Between the Tape
The big one is coming! Of all the races in the world, the Olympic XCO race for many racers is the pinnacle event. Four years of preparation and a lifetime of hard work has led to a few riders already booking their ticket to Tokyo. For many others, the next few months of racing will decide if their Olympic dream will come true in 2020.
The Nove Mesto World Cup in May will mark the penultimate stop on the Olympic journey for some racers. A top performance there could sign the ticket for the train bound for Tokyo, which will make this World Cup race a hard-fought spectacle. World Cups have around 120+ riders take to the start line while World Championships feature about 90 riders in the men’s race, while the women’s is usually 60–70 riders.
The Olympics will see 38 riders in both men’s and women’s battle it out, which will likely mean a few top riders will not feature on the day due to Olympic quota restraints. It’s a tough part of the game, especially for countries with a lot of good riders as well as countries with only one or two good riders. Countries like Switzerland will likely leave good riders capable of a top 10 at home due to the number of great riders they have, while countries with only one or two top-ranked riders will struggle to qualify even one rider based on the Olympic qualification process.
To send the maximum of three riders, a country needs to be ranked either one or two in the world based on the nation’s ranking points, which is made up by tallying the country’s top three riders’ UCI points for a given timeframe. Countries ranked three to seven can send two riders and countries ranked eight to twenty-one can send one rider. Countries ranked twenty-two and below can qualify a rider through the African, American or Asian Continental Championships but these are very limited. This can be very difficult for countries with only one top rider as that rider will need to gain enough points on their own to overcome a country with three top riders’ UCI points.
This is why the Olympic dream is so hard fought and why it’s a four year plus a lifetime battle to qualify let alone actually win. For many riders the process will be tough both personally and financially. It’s no secret that there isn’t a whole lot of money in mountain biking with top riders still at ‘privateer’ level. Even in Europe I’ve seen riders on factory teams being supported by their parents at races because teams didn’t have the personnel to help. I’ve also seen seemingly ‘pro’ riders buying their own bikes albeit it at a discount...
Mountain biking isn’t alone in being underfunded of course but it does make it tough for riders, especially for those coming from distant lands like Australia to go and race in Europe. The Olympic cycle is often a career cycle for riders with at least one or two cycles going into a ‘career’. Every cycle will see a few riders hang the bike up for a real job. It’s a hard part of the game and is a reason why it is so important for riders to have a plan B. At the end of the day though, it is a great journey and come July 27–28 in Tokyo the XC-Olympic race will be another must-watch edition of most of the fastest riders in the world racing for gold!