The argument goes something like this:
Women’s races don’t deserve as much airtime (or any airtime at all) as Men’s because there is really no competition when it comes to popularity. It’s simply not a viable proposition.
The counter argument unrolls thusly:
Women’s racing is not as popular as Men’s because there are nearly no televised races.
And never the twain shall meet…until GCN Race TV came around, that is. Or at least for me. This year GCN/Eurosport has managed to snag nearly every race you could imagine, televising all of them from whenever the local feed begins. This includes all the Women’s races, which is more than I had imagined, to be honest.
Since the GCN interface is Netflix-ish (or so I’m told – I don’t have it), there are lots of prominent ‘buttons’ for you to click on for races, and the Women’s races are right next to Men’s up there, making it easy to go and give it a boo. I’ve watched every single one this year, or parts of every single one, at least; and I am now a growing fan. Why? Because I now know my Van Vleutens from my Van der Breggens and I am getting more invested in the scene now.
The racing is also getting more exciting and professional, although I admit I never watched too much of it before. Still, the structured strategies I saw in today’s LBL, when compared with the free-for-all I remember from the first time I watched a race a few years ago, is light-years apart.
It helps that big teams like Movistar and Jumbo Visma have women’s squads now and it really seems like we are on the cusp of something big happening. Bravo to GCN for helping bring all this great racing to my permanent staycation.
I still can’t tell a sprinter from a climber in the Women’s ranks, but I’m getting there. Do yourself a favor if you haven’t already, and give them a shot.
The Vicious Cycle 
Good competition and entertainment today. Voss was beaten by team tactics and great ride from van Der Breggen.
From my point of view it is Eurosport expanding it’s television coverage of women’s racing. I’ve been loving all the extra coverage this year, but none of it has anything to do with the GCN commentators in my opionion. It is simply a video feed that Eurosport can commentate on in many languages, and the GCN can use for the North American / UK audience.
I’m not sure GCN really has any play in whether or not helicopters and motorcycles carrying live feeds happen or not. My gut feel is that this is between the organizers of the race and Eurosport (who then provide the video feed for GCN announcers).
But, it’s great that the anglophone followers can now see women’s racing as well as men’s. That super positive.
I agree. I didn’t explain it well, but I was trying to say that I thought it was positive that GCN (or Eurosport, or both) is putting it all in one place for easy viewing. I can only speak for myself, but this is the fact that has gotten me watching more.
Hi, I know you didn’t follow cyclocross that deep. In cross the races over the last years it was very boring. Mathieu winning everything and the occasion he hat a flat were 1 to 1000. Even formula 1 ist mor exiting. For 4 to 5 years i only watched the womens race. I am so happy to see marianne and all the others in action without searching for doggy feeds. Only three years back at strade you could see the camera man within the final curve in siena taking of the cover of his camera, when the female winning was passing by. I really felt ashamed..
I remember seeing that kind of thing, too, in the races I watched in the past. It’s really come a long way very quickly. They deserve to have full races covered, like the men. As for ‘cross, I’ve actually watched a few races this year, but I get dizzy watching them going around in circles 😉