No hiding from reality but 2021 might just pan out fine after all
REMEMBER when we all pretended 2021 would be miraculously different? That the infinitesimal force of momentum that nudged the minute hand beyond midnight on December 31 would propel us into a new reality, where coronavirus was so embarrassed by how passe it was it sulked off to the dusty cupboards of our memories? It wasn’t the virus that was the problem, but 2020 itself.
While most of us have had to accept this horror show doesn’t pay attention to the numbers on our calendar, some in elite sport have moved beyond waiting for it to be over.
As though boredom itself were a cure. Or scoring a goal. Or waving a tennis racket with a degree of proficiency. Spare a thought for those fighting for their basic human rights of on-pitch celebrations and out-ofthin-air private homes with tennis courts, for pity’s sake. The virus can’t surely expect the incredibly successful to continue playing ‘normal’ with the rest of us.
Which is why I’m going to suggest something rarely proposed in sports journalism, certainly not from an ethical or medical standpoint. Perhaps some elite sports could take a lead from professional cycling. I’ve said it now, so come with me, on a journey to southern Spain.
This week I was invited to Team
Jumbo Visma’s launch for 2021. A cycling team launch is traditionally a big deal. Race programmes are announced, Tour de France plans presented and riders are expected to give us enough to debate ad nauseam until the season proper begins.
Last year, I hosted the same event for TV in front of a live audience of a few hundred people, with international journalists given a separate press event. This year, the world’s No.1 team opened their doors to just two outsiders, me and my colleague on The Cycling Podcast, Richard Moore.
Gaining access to their bubble was as strict a procedure as you would hope. Having already complied with the team request to have three PCR tests in the six days before arriving, there was a further rapid test in the hotel lobby. Only once our tests came back negative, and we’d taken our goodie bags with two bottles of antibac and a dozen facemasks, were we allowed to check in. The nostalgia of free keyrings and cheap cycling caps belongs to another time.
No one leaves the hotel other than to train and the venue is closed to the public, but testing is regular and rigorous. Facemasks are compulsory except when eating or riding. Covid makes little exception for Spring Classics preparation.
Creating and maintaining a sterile bubble is one thing, the tougher challenge is planning for a racing calendar which will be entirely at the whim of an ever-evolving virus and the ever-changing protocols of the many countries races pass through.
Elite sport is all about controlling the controllables. When those become
The virus can’t expect the successful to continue playing ‘normal’ with us
fewer and farther between, how do you bridge between the small islands of certainty to build a path through the year? You don’t, apparently.
You simply plan and train as you normally would, and keep lycra’d limbs crossed as many races as possible will go ahead. Everyone I spoke to, from riders to management gave at least a metaphorical shrug of the shoulders when asked about the uncertainty of the year ahead. You are not going to win Amstel Gold or the Criterium du Dauphine without training as if they’re going ahead, but neither are you going to strongarm the virus into allowing races to happen.
Bullish determination is fine for race day, trying to tough talk a way through a pandemic, utterly pointless.
To non-cycling followers, it may seem easier for the sport to adopt a pragmatic approach than, say, football or tennis. There’s less money involved so the stakes are not as high. But, perhaps it’s because of the financial discrepancy that there is even more to lose. This isn’t a sport that is too big to fail. There were almost twice as many staff and riders at the Jumbo Visma camp as have been quarantined in Melbourne before the Australian Open. There are a lot of livelihoods relying on the need to take this threat seriously, and that’s just in one team.
Nor is pragmatism a natural instinct of the sport. This is a world where it is still normal to ride with a broken collarbone if it means getting to the end of the race. The shrugging of
shoulders and acceptance of defeat is not, usually, an option.
At a camp where the world’s No.1 rider, Primoz Roglic, was absent because of a proximity of Covid case at home, there is no escaping the wider reality, or pretending privilege, athleticism or status are some sort of vaccination in themselves.
And yet, how reassuring to be in an environment where plans are being made despite the uncertainty, where goals extend beyond getting changed out of crusty tracksuit bottoms before lunchtime. Yes, this year may pan out just fine after all, but it will not be because we’ve pretended it so.