Last week, one of the biggest bike races in the world was taking place. It consisted of a titanic battle between two of the best riders in the sport through a variety of different types of stages, ending in the high mountains. No, not the Tour de France and Tadej Pogačar v Jonas Vingegaard, but the Giro d’Italia Women, and Elisa Longo Borghini v Lotte Kopecky. Longo Borghini won a thrilling race.
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However, I can’t blame you too much if the Giro failed to feature on your radar, it is on at the same time as the all-encompassing Tour de France. The Tour is like a black hole, sucking in all matter that surrounds it, and the Giro is an unfortunate victim of this. For years, it has been the most prestigious women’s stage race on the calendar - until the Tour de France Femmes was created - and yet it has always insisted on running concurrently with the men’s Tour. Just for a rough guide in popularity, the women’s Giro has 19,000 followers on Instagram, while the Tour has 2.5m. It’s not a fair contest.
I know who won each Giro stage, I’ve read the race reports, I’ve seen some highlights, but as someone on the ground at the Tour de France, it would be very possible for the Giro to completely pass me by. The trials and tribulations of covering the Tour are very much real, and they don’t allow for things like watching the Giro live. And I work in cycling for a living, so I can’t imagine what it is like for the casual fan.
The casual fan, who might be tempted by thrilling stage race action, must be at the front of the mind of race organisers, and yet the Giro has always insisted on its slot in the calendar. While the Vuelta Femenina and the Tour de France Femmes find spots in the Women’s WorldTour calendar that aren’t at the same time as a more popular men’s event, the Giro remains stubborn.
The reasons given have always been twofold: the viewing figures in Italy were higher when the race was shown in a highlights package after the men’s Tour stage that day on Italian TV, and that with a smaller women’s peloton, there are few alternative slots available for the race to run. The former argument seems to belong to a different era. In our age of on-demand streaming and the ability to watch something anytime, anywhere, then surely it makes sense to move the race in the calendar. The latter feels out of date, too, and regardless, a re-shuffle in favour of one of the most prestigious races in the women’s calendar feels achievable with enough impetus.
The WorldTour calendar is already full to bursting - granted - but a race with the importance of the Giro should be allowed to pick a better slot, perhaps moving to before the Tour, and swapping a couple of events around. It just seems like madness that the Giro, the first women’s Grand Tour, insists on running in mid-July and having less attention as a result. There’s only so much the cycling media can do to big it up when something as huge as the men’s Tour is on at the same time.
Partly due to branding, partly due to the lineup, and partly due to the calendar, the Tour de France Femmes already feels like a bigger race, and the Giro had a head start of decades. Now under the management of RCS, the organisers of the men’s Giro too, surely it is time for a rethink and a reboot. It just makes no sense. Surely the best cyclists in the world deserve a race that takes the limelight. Surely.
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If you want to get in touch with Adam, email adam.becket@futurenet.com.
