BBC Spoty

[Jon Crofts]

Play fair, "over" is a massive leap from "had it's peak" and "slowly decline in popularity".

Fair enough.  Still don't think it's peaked, Rio is around the corner and the UCI Worlds are in London in a few weeks time.

[Simon Page]

Yeah cycling is over.
Care to take a look at sales figures for bikes, bike parts, clothing and accessories for the past 12 months and come back and tell us it's over?

It's a bit like fishing though; loads of people do it, few watch it. TV viewers for the Blighty stages of the 2014 Tour peaked at about 4m. The same weekend the British Grand Prix got 11m and the Wimbledon final (without Murray) peaked at over 19m. All three traditionally minority sports but the viewing gulf explains why you need an Olympic Gold and massive profile as an individual to win SPOTY as a cyclist. Wiggins and Hoy transcended the relatively low viewing figures for cycling, Froome probably never will even though way more people cycle than drive Formula 1 cars or play tennis.

[Chris Jameson]

Anybody who thinks cycling is in some sort of decline should come and see the roads in North Yorkshire on a weekend, the Grand Depart has a lot to do with it as people are keen to cycle some or all of the route but there is no way the numbers are declining.

[Dave Cooper please]

Yeah cycling is over.
Care to take a look at sales figures for bikes, bike parts, clothing and accessories for the past 12 months and come back and tell us it's over?

It's a bit like fishing though; loads of people do it, few watch it. TV viewers for the Blighty stages of the 2014 Tour peaked at about 4m. The same weekend the British Grand Prix got 11m and the Wimbledon final (without Murray) peaked at over 19m. All three traditionally minority sports but the viewing gulf explains why you need an Olympic Gold and massive profile as an individual to win SPOTY as a cyclist. Wiggins and Hoy transcended the relatively low viewing figures for cycling, Froome probably never will even though way more people cycle than drive Formula 1 cars or play tennis.

Genuine question, were the TDF stages in Yorkshire shown on BBC1 like the Grand Prix and Wimbledon were?
Besides, cycling isn't particularly a great TV sport, bugger all happens for hours in most stages unless they are up the mountains or approaching a finish. I mean I could watch it all day but it's not for everyone is it?

[Jon Crofts]

Anybody who thinks cycling is in some sort of decline should come and see the roads in North Yorkshire on a weekend, the Grand Depart has a lot to do with it as people are keen to cycle some or all of the route but there is no way the numbers are declining.

Surrey is just as bad, you can't move for Lycra louts of a weekend.

[Simon Page]

Genuine question, were the TDF stages in Yorkshire shown on BBC1 like the Grand Prix and Wimbledon were?
Besides, cycling isn't particularly a great TV sport, bugger all happens for hours in most stages unless they are up the mountains or approaching a finish. I mean I could watch it all day but it's not for everyone is it?

Tour was on ITV, Wimbledon BBC1, F1 (I think) BBC2.

Like I said, it's not that people don't do it. I cycle to work more often than not and there are loads of others doing the same route. It's more popular as a participation pastime than ever, but in terms of a popularity contest for watching and caring about the competitive sport - rather than how many people are wearing a fairly useless hat, a trades description violating yellow top and a camera to upload footage of themselves being punched while jumping red lights or peddling a bit of a race stage - it's massively minority outside the Olympics. It's like Pool. Loads of people play it, but how many watch it and get bothered by who wins it?

[DaveD]

The TdF intermediate sprint was on Epping High Street in 2014. I went along and the town was literally full. You could hardly walk up and down the pavement there were so many people lining the route.

I've always watched it on tv since the Indurain years - my wife gets very irritated that we have an hour of highlights every single night for three weeks - but I know very few fellow travellers to talk about it with. Even less than NFL...