No track at Olympics

[hilljockey]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/ioc-turns-track-events-upside-down

[dr_rob]

Well, they wanted equality. Now the men's and women's programmes will be equally boring.

[Metro Commuter]

Hmmm.

I do agree with equality, and it was clearly unfair to have the men able to compete in 7 events in China and the women only able to compete in 3 events.

One wonders why not increase the womens' program to 7 events, same as the men? That would achieve equality.  The real purpose is to effect a reduction in track racing events so some other sport gets an increase.  From memory, wasn't the inclusion of BMX at the cost of track cycling?

[Masso]

The Olympics is becoming irelevent and more importance should go to world championships for individual sports. IMO

[dr_rob]

I think they traded the Kilo for the BMX.

I'm not a fan of the Omnium (even though we have a world champ).

Seems to me that if you're going to spend all this money building a world-class venue, then it would make sense to run as many events as possible over the time period. Increasing the women's events would have been the best option.

This probably means that guys like Phinney, Bobridge, et al are going to enter the Pro road ranks sooner, leaving little incentive for the endurance trackies to persist.

[Metro Commuter]

Masso,

I think you are correct (well done, had to happen some time) that the Olympics has limited relevance to racing cyclists, because I assume most do not see it as the best competition.  However, to non-cyclists and receational cyclists, the Olympics might be the only time they might watch any cycling event (except, perhaps, for TdF snippets), and that will only happen if there is an Australian with a chance of a medal.

The Olympics is, to a significant degree, about commercial interests.  Cycling, and particularily track cycling, just does not compete in terms of return to sponsors when compared to sports like swimming, running and soccer.