pick of the WWT teams when she decided to move on from Mitchelton. However, she recently revealed in an interview how she turned down a spot on Trek-Segafredo in favour of her new home of Movistar because “they wouldn’t need me.” Instead, the prolific Dutchwoman preferred to take on the “challenge” of riding for a developing team in the form of the Spanish squad.
Results 🏆
On the road, Agua Marina Espínola of continental team Massi-Tactic won both the road race and the ITT to become the Paraguay national champion of both disciplines.
Over to ‘cross and in an extremely muddy Superprestige Gavere, Lucinda Brand claimed her fourth straight win of the series ahead of Denise Betsema and Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado. If you missed the race live then check out this gallery for an illustration of just how filthy the conditions were.
Upcoming Races 📅
The second round of the UCI Cyclo-Cross World Cup will take place this Sunday in Namur, Belgium. The usual suspects of Lucinda Brand, Ceylin Alvarado, and Denise Betsema (Pauwels Sauzen-Bingoal) will battle it out from 1:40pm CET.
Elsewhere in the world of ‘cross, the inimitable Marianne Vos will kick off her 2020/21 cyclo-cross season at Ethias Cross Essen, (also Belgium), next Tuesday.
Elsewhere 🌍
Remembering Sharon Laws
This week, the women’s peloton and cycling fans paid tribute to Sharon Laws, who tragically passed away three years ago on the 16th December 2017 after being diagnosed with cancer right after retiring from professional cycling. Laws was a brilliant rider, a former national champion and an advocate for progress in women’s cycling. For anyone unfamiliar with Laws or those who simply want to read more about her there is this touching tribute, and this piece written in her own words.
Riders of the Year
German national champion Lisa Brennauer and her promising compatriot Liane Lippert were crowned the winners of the Voxwomen Sharon Laws Rider and Young Rider of the Year Award. You can read Lisa’s reaction here, and Liane’s here.
Madrid Challenge Moving Up?
The Madrid Challenge by La Vuelta organisers confirmed that plans are in motion for the race - which currently consists of three stages - to be extended to between two and four days “in the mid-to-long-term.”
The UCI Continue Doing UCI Things
Last week’s WCW featured the announcement that the 2024 Paris Olympic Games would bring equal numbers in all cycling events for both men and women. However as this piece by Sadbhb O’Shea reveals, the UCI don’t quite deserve the massive pat on the back they were giving themselves in their press release.
Who Runs the Press
Cycling magazine Rouleur have announced that their first issue of 2021 will be an all-female edition, guest edited by Orla Chennaoui. The cycling press has a long way to go to achieve equality - both in terms of what they write about and who writes it - so it’s exciting to see such a big player take a stand like this.
Wishful Planning
Women’s cycling fans might have gotten their hopes up on Tuesday after seeing a map graphic of a 14-stage edition of the Women’s Tour spanning London to Glasgow floating around the internet. The proposal (a detailed, 46-page document titled 'The first women’s Grand Tour - A proposal') was in fact the work of women’s cycling fan Harry Eaton. Eaton told Cycling News that his aim was, “to try and build on the existing movement pushing for gender equality in cycling with a view that a potential medium-term 'solution' is expanding The Women's Tour while we wait for ASO and RCS Sport to get their heads screwed on the right way."
Musical Calendars
The Healthy Ageing Tour will move from April to early March for its 10th edition, to run in conjunction with the elite and U23 men’s 2.2 Olympia’s Tour races. The event’s new slot will be from the 9th-12th March - between Strade Bianche on the 6th and Ronde van Drenthe on the 14th. Nothing has yet been disclosed about whether the usual junior event will also take place.
Out in Force
This week, Strava released statistics on activities logged on their platform during the pandemic. One of the most notable findings was that the number of activities logged by women rose exponentially when compared to 2019. The platform’s director of international marketing cited temporarily quieter roads as a possible factor in the increase in the number of women out on their bikes during lockdown, which is entirely plausible considering safety is often quoted as a reason for women are deterred from cycling on the road.
Recommendations
Read 📰
If you think your lycra is uncomfortable then spare a thought for the women of the 19th Century who took to two wheels wearing petticoats. This fascinating article highlights the pioneering women who filed patents for bike-friendly womenswear in the late 1800s and how this grew in tandem with a burgeoning women’s liberation movement:
“These inventions are just some of the fascinating ways early female cyclists responded to challenges to their freedom of movement. Through new radical garments and their differently clad bodies they pushed against established forms of gendered citizenship and the stigma of urban harassment. Claiming their designs through patenting was not only a practical way of sharing and distributing ideas; it was also a political act.”
Anyone who listened to last week’s podcast recommendation might recognise the author, Dr Kat Jungnickel.
Listen 🎧
The Cycling Podcast Féminin from 15.12.20
What’s Christmas without a quiz? This episode of the long-standing women’s cycling podcast, The Cycling Podcast Féminin features exactly that amongst interviews with figures from Drops talking about their new sponsorship, a discussion with Ashleigh Moolman Pasio on diversity in cycling, and a chat with a newly-retired Gracie Elvin.
The Game Changers Podcast
A recommendation of an entire series rather than an individual episode, The Game Changers Podcast - launched in May 2019 and now in its sixth series - features an in-depth interview with some of the biggest names in women’s sport. Decorated Paralympic cyclist Dame Sarah Story has featured as a guest, and there are many more episodes featuring interesting and celebrated women to get stuck into.
Finally
Christmas - and a tenuous link to keywords woman+cycling - is the perfect excuse to share this gorgeous New Yorker cover from 1942:
Souce: Pinterest
That’s All
That’s it for this week (and possibly this year). As ever, thank you for supporting WCW and women’s cycling. This is truly a labour of love and I’m overwhelmed by the support that people have sent its way since the first issue. I know it’s a profoundly boring refrain but please like and share this if you enjoyed it. Feel free to offer constructive feedback, I can take it. Truly Grinchy comments, however, will be met with a ‘bah, humbug!’
I hope you all have as close to a ‘nice’ Christmas as you possibly can under the circumstances. Hang in ‘cause 2020 is nearly over.
Until next time (there will be one, I promise).
Amy x