Women's Cycling Weekly Issue Seven
A weekly curation of women's cycling news and content straight to your inbox
Hello! Welcome to Women’s Cycling Weekly issue seven.
We all deserve credit for making it through what has been an absolute bin fire of a week, especially for the first week of January. I hope this little dose of women’s cycling content provides some respite from the relentless doom of the news and lockdown-induced Groundhog Day vibes.
Amid the looming spectre of a second (or third?) wave of Coronavirus sweeping through Europe, many teams are at training camps preparing for whenever the 2021 season might actually start (🤞). It seems to have been a relatively slow news week but there’s lots of great content to get stuck into to make up for it.
News 📰
French rider Marion Sicot has been given a two-year suspension from the French anti-doping authority for taking EPO in June 2019. She originally faced a four year ban but asked for a reduced term in light of the sexual harassment and psychological abuse she experienced by her team manager at the time, Marc Bracke of Doltcini Van Eyck. The UCI found Bracke to be guilty of harassment last year. The decision was made on December 16th 2020 and has been applied retroactively, meaning that Sicot can return to competition this July.
In more positive Gallic news, Cofidis, who currently sponsor men’s Pro Continental and paracycling teams announced today that they would be backing a women’s team from 2022. They did not specify whether this would be a UCI team although it would be fair to assume that a French squad to want to field a team in the promised 2022 Women’s Tour de France (although it is not possible for a team to enter immediately at WWT level.) This will make them the eighth men’s team to also field a women’s team.
A senior IOC figure, Dick Pound, has expressed doubts over whether the Tokyo Olympic Games will go ahead in light of the current Coronavirus situation in Japan - although the organisers deny that this is the case. It has also been suggested that Olympic athletes could be prioritised for vaccine distribution ahead of the Games.
According to a recent article, Australian riders including FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope’s Lauren Kitchen may find it difficult to travel to domestic races including the national championships as well as facing challenges over returning to Europe due to Australian lockdown and border closure measures.
Finally, I know I said I wasn't going to go over all of the new kits but this one deserves a mention:
The new Liv Racing kit (which I personally think is 🔥) will make its first appearance at the Belgian cyclocross championships with Lotte Kopecky on Sunday. There are some who have criticised the fact that it can be described as ‘feminine’ owing to the fact that it is largely purple with a floral pattern but it’s a far cry from the typical ‘bright pink and short shorts’ look that many manufacturers offer as their token gesture towards a women’s offering. As far as pro kit goes, anything that breaks from the norm is a win in my opinion. Plus, purple is a feminist colour x
Upcoming Races 📅
As mentioned in last week’s newsletter this Sunday - 10th January - myriad cyclocross national championships will take place. They include the Swiss, Spanish, Italian, Hungarian, French, Danish, Belgian and Austrian events.
If you’re new to ‘cross and want to know more about it then I highly recommend Wide Angle Podium’s Youtube series ‘CXs and Os’ explainer videos in which they break down the various features and quirks of top-level cyclocross racing.
Read 🗞️
This CyclingTips interview with Olympic Champion Connie Carpenter - who also happens to be the mother of ex-pro Taylor Phinney - unearths some stark facts including that a certain orange-faced aspiring despot even managed to put a spanner through the figurative spokes of progression in women’s cycling in the 1980s. Carpenter is one of us, lamenting the fact that in the year 2021 she still needs to use social media to follow women’s races that ought to be broadcast live:
“I am on social media solely to follow women’s races which in 2020 is pretty bad,” she explains. “Why can’t we watch more? The men’s races tend to become longer, more formulaic and therefore boring. Make them shorter and show the women.”
Quite.
CyclingNews are running some good in-depth 2021 women’s team previews, so far DSM and FDJ have been covered.
Following on from a movement back in October in which UK-based time trialists campaigned for equal prize money in their events - in which over 4,000 people signed an open letter to the organisation Cycling Time Trials - a discrimination case over the unequal prize pots has been brought to the Equality and Advisory Support Service (EASS) who subsequently found that some of the prize money discrimination could be in breach of the 2010 Equality Act.
Listen 🎧
I hadn’t heard of the ‘Breakfast with Boz’ podcast from former pro turned gravel racer Ian Boswell but on one of my regular sessions of trawling for interviews with some of my favourite female pros I came across this episode with Lizzie Deignan and Sonya Looney on motherhood and sport (for Mother’s Day, natch). Both have really interesting things to say on the subject. Listen if only for the really sweet conversation between Boswell and his own mother at the beginning.
Book Club 📚
For the third issue running I realise I don’t have a book to recommend and, truthfully, there are just not that many on the subject out there to sustain a weekly recommendation. As a teaser, though, I will add that I am currently ¾ of the way through a very interesting book about a legendary figure in women’s cycling that I can’t wait to share next week!
Feel Good Friday 💕
The segment in which I tenuously link to a good-news article containing the keywords ‘woman’ + ‘cycling’ returns with the extraordinary story of this woman who, as part of a game called ‘Turf’ (me neither) spends up to 10 hours every day cycling around the streets of Edinburgh. The 51-year-old mother of four racked up 317 hours and 1,400 miles on the bike in November.
That’s All 👋
Thanks again for getting to the end of another WCW. I hope you enjoyed it and found some interesting content to read/watch/listen to, on which note I would be really grateful for any feedback you might have regarding the type of content you prefer this newsletter to have. If you find the newsy stuff boring and want more recommendations or if you don’t like having me shove content down your throat and would rather get more of the latest news instead then reply to this email - I would be very grateful for any feedback!
Have a great weekend,
Amy x
Love the content! A book recommendation could be "Tough women adventures stories" from Jenny Tough xxx
Great weekly round-up, happy to have found your twitter during the Giro Rosa 👏