Too soon? Nah, there's some news out already so lets do it. 
The first rider to confirm his ride next year was Dean Lucas a few weeks back, he's staying at Intense. Here's hoping he gets a good season under his belt again.
The UCI has changed the system, here's a brief run down from Vital:
-Top 60 men qualify, not the top 80.
-Protected riders has changed. The top ten men and top 5 women in standings are protected as well as the top 10 and top 5 from the previous season.
-Protected riders will start after the quickest qualifier instead of before the top ten qualifiers.
-At the last race, the points for qualifying and you race result will be known after your race run so it will add some drama.
Seems like these changes are all to enhance the media broadcast (Red Bull TV). You still can't run a camera in your qualy or race run unless the broadcast company says so. Thats been a rule for a while but we still see tons of footage from race runs.
I think the privateer guys will suffer the most and that can't be good for the sport. Rules are rules but pushing people out of the big game is pretty shit and lets face it, 20 riders less in qualifying is a big slab of riders and guys just won't show now. Thats shit. Not only is this rule changing the way the broadcast will be shown, its changing the spectacle of actually being at a race. I think the notion of protecting riders is basically rigging the sport to make sure the guys who are on teams paying the most cash are going to get a start but the guys who are potentially quicker and not washed up has-beens can still parade their stank and run a race time slower than a privateer's qualifying run.
There's never been a huge amount of money thrown around in this but the UCI need their nuts kicked in and if Red Bull are funding this kind of shit just to "enhance" the broadcast then they can fuck off. It's not broken, it's reducing the quality of the show by making it so damn predictable and your notion of showing a constant field of protected riders in the broadcast will look fucking stupid if 20 small time guys qualify better than the alleged quick guys and you have to show all of them when they finish ahead of the alleged quick guys.
Thank fuck for Crankworx events filling the void.
The first rider to confirm his ride next year was Dean Lucas a few weeks back, he's staying at Intense. Here's hoping he gets a good season under his belt again.
The UCI has changed the system, here's a brief run down from Vital:
-Top 60 men qualify, not the top 80.
-Protected riders has changed. The top ten men and top 5 women in standings are protected as well as the top 10 and top 5 from the previous season.
-Protected riders will start after the quickest qualifier instead of before the top ten qualifiers.
-At the last race, the points for qualifying and you race result will be known after your race run so it will add some drama.
Seems like these changes are all to enhance the media broadcast (Red Bull TV). You still can't run a camera in your qualy or race run unless the broadcast company says so. Thats been a rule for a while but we still see tons of footage from race runs.
I think the privateer guys will suffer the most and that can't be good for the sport. Rules are rules but pushing people out of the big game is pretty shit and lets face it, 20 riders less in qualifying is a big slab of riders and guys just won't show now. Thats shit. Not only is this rule changing the way the broadcast will be shown, its changing the spectacle of actually being at a race. I think the notion of protecting riders is basically rigging the sport to make sure the guys who are on teams paying the most cash are going to get a start but the guys who are potentially quicker and not washed up has-beens can still parade their stank and run a race time slower than a privateer's qualifying run.
There's never been a huge amount of money thrown around in this but the UCI need their nuts kicked in and if Red Bull are funding this kind of shit just to "enhance" the broadcast then they can fuck off. It's not broken, it's reducing the quality of the show by making it so damn predictable and your notion of showing a constant field of protected riders in the broadcast will look fucking stupid if 20 small time guys qualify better than the alleged quick guys and you have to show all of them when they finish ahead of the alleged quick guys.
Thank fuck for Crankworx events filling the void.
