2025 Race Talk

Wow, sounds like a lot of big changes! If these come to fruition, I wonder how many riders we’ll see break their existing multi year contracts to change to one of the official teams.

Some good, some bad, and a lot of question marks. The biggest unknown and worry for me is fast riders that are unknown or don’t get on one of the 20 ranked teams having a chance to prove their worth at WCs. Hopefully the combination of a continental series and national team selections will keep those who have the chops to race, racing. 

How far into 2025 will riders be looking for sponsors?

The team thing is a bit concerning, wildcard entry wreaks of greasy politics over who gets in. I like the qualifying idea with no protected riders. You have to put down a run at some point to make it. 

Also like the kit thing, too many press releases and instagramming a new kit colourway every single weekend of racing. Pick a kit and stick with it.  

The Continental series is needed. Every successful sport has a feeder system. I am sure it won't be anywhere near perfect off the start, but it needs a formalized start. I wonder how that impacts junior category though. 

The 10 rider thing seems a bit unlikely. What's the average team size this year, 4?

Agreed. Dylan Maples is our latest example of a rider we might not see make it to the top with these future rules. He’s suddenly a top 20 rider, but that’s only because the system provides opportunity to break through. 
I’m with Spomer - good riddance to protected status. Seemed lame to me. It’s a means of making the rich richer. 
Fixed number plates and one uniform make a lot of sense for creating rider recognizability. When teams change uniforms alll the time, you’ve gotta be sharp to pick out who’s who. Making riders easy to recognize is good for TV, I imagine. 

Tons of question marks.  Guess we’ll just have to see what happens.  But at the moment my biggest question is what constitutes a team?  Can commencal have 10 riders with the same frame and jersey color but a variety of sponsors?  Ie can half the commencal riders wear dharco/mucoff and the other half wear tld/dorval.  Can fox syndicate be half Santa Cruz and half frameworks riders?  Can someone like ag ride his crestline and sponsors under a factory teams colors?

Simply long term either thinks will work out or change back.  But short term you can mitigate some potentially catastrophic damage if you leave proper wiggle room for the riders and industry.

Pretty concerned 

This will ruin the Cinderella story, and the small team success which is core to the sport and one of the best parts.

Not enough riders and small teams. 

Protected riders are kinda lame, but I do think it has more to do with how long and how many. It should be from race to race not season to season. DH is dangerous, if you make it on the podium of 5 you should have earned a bye for the next round. It rewards consistent riders and gives a first timer a breather for the next round.

Wildcard teams are a bad idea how do you pitch a Wildcard team to sponsors? "Hey I got some fast dudes and a real fast chick on a team that might make it into a wildcard slot to race on the other side of the world, and all they have to do is rely on an arbitrary group to decide whether or not they are allowed try and qualify only to maybe make it into the final. We can definitely put your logo on the side of a rental van down but the river if it doesn't get stolen while riding 2km to get to the gondola." 

Continental Series- if executed right this is a good plan

Fixed number and plates- fantastic moto has this down pat better to figure out who is who.

Standardized jersey colors- this could be lame but this year (last year too?) has been hard to figure out who is who.

I like the idea of Q1 LCQ and a final over two days. Mechanicals are unfortunate it would be nice to see a rider with a flat get to the bottom safe and send it in the LCQ make it to the final and get a flat again, or podium. Gives it that Cinderella story an opportunity.

Kinda feel like a lot of companies will re-think how they want to spend money and instead of putting it into a Russian roulette, they will probably pull out to support something else. 

What will happen to pros that miss races due to injury and for example will also not be able to be national champs... end of their career?

This will most likely also affect innovation in downhill and MTB overall and again, it will most likely pull out money from it...

What next? One photographer per country but only two lenses and one lens for finals? Must have a folio being a pro at least 20 years with 10 in DTP. 

 

What about any changes to XC or enduro? 

In general, it can be said that the UCI sucks.
and we need a new federation or red bull.
ISF not FIS for the snowboarders ...

I think it's WBD that are behind these changes, rather than the UCI (although I guess you can hold them responsible for handing over the reins).

UCI is only rule enforcement and legislative side of cycling

This will be WBD all about TV baby!

Continental Series - What is this? Which continents? Which races? ESO/WBD-specific races or tacked on to existing events that "earn points"? 

Continents?  Come on have we not learned already there is only one when it comes to bikes. Europe.  

Maybe teams will consolidate together to fit in the limited spots?

If a rider is a pretty solid 30th overall, making the main say half the time (28th, DNQ(32), 29th, DNQ(31), 30th, DNQ(33)…), and if that rider is getting into the main through the non-points-paying LCQ, does he or she earn enough points to stay in the top 50 and remain eligible for the next race?

Put another way, does the proposed point system promote stability in the group of 25ish-through-45-ish riders trying all year to find that next step, or does it promote churn in that group with different riders constantly stepping up giving it a shot and likely falling out unless they really hit their stride?

Lots of questions come up about just who pays the cost of having the bottom 25 show up, without whom collectively the top 25 would appear to be racing an invitational and leave doubts as to whether they really are the top 25, but individually very few of the bottom 25 will appear for more than a moment in media generated around the race. So how do we value them and who pays their way?

Seems like Top 50 + National / Continental Champions is the critical number…more so than the 20 teams. 
What happens, say, if you’re out for the season after blowing your knee up in Tasmania? Won 20% of all races two years ago but you had no points this year? Will yungJG have to go smoke everyone at a Continental series race before he’s allowed back at World Cups? 
Overall the second qualifier is enough to make up for the possible negatives that I can see. No points on the table, just a second shot after a crash or flat tire. That’s great! 

Gonna be interesting to see who’s where next year. Those five wildcard teams could be rad, full of fading fan favorites. 

I just deleted two paragraphs about dominance vs parity in sports leagues…doesn’t matter here yet, as I checked the current Top 50 UCI rankings and that’s that. We’re going to be okay. Except for injuries, gonna have to clarify that. 

 

Some Good things…the number plate system from moto, the protection getting dropped,same team kit,but the rest of it…shit! Too many questions and variables! Hopefully they’ll have a riders meeting where all this can be discussed and sorted! Or Protested and strike..if the riders aren’t for it the shouldn’t ride! Union time!…Man,No more underdog stories or guys having a breakthrough ride and getting a career…..not stoked about the accessibility for guys working there ass off on their dream!

Super stoked to see a Heat, LCQ and Main. Even more stoked to see more women for the final as the current limit of 10 is just ridiculous. 

A true rider’s union will never happen because some of the top guys couldn’t care less about the bottom half of the field. I can think of numerous Bruni quotes off the top of my head. I’m guessing the rumored changes have already been discussed with the riders and managers of the current larger teams and their input has already been given. 

That’s a current rule. Teams can already have up to 10 riders most just choose not too

And there currently is a rule for 15 elite teams based on each years standings with 5 wild card teams

Section 4.18 https://assets.ctfassets.net/761l7gh5x5an/6qYIYIddcAPjN248n7tVDI/60971c…

Went to read the current rules and highlighted them below. Nothing about the team stuff has changed - it has been 15+5, and will continue to be. Rest your pitchforks on that. Protected riders going away good or bad, I don't know, I suppose the current top riders will have to put a bit more effort into qualies? The team kit color stuff has always excluded DH teams, guess they added DH back in. Nothing else really, Top 50 or National winner or continential top 3 whatever can compete makes sense - they want only the top athletes competing in the elite series, the rest are going to prop up the feeder/local series which should make local racing better.

so we going to try and name the 15 teams?

Frameworks, Union, Propain Positive and numerous others, have riders that can make the final 30.... I don't think their budgets have brown paper bags full of cash for the UCI.

What if they were allowed to have reserve riders, so a team with a rider that qualified but got hurt/injured before finally… the team would be allowed to put in a replacement rider.. team/brand still get exposure. just spit balling ideas see what people think. 

I hate the thought of a lot of well known riders having to walk away from racing now that there chances of a place on a team or even having points to race are slim. 

Some of our favorites can’t qualify for the 60 man semi. The clock doesn’t lie. Maybe the continental / feeder series will be better because of it. 

So "q1" and "q2"...this means there's still  qualifiers - semi-finals - finals?  Doesn't everyone hate the semi-final thing on the same day as the actual race?

I read it to be more like super/moto x. 
Two different group.. different times.. and the top 30 (20 from q1 and 10 from q2)  advance to final. not sure how that’s going to work.. or why they are doing it that way. The only reason they do it in Moto is because of the amount of riders on the track. 

Qualifying in Moto x is fun to watch, but doubt it could be replicated in DH. 

No idea why they needed to change the whole thing anyway. stick with qualifying on Saturday and race on Sunday. don’t need to show qualification, just compress in into a highlight reel and show it before Sundays race, 

I believe it will be a qualifier (of all riders, Probably top ranked riders first).  Then they will do a last chance qualifier of remaining riders instead of semifinals.  The qualifier will probably have similar points to the later redbull era with most the points going to the top few riders and 1-15ish for the rest of the 20.  There will be no points (towards championship or entry requirements) for winning lcqs. i Imagine they will have some type of highlights/interview package encompassing both races for now.  With potentially some live streaming from the finish corral.

Then a 30 rider final the same it has been the last couple years.

Seems like a positive change for tv.  Not necessarily a positive change for onsite spectators.  But it's more racing than the original system even if it's less than the past couple years.  Also more in line with the original "ethos" of the sport.

I personally think now is the perfect time to add another 5 riders to women.  Hopefully another 5 in a year or two as more fast juniors enter the elite ranks.  The goal should be to grow the women's side solely at this point.  

I also like no protection.  But quite frankly I think protection has worked not only in terms of tv narrative but simply competition.  Tahnee won this year with a protected race run.  Dak got 2nd with a run that looked like it was going to win.  As long as you are increasing the maximum of riders instead of removing spots i think protection makes a lot of sense.  You could easily do 1-12 protected riders in 2-20 minutes of tv time. Thats top 3 both men and women's for current and previous season.  And most races and seasons you'll have fewer numbers than that.  Just give them 1 minute splits and send them early.  And if a protected rider uses this to their advantage for weather than so be it.  Just adds to the narrative.

Current Elite Gravity MTB Teams 

DH