The Modern Sport of Cycling

       Many people if asked to name five professional cyclist would struggle they would name Lance Armstrong, Sir Chris Hoy and possibly Mark Cavendish they may very well name the rest of the Olympic track racing team. But if you where to ask them what is the sports major event most people would be able to tell you that it is the Tour de France. This to me seems to show that people know about the sport but don't care for watching it and i think that is a real shame.
       The sport of cycling has had it's recent history marred by drugs scandals, the hope that it was just one generation of cyclists still lives in many, this year tall three pinnacle events of the UCI (International Cycling Union) World Ranking, the Giro d'Italia, the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España (still ongoing) have all been free of major doping incidents.for the for nearly ten years. Of course these tours have not been without incident, Mark Renshaw's headbutt on Julian Dean on the 11th stage of the Tour de France this year immediately comes to mind.
       This is has also not been without some British and Irish success, Bradley Wiggins won the opening time trial of the Giro d'Italia, Mark Cavendish won five stages of the Tour de France but still missed out on the elusive green jersey for best sprinter of the Tour, Mark is currently wearing the green jersey in the Vuelta a España after 10 of the 21 stages and Daniel Martin won the Tour of Poland a UCI World Ranking Event.
       Now my next question to the random member of the public is have they ever heard a cycling event called the Tour of Britain, I assume that they would say no and to me that is a not a shock the only people that probably know that the Tour of Britain is coming are the small number of British road cycling fans, the viewers of ITV4 who might have seen an advert for the highlights or the people who commute will be affected due to the road closures.
      The Tour of Britain starts this Saturday the 11th with stage one going from Rochdale to Blackpool finishing on the promenade by the south pier. Watching a sprint finish in cycling is something I implore everyone to see at least once, you will have all rode a bike and at some point you will have probably tried to go as fast as you can on it, watching a sprint finish just blows your mind away, the speed which these cyclists are going at and to still have the control to move around without taking each other out amazes me and the bursts of acceleration which the top men can do are simply outstanding.
      The Tour will continue for the rest of the week with finishes at Stoke-on-Trent, Swansea, Teignmouth, Glastonbury, Great Yarmouth, Colchester and finally in Newham, London on the Royal Albert Way.  If you can't make it to any of the finishing sites it is still worth 20-30 minutes of you time to go and watch the cyclists pass during a stage, the routes are available here with approximate times as well.  Please do go support this great event, it is not currently a UCI World Ranking event so the top teams don't always attend thankfully this year quite a few are, the event needs more people to turn up and support it and if they do it can only better the case for the inclusion of this event in the UCI World Rankings and then the top names will come and more people will turn up and put the Tour of Britain truely on the world cycling map.