In sports, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific goal.
The Tour of Flanders, also known as De Ronde, is an annual road cycling race held in Belgium every spring. The most important cycling race in Flanders, it is part of the UCI World Tour and organized by Flanders Classics. Its nickname is Vlaanderens Mooiste. First held in 1913, the Tour of Flanders had its 100th edition in 2016.
Bernard Hinault is a French former professional road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In his career, Hinault entered a total of thirteen Grand Tours. He abandoned one of them while in the lead, finished in 2nd place on two occasions and won the other ten, putting him one behind Merckx for the all-time record. No rider since Hinault has achieved more than seven.
An individual time trial (ITT) is a road bicycle race in which cyclists race alone against the clock. There are also track-based time trials where riders compete in velodromes, and team time trials (TTT). ITTs are also referred to as "the race of truth", as winning depends only on each rider's strength and endurance, and not on help provided by teammates and others riding ahead and creating a slipstream. Individual time trial are usually held on flat or rolling terrain, although sometimes they are held up a mountain road. Sometimes the opening stage of a stage race is a very short individual time trial called a prologue.
Thomas Simpson was one of Britain's most successful professional cyclists. He was born in Haswell, County Durham, and later moved to Harworth, Nottinghamshire. Simpson began road cycling as a teenager before taking up track cycling, specialising in pursuit races. He won a bronze medal for track cycling at the 1956 Summer Olympics and a silver at the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games.
The Race Across America, or RAAM, is an ultra-distance road cycling race held across the United States that started in 1982 as the Great American Bike Race.
Cyclo-cross is a form of bicycle racing. Races typically take place in the autumn and winter, and consist of many laps of a short course featuring pavement, wooded trails, grass, steep hills and obstacles requiring the rider to quickly dismount, carry the bike while navigating the obstruction and remount. Races for senior categories are generally between 40 minutes and an hour long, with the distance varying depending on the ground conditions. The sport is strongest in the traditional road cycling countries such as Belgium, France and the Netherlands.
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 and mountain bike trials. 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.
London to Brighton refers to a variety of races, tours, charity bicycle rides and rallies that take place between London and Brighton in the United Kingdom.
Liège–Bastogne–Liège[ljɛʒ.bas.tɔɲ.ljɛʒ], also known as La Doyenne, is a one-day classic cycling race in Belgium. First run in 1892, it is the oldest of the five Monuments of the European professional road cycling calendar; usually coming as the last of the spring classics. It is held annually in late April, in the Ardennes region of Belgium, from Liège to Bastogne and back.
The Tour of Britain is a multi-stage cycling race, conducted on British roads, in which participants race across Great Britain to complete the race in the fastest time.
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.
A cyclosportive, or often simply sportive, is a short to long distance, organised, mass-participation cycling event, typically held annually. The Italian term Gran Fondo is commonly used for these events in the United States, Australia and some other English-speaking countries.
Dieter "Didi" Senft is a German cycling fan who is known as Didi the Devil or El Diablo at the Tour de France and Giro d'Italia. Since 1993, he has been seen in the Tour and Giro's many stages wearing his red devil costume and painting trident symbols on the road some miles before he appears. Senft said the inspiration for his costume came from secretly watching the Tour de France on West German TV and hearing a broadcaster refer to the red triangular flag that marks the last kilometer as "the devil's red flag."
This is a glossary of terms and jargon used in cycling, mountain biking, and cycle sport.
Mountain bike racing is the competitive cycle sport discipline of mountain biking held on off-road terrain. The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) recognised the discipline relatively late in 1990, when it sanctioned the world championships in Durango, Colorado. The first UCI Mountain Bike World Cup series took place in 1988. Its nine-race circuit covered two continents—Europe and North America—and was sponsored by Grundig. Cross-country racing was the only World Cup sport at this time. In 1993, a six-event downhill World Cup was introduced. In 1996, cross-country mountain biking events were added to the Olympic Games. In 2006, cross-country mountain biking events became part of the World Deaf Cycling Championships for the first time in San Francisco, USA.
Anthony 'Tony' Hewson was a British racing cyclist who rode the Tour de France and, as an amateur, won the Tour of Britain in 1955. He was critical of the way, as he saw it, British cycling has been let down by its administrators.
RideLondon is an annual festival of cycling held in London. Intended as an annual legacy of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, it was first held in 2013. The format consists of a series of cycling events on closed roads around London and Essex for amateur and professional cyclists.
A Gran Fondo is a type of long-distance road cycling ride originating in Italy in 1970, and roughly translates into English as "Big Ride". Italian Gran Fondos are officially defined and certified by the Italian Cycling Federation as a bicycle event at least 120 kilometres (75 mi) long, and are individually chip-timed races with prizes for the fastest riders in each category. The starts are done en masse, and the format allows for riders of every level to participate, much like a marathon, where most participants are competing against the clock instead of other participants. Traditionally a large meal is served to the participants at the end of the event, and roads are shut down.
The definition of ultra-distance cycling is far more vague than in ultra running or in ultra-triathlon. Any bike race or ride longer than a century ride, which is 100 miles (160 km), is sometimes considered to be ultra-distance cycling. However, such events are relatively common, so using a longer distance to define the category is more useful, such as any race or ride that is longer than 200 kilometres (120 mi), 300 kilometres (190 mi) or even a double century, 200 miles (320 km).
