Track cycling is a bicycle racing sport usually held on specially built banked tracks or velodromes using purpose-designed track bicycles.
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.
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.
A racing bicycle, also known as a road bike is a bicycle designed for competitive road cycling, a sport governed by and according to the rules of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI).
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, hardcourt bike polo 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.
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.
Kestrel is an American bicycle brand which specializes in high-end bikes for triathlons and road racing. Kestrel has been owned by Advanced Sports International since 2007.
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.
Orbea is a bicycle manufacturer based in Mallabia, Spain. It is part of the Mondragón Cooperative Corporation and Spain's largest bicycle manufacturer. Orbea manufactures and assembles bikes at their own factory in Mallabia, the other models being made in Portugal and frameset are from China.
Cervélo Cycles is a manufacturer of racing and track bicycles. Cervélo uses CAD, computational fluid dynamics, and wind tunnel testing at a variety of facilities including the San Diego Air and Space Technology Center, in California, US, to aid its designs. Frame materials include carbon fibre. Cervélo currently makes 5 series of bikes: the C series and R series of road bikes, the latter featuring multi-shaped, "Squoval" frame tubes; the S series of road bikes and P series of triathlon/time trial bikes, both of which feature airfoil shaped down tubes; and the T series of track bikes. In professional competition, cyclists have ridden Cervélo bicycles to victory in all three of road cycling's grand tours: the Tour de France; the Giro d'Italia; and the Vuelta a España. In 2023, Cervélo achieved a historic sweep of all three grand tours in a single year.
Litespeed is a U.S. bicycle manufacturer founded in 1986 in Ooltewah, Tennessee by David Lynskey. Litespeed makes titanium and carbon fiber frame road racing bicycles and mountain bikes. Titanium bicycle frames are famed for their ride quality. Litespeed, along with triathlon specific bicycle manufacturer Quintana Roo, is a subsidiary of the American Bicycle Group.
Caroline Sarah J. Alexander is a cross-country mountain biker and road cyclist born in Barrow-in-Furness. She was a swimmer as a child and did not cycle until she was 20. She first rode a bike in competition in a triathlon: she came second in the swimming and was fastest on the bike. She entered her first mountain bike race, which she won. Within a year she was one of the top three mountain-bike racers in the UK. She left her job as a draughtswoman in Barrow shipyards and became a full-time cyclist.
Boardman Bikes, Ltd. is a British bicycle manufacturer, founded by the professional cyclist Chris Boardman, Sarah Mooney and Alan Ingarfield, and launched in the United Kingdom and Ireland in 2007. Ingarfield is the Chairman of the company, Mooney is the CEO and Boardman heads Research & Development alongside the special projects program B56.
Adrien Niyonshuti is a Rwandan former professional bicycle racer, who rode professionally for Team Dimension Data from 2009 to 2017. In 2021, he worked as a directeur sportif for UCI Continental team Skol Adrien Cycling Academy. In 2023, he will be leading the Benin National Cycling team to prepare for the UCI Championships to be held on the continent in 2025.
Cycling in Australia is a common form of transport, recreation and sport. Many Australians enjoy cycling because it improves their health and reduces road congestion and air pollution. The government has encouraged more people to start, with several state advertising campaigns aimed at increasing safety for those who choose to ride. There is a common perception that riding is a dangerous activity. While it is safer to walk, cycling is a safer method of transport than driving. Cycling is less popular in Australia than in Europe, however cyclists make up one in forty road deaths and one in seven serious injuries.
Cycling has been contested at every Summer Paralympic Games since the 1984 Summer Paralympics. From an original program of seven road races, the sport is now contested on both road and track, and since 2012 the cycling program at the Paralympics is typically the third largest of any sport in the Games, behind athletics and swimming, and running at approximately 50 separate events.
Time trials have been part of cycling for more than a hundred years. The first time trial was run in 1895 after a ban on road racing was imposed by the National Cyclists' Union. It wasn't until 1939 that the time trial made its world stage debut as an official stage of the Tour de France. It was originally used as a method of drawing more people to listen to the Grand Tour on the newly available radio broadcast of the 1939 race. The main thing that distinguished the first time-trial from the traditional form of road racing was that the riders started at intervals instead of one large group and they raced against the clock instead of each other. Unlike road racing where the a rider can hang in the peloton and draft off of other riders to conserve energy, time trial races put the rider out alone on the course. There are no breaks and no one to draft off, causing a rider to push as hard as they can the entire race. Bicycles have also evolved to accommodate this new form of racing, with most of the breakthroughs occurring in the last 40–50 years with the introduction of triathlons.
BMC Switzerland AG is a Swiss bicycle and cycling product manufacturer based in Grenchen. BMC designs, builds and distributes road bikes, mountain bikes, and commuter bikes primarily for sale to dealers in North America, Europe, South Africa, Australia, East Asia and the United Arab Emirates.
Gravel cycling, gravel biking or gravel grinding is a sport or a leisure activity, in which participants ride bicycles, mostly on gravel roads. Sometimes, specially designed gravel bikes are used; in other cases, any bicycle capable of covering the terrain can be used.
