The 2008 French Road Cycling Cup is the 17th edition of the French Road Cycling Cup. It started on February 24 with the Tour du Haut Var and finished on October 9 with Paris–Bourges. Jérôme Pineau of Bouygues Télécom won the overall competition, despite not winning any of the races.
The Union Cycliste Internationale is the world governing body for sports cycling and oversees international competitive cycling events. The UCI is based in Aigle, Switzerland.
Cycle sport is competitive physical activity using bicycles. There are several categories of bicycle racing including road bicycle racing, cyclo-cross, mountain bike racing, track cycling, BMX, and cycle speedway. Non-racing cycling sports include artistic cycling, cycle polo, freestyle BMX, mountain bike trials and cycleball. The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) is the world governing body for cycling and international competitive cycling events. The International Human Powered Vehicle Association is the governing body for human-powered vehicles that imposes far fewer restrictions on their design than does the UCI. The UltraMarathon Cycling Association is the governing body for many ultra-distance cycling races.
Johan Museeuw is a retired Belgian professional road racing cyclist who was a professional from 1988 until 2004. Nicknamed The Lion of Flanders, he was particularly successful in the cobbled classics of Flanders and Northern France and was considered one of the best classic races specialists of the 1990s.
Paolo Bettini is an Italian former champion road racing cyclist, and the former coach of the Italian national cycling team. Considered the best classics specialist of his generation, and probably one of the strongest of all times, he won gold medals in the 2004 Athens Olympics road race and in the 2006 and 2007 World Road Race Championships. He is nicknamed Il Grillo for his repeated sudden attacks and his sprinting style.
Diana Žiliūtė is a Lithuanian racing cyclist who dominated women's road racing in the late 1990s.
Road bicycle racing is the cycle sport discipline of road cycling, held primarily on paved roads. Road racing is the most popular professional form of bicycle racing, in terms of numbers of competitors, events and spectators. The two most common competition formats are mass start events, where riders start simultaneously and race to a set finish point; and time trials, where individual riders or teams race a course alone against the clock. Stage races or "tours" take multiple days, and consist of several mass-start or time-trial stages ridden consecutively.
The Bretagne Classic, also called Bretagne Classic Ouest-France, is an elite cycling classic held annually in late summer around the Breton village of Plouay in western France.
Giorgia Bronzini is an Italian former professional racing cyclist, who rode professionally between 2003 and 2017. She won the women's road race in the UCI Road World Championships in both 2010 and 2011 and the women's points race in the UCI Track Cycling World Championships in 2009.
The Japan Cup Cycle Road Race is an annual professional road bicycle racing classic one-day race held in the city of Utsunomiya in Japan since 1992. The race usually held in October each year. It is sanctioned by the International Cycling Union (UCI) as a 1.Pro race as part of the UCI ProSeries.
François "Franck" Pervis is a French track cyclist. He is a former junior world champion in the team sprint and twice European under 23 champion, as well as a seven-time world champion and a holder of two world records. In 2014 he became the first track cyclist to win three individual world titles at one championship, in the keirin, 1 km and sprint.
The Royal Belgian Cycling League or KBWB/RLVB is the national governing body of cycle racing in Belgium. It was founded on 11 November 1882.
Grand Prix de Denain is a professional cycle road race held in Denain, France. For 10 years from 2005 the race was organized as a 1.1 event on the UCI Europe Tour, before becoming a 1.HC event for the 2016 season. In 2020, the race joined the UCI ProSeries. It is also part of the French Road Cycling Cup.
The French Road Cycling Cup is a road bicycle racing competition under the Fédération Francaise de Cyclisme each year since 1992. It consists of a number of one-day races in France each year. Each of these races is open for all riders, but until 2015 only French riders and riders who were part of a French team were able to score points for the French Road Cycling Cup. As of 2016, all riders score points. The team competition remains a contest between the French teams only.
Elizabeth Mary Deignan is an English professional world champion track and road racing cyclist, who rides for UCI Women's WorldTeam Lidl–Trek. She was the 2015 World road race champion.
Charlotte Becker is a German professional racing cyclist, who currently rides for UCI Women's Continental Team Arkéa Pro Cycling Team. She competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in the women's road race, but finished over the time limit. She also competed on the track in the women's team pursuit for the national team. She signed for Team Hitec Products for the 2015 road cycling season.
Peter Robert Kennaugh MBE is a Manx former professional racing cyclist, who rode professionally between 2010 and 2019 for Team Sky and Bora–Hansgrohe. In 2012 he won the gold medal as part of the Great Britain Team Pursuit team at the 2012 Summer Olympics, becoming the first Manxman in 100 years to win gold. On 5 April 2019, he announced that he was taking an indefinite break from professional cycling to focus on his mental health.
Marion Clignet is a French former track cyclist. Clignet was diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of 22 and was shunned by the United States Cycling Federation, and she subsequently raced for France since 1991. She rode at three Olympic Games for France.
The UCI men's road racing world rankings are a point system which is used to rank men's road cycling riders. Points are accrued over a rolling 52 weeks in three categories.
Pauline Ferrand-Prévot is a French multi-discipline bicycle racer, who rides for UCI Mountain Bike team Ineos Grenadiers in cross-country cycling. Ferrand-Prévot has also competed in road bicycle racing and cyclo-cross during her career, winning the world title in each discipline. During the 2015 season, aged just 23, she became the first person ever – in the history of cycling – to simultaneously hold the World road title, World cyclo-cross title and World cross-country mountain bike title.
Jutatip Maneephan is a Thai road bicycle racer and track cyclist, who rides for UCI Women's Continental Team Thailand Women's Cycling Team.