Ribble Pro Cycling set to step up to Continental level

One Pro Women’s team won’t be lining up in 2019, reports Paul Knott

The British racing scene has been given a boost after an off-season of discontent. Ribble Pro Cycling team manager Jack Rees has revealed the team is set to step up to Continental level in 2019.

He told Cycling Weekly: “We’ve been racing at the UK level for a good few years under different guises but we’ve not had the level of backing that we have now. There wasn’t much left to do at the level we were competing at and you need to have UCI status to even consider riding the Tour of Britain, which is the shop window for sponsors and for riders.”

The framework for qualification for the Tour of Britain hasn’t been disclosed as of yet, but the chance to gain invitations to UCI races including the Tour de Yorkshire is high up on Rees’s wish list.

“We wouldn’t be going to make up the numbers, we’d want to animate the race, just look at Canyon-eisberg [who won stage one of the Tour de Yorkshire this year],” he said.

Ribble includes Huub-wattbike track riders John Archibald and Dan Bigham, alongside top points scorer Will Corbett. The team will effectively replace One Pro Cycling, whose plan to set up a women’s team to replace their defunct men’s team was abandoned last week. Speaking to CW, team owner Matt Prior said: “We’ve spoken to 250 businesses over the last year, so there were a huge number of conversations. But the governing body has a responsibility to give stability to the sport and look after the teams, whether it’s the UCI, British Cycling, whoever, there needs to be more support and help.”

Aware of the turbulent times facing many British teams and races, BC met with team managers and race organisers last week to discuss the upcoming season.

Rees himself was unable to make the meeting but Tim Elverson, team manager at Canyon-eisberg, was typical of those attendees CW spoke to in his upbeat assessment. “They are just trying to help out a bit more, and are willing to listen and willing to do something about it. So it was all very positive,” he said.

Elverson has strived for more top-level racing to be based in the south of the county; however, it looks likely that a top-flight race on the Isle of Man could come first after provisional talks at last week’s meetings.

“We wouldn’t be going to make up numbers”