Yeah probably, but no one in the US knows who Sam Bennett or Caleb Ewan are. Sending Americans to Europe to race Sam and Caleb doesn’t help grow the sport of cycling in America. Twitter beefs and jersey dramas are what Americans love to see. Have you ever seen ESPN? It’s drama drama drama.
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Sure, I mean, that’s fun and these guys are doing good things for the sport, but if I were a US cycling fan I’d be demanding more UCI events at home in the US to test these guys against the best.
It’s like starting some domestic Tennis hype-comp where games only have 2 sets, your own majors, everything and totally ignoring that Nadal, Federer, Djokovic, Wimbledon and Roland Garros exist.
Dunno, this US crit racing just gives off so much of this energy:
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I mean, we had Lance… lol
Road racing is basically dead in the US. Trying to do the same old tactics (UCI races, EuroPros, teams with different names every year) to grow cycling in America clearly doesn’t work. I give credit to L39ION and other cohorts for trying a new approach, even if it seems gaudy or tacky to a worldwide audience.
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All good points.
You could look at a model like Cricket has.
The biggest market is India (by far) and similarly they needed a new product to captivate the market.
They went for a shorter format (~2 hour game) and called it the “Indian Premier League”
Difference is, they found a window in the international calendar that worked then made space to invite the world’s best players to participate.
In a cycling context, I guess if you made a window for crit racing in the calendar and invited some world tour teams to compete, or even better hold a ‘draft’ where some riders can be auctioned to US ‘Premier Crit League’ teams that would be cool.
The World Tour teams could be convinced by taking the auction proceeds. Would solve some of the viability / sponsorship issues for the World Tour teams.
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Is the rest of the world that insecure that we are enjoying our domestic crit scene?
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That sounds like it could be an interesting approach, a good creative route.
Something else that’s problematic to developing US talent is the distance/time zones. In other sports like soccer, I’ve read a lot of articles about teenagers have to move to Europe to join the academy/club to train, but they don’t do well mentally because they’re far from home, few friends/family, and miss out on their youth. I wonder if the US Crit and gravel scenes were built up with occasional appearances by top WT pros, if it would help build a better foundation and create stronger local training environments where US riders could stay at home and still progress to a WT level, then make the geographic jump when they’re over 18.
Yeah, but those are the same issues that any athlete in any global sport from Australia or New Zealand faces to be fair and the timezones/distance are far harder to manage 
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I actually have a buddy who’s dad still races BMX at almost 70 years old, super hardcore. A lot of times he will be only older guy there though unfortunately.
I was a MTBer and motocrosser back in the BMX heyday so I never raced, but had several good friends that did.
Uh, what? I would posit a lot more US cycling fans know them than Justin Williams. In fact I don’t even think it’s close.
If you are taking about a random person off the street, then the chances of them knowing anyone are microscopic.
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Using the incredibly scientific method of Instagram followers
Caleb: 150k
Sam: 127k
Justin: 107k
Closer than I expected, but also speaks to how little anyone actually cares about road cycling globally.
Seems like the future is mountain biking:
Kate Courtney: 519k
Nino: 612k
PFP: 440k
For reference, the really big names:
Sagan: 1.9M
Froome: 1.2M
Bernal: 1.1M
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It was the day before the race(s) - no one else was in the group.
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Maybe that’s why I found it kind of boring. Just not a fan of the same laps over and over. Not much happening.
At least on the long “boring” sprint stages, there’s a bigger battle leading into the line, with multiple teams jockeying for position. Yesterday it was just one team sitting on the front. I’m not saying that’s easy or not impressive, just not exciting.
IMO it’s difficult for someone “outside” of cycling to relate to road racing if it’s not something that’s really ingrained in their culture. My hometown hosted the Tour Down Under, and although everyone made a big thing about the event and any Australian athletes, I think there was very much a sense that it was an “imported” thing, and I don’t think there was a lot of understanding of the event itself. Sort of like people who have the Olympics on out of some sense of significance or patriotism.
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This sounds very similar to Justin’s long-term vision of the US cycling scene. He talks about it on the ‘From the Gun’ podcast.
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So does mean he’s ineligible for future US champs races - amateur or pro?
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I reckon he could still race for UCI points, no? Not for the championship, though.
Dunno how it is in the States, here in Au Nationals is for Aussies only, he wouldn’t be able to enter.
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Yeah, I don’t believe he can enter. At 32yo, I don’t think he has much interest in competing at Nats anymore. He isn’t listed on the roster as a Conti team either, just the team manager, so I think he was planning this for a while.
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