The Finances of Team Sky

Cycling teams are businesses. The holder of a UCI Pro Team licence can be an individual but most often the team is a corporate entity, a company created to handle the income from sponsors and pay out expenses like rider wages.

This is the case with Team Sky and, like all companies, it publishes its annual report and accounts. Here is a look at the finances of Team Sky, from the exact budget down to the tiny details and it’s more than just dull accounts, it tells us plenty about the team and the sport. Including why the team has only three employees.

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Track Racing, Bastion of Inequality

I’ll be covering the track racing over the coming days and am looking forward to it. But there’s one thing to cover first, the way women get unequal treatment in the sport.

The opening ceremony of the London games featured scenes from Britain’s past including a tribute to the women who fought for the right to vote and later several women were flag carriers for the Gulf states, a first for the region. But if the struggle for equality is celebrated by some there are still parts of the games were men and women are not treated equally.

Cycling is one such sport and this blog doesn’t cover the others. Cycling is at a halfway point, the 2012 games are the first to award an equal amount of medals to the men and women but women are still riding shorter distances and have smaller team sizes. Should things be equal, can things be equal?

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Olympic Time Trial Preview

Olympic rings

It’s not often a time trial gets a preview but this is the Olympics. But as special as the occasion might be, the course is a classic test of speed and power for men and women alike. It’s also the moment the Olympics leave London’s shiny new sports facilities and medieval palaces for the suburbs and their brick-built houses.

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Enovos Quits Radioshack-Nissan Team

European energy company Enovos has been a co-sponsor of the Radioshack-Nissan team, starting with Leopard-Trek last year. But it has just announced it is walking away mid-season from the cycling team, publicly dropping its connections to the team. This is very rare in cycling and sport in general.

Here’s the press release translated into English:

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Olympic Shorts

There’s a pause in the Olympic cycling program with the time trial not until Wednesday and then activities start in the velodrome on Thursday. Remember you can download an iCal file for your electronic diary for the dates and timing of all events.

The Olympics are very different from everything else we are used to. A rider who makes a mess of the Tour of Flanders can hope to make amends in Paris-Roubaix. Have a jours sans in the Tour de France and you can hope it’s someone else’s turn the following day. Even if things go wrong in the world’s there’s always next year. But the Olympic road race? It’s not until 2016 and the Rio race promises to be very hilly.

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Olympic Road Race: The Moment The Race Was Won

On the back of the Box Hill circuit there was a descent followed by a steep rise that turned into a drag. It’s the kind of road you approach with plenty of momentum from the descent but then it climbs up too much to carry speed, instead riders had to balance momentum with power.

That’s just what happened today, we saw a clever move launched by Olga Zabelinskaya, blasting past Amber Neben and Emma Pooley and the Russian was joined by Lizzie Armitstead, Shelley Olds and Marianne Vos. The four got away and this was the winning move.

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Olympic Road Race: The Moment The Race Was Won

With 8km go go both Rigoberto Uran and Alexander Vinokourov attacked at the same time. They came round a ninety degree bend and both jumped out of the saddle, one going on the left and the other on the right of a wide road. It looked like happy coincidence, both riders went clear and found themselves able to cooperate. But this dual effort seemed to confuse the others and gave them the chance to get a small lead and co-operate. It was the moment the race was won.

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Olympics: Women’s Road Race Preview

If Box Hill was supposed to make the men’s course selective yesterday, the UCI have pre-empted this with some odd rules meaning the women’s race has only 66 starters and several of these are mountain bikers and track cyclists. But if the field is reduced, the quality isn’t and we can expect a battle royale to reach the finish outside Buckingham Palace.

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Olympic Games Road Race Preview

The ultimate one day race? If the Tour de France represents the pinnacle of world cycling and the Tour of Flanders is arguably the top one-day classic of the season, the Olympic Games road race is unique because of its rarity and international recognition.

The men’s road race is the longest event of the 2012 Olympic games across all sports, taking an estimated six hours. This matters because the course is all about the distance and time, a small climb will be used and if it is not selective once then it will end the hopes of many by the ninth time after which the race heads back to London for a superb finish on The Mall, the proud avenue in front of Buckingham Palace.

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The Fastest Sprinter Who Can’t Win

Scan the start list of the men’s road race for the Olympic Games and you’ll spot several sprinters and fast finishers. Mark Cavendish, André Greipel and Peter Sagan for example. Who is the fastest?

The answer is obvious, it’s rider number 42: Mickaël Bourgain of France. He’s four times world champion in the team sprint event. On the track.

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