PEZ talks with Gord Fraser, Lesley Tomlinson, and Eric Hill as we dive into what’s working, what’s not, and the future of road racing in North America.
If you ask a dozen people involved in professional road cycling in North America about the state of the sport, you are likely to get twelve very different responses. For some it is a bleak landscape, laid bare by the challenges of the pandemic, a volatile business model and waves of bad press due to doping scandals. Others will see a new world of opportunity with the emerging popularity of disciplines like gravel and e-sports and novel media coverage for the sport from big players like Netflix. In one context, we are seeing tremendous success for North Americans on the world stage, with an American grand tour winner and a host of high level contenders who graduated from racing on this side of the pond. In another, we have seen the possibility of being a real professional rider, one that makes a living in the sport, diminish to almost zero.
Crit racing in the US
It would be impossible to put together a clear picture of where North American pro racing stands today without considering all of these perspectives. So we did just that, talking to multiple team owners, directors, riders and representatives from national federations. Over the course of this series Pro Cycling in North America we will hear from all of those stakeholders on their experiences, their struggles and their hopes for the future. In this first article we focus on the people on the front lines, trying to make the business of cycling work day to day and season to season: the team owners and directors of some of North America’s top teams.
LeMond, Anderson, and Kelly were part of a very different era of road racing.
Anyone who has been around this sport long enough has experienced numerous ebbs and flows of the business. American Tour de France winners like LeMond and Armstrong brought explosive growth as did exciting new disciplines like mountain biking and gravel today. Natural periods of economic recession and high profile scandals have led to matching declines and the contraction of the North American peloton. Gord Fraser, long time director and sprint superstar of the 90’s and 2000’s, experienced some of the high points as a rider and many of the lows during his time driving the team car. He identifies the LeMond era of the late 80’s and early 90’s as perhaps the best time for pro racing in the US and Canada with a seemingly endless supply of racing and prize purses. The post-Lance years though he says was when the sport reached a new level of professionalism and racing quality. Indeed, those years saw the first editions of top level stage races like the Tours of Georgia, Missouri, Utah, Alberta, Colorado and the jewel in the North American crown the Amgen Tour of California. As of 2020 not a single one of those races remains on the calendar.
The Tour of California brought the world’s top riders to North America but was never economically viable.
Likely as a direct result, the number of pros making a living in the men’s peloton shrank from dozens on the rosters of a consistent 4-8 teams to a handful of stars on the remaining few professional operations. The situation in the women’s peloton is just as dire, and even U23 development opportunities, once a large part of the North American business model, have struggled to survive. That struggle has been a reality for the last several years for road and MTB Olympian and owner of TaG Race Team, Lesley Tomlinson. TaG (a Vancouver cornerstone coaching business and club) is going into its 12th year and is one of Canada’s best, last hopes for U23 riders both male and female. The team has been an unqualified success, including multiple National Championships and numerous graduates to the professional ranks. However, that shining track record hasn’t made the team immune to the challenges facing the North American peloton.
Lesley Tomlinson from TaG, Olympian, Olympic commentator and owner of arguably the best u23 team in Canada these days
The Covid 19 pandemic has likely had the biggest impact on the team’s viability. The pandemic brought on an unprecedented economic boom in the cycling industry with bikes flying off showroom floors during periods of lockdown and stimulus checks. Tomlinson estimates the industry demand expanded by five times during those years. Now though, the accompanying market correction has been severe, with suppliers struggling to move orders going back months and even years. TaG Racing and the pro peloton at large have taken a hit on both sides of the boom and bust. During the boom, suppliers had no bikes to spare for sponsorship and no need for marketing. Today, most industry sponsors balk at the idea of spending resources on pro racing as they manage revenue shortfalls.
The Maryland Classic
Industry sponsorship aside, Lesley also highlights the inflated costs associated with racing. Top events are spread across the continent and every movement of the team now costs around 25% more than it did pre-pandemic with flights, fuel, lodging and staff all requiring more cash than ever before. Host-housing at races was once a huge help to racing budgets with local volunteers generously welcoming teams into their homes during races free of charge. Covid concerns eliminated that option and it has been slow to return, meaning each stage race demands an additional 5-8 thousand dollars for hotels or short term rentals. This combination of rising costs and declining sponsorship has spelled the end for numerous teams, but Lesley fights on. To her, the mission of development is too important to abandon without a fight. Bike racing changes young lives for the better and even in a world where many are struggling, she is adamant that it is an effort worth preserving and that she can continue to prove that value to sponsors.
It would be easy to see the challenges and take on a pessimistic view for the future of the sport domestically, at least in the near term. The negative economic forces are unlikely to reverse themselves any time soon and that will be an uphill struggle. Surprisingly though, everyone interviewed for this piece expressed cautious optimism for the future. A lot of that optimism is based on new approaches evolving beyond the traditional business model of the sport. Eric Hill, owner of Project Echelon racing, has capitalized on an innovative approach to steadily grow his team into what many consider to be the top professional program in North America. Instead of swinging for high dollar, “angel investor” sponsors season after season, he built Project Echelon with a community of support.
The team is based on the mission of improving the lives of veterans through cycling, operating as a non-profit organization and attracting sponsors to its worthy cause. The racing team in turn, provides coaching, support and inspiration to the team’s veteran community. It has proven to be a unique but highly effective symbiotic relationship that has made sustainable growth possible as the team’s community continues to attract financial backing. However, that growth is something Hill has managed very carefully over time. He has learned from the trend of North American teams aiming for a steep trajectory to the World Tour and the Tour de France-efforts that have almost universally ended in those teams’ demise. Examining Echelon’s own trajectory, every step is measured in evolving in Eric’s words: from the best team in Wisconsin, to one of the national contenders, to the best team in North America to today, taking on World Tour teams in select international campaigns.
Project Echelon in Maryland
Success like that only matters though, if the world can see it through media exposure. The difficulty in seeking that exposure is something all three interviewees commented on. Project Echelon, has taken to producing its own exposure, of course in social media but also through less common approaches like a team podcast and in person veteran events at many of the team’s major races. The need for this approach was clear to Eric when talking to a major cycling news outlet after the team won one of America’s biggest races, the Redlands Bicycle Classic. He was told by an editor that they would try to run the story but that “if Peter Sagan pops a wheelie at the Giro tomorrow, you will probably get bumped”. It is a harsh reality, in which guaranteed clicks for famous names will be taken over a good story every time. Gord Fraser also sees the similar obstacles in reaching an audience but like Eric, tries to focus on the opportunity of the new media rather than its pitfalls. He insists that if teams can tell the right story, the right way, they can capture the exposure they and their sponsors need. If Project Echelon’s incremental success is any indication, he may be proven right in the long run.
To many, these generally optimistic perspectives from major stakeholders of the North American Peloton may come as a surprise or even ring false. But in these in depth conversations, it hardly seemed like these owners and directors were merely putting on a brave face or hoping for miracles. Despite the setbacks, there are still immensely talented and experienced people working on new solutions to build the sport back to its great potential. Certain points become clear, like the need to build a team with community and not just fickle sponsor infusions-something both Project Echelon and TaG have done diligently. Even a team with high sponsorship income like Legion of Los Angeles, was at one time at least, based on a cause and community activation. Growth and the risks accompanying it has to be carefully calibrated to avoid growing to death like many former giants on the North American scene. Some of the optimism is also based on the documented phenomenon of opportunity in times of economic downturn. More than half of all Fortune 500 companies were started during a recession and as Fraser said “there’s never been a more cost effective time to sponsor a cycling team”, reflecting on the desperate search for funding. All three interviewees have seen hard times before and have worked their way through to the other side. Talking to all of them and hearing their passionate commitment to the sport’s future, it seems a good bet they will do it again.
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