Cycling: In the morning, the UCI confirmed that 18 WorldTour licenses will also be issued in the coming year. This deviates from the originally planned reforms, which envisaged a reduction to 17 first division teams. According to the current constellation, the South African team Dimension Data would have lost its license. The parties involved came to an agreement at a meeting in Geneva.
Dimension Data breathes a sigh of relief. As rumored in recent weeks, the world governing body is slightly backtracking on its originally planned WorldTour reforms ( as we reported ), which would have reduced the total number of WT teams to 17. These plans had put the UCI in a difficult position, because with the new teams BORA-hansgrohe and Bahrain-Merida, both virtually guaranteed their WorldTour spots thanks to the signing of several top riders, it would have meant that Dimension Data would have been dropped from the top tier. Despite a successful season, the South African team is ranked last in the WorldTour team rankings, which, along with financial considerations, are crucial for awarding licenses.
This situation was also so unpleasant for the UCI because the team namesake Dimension Data is an important financier and sponsor of the racing organization heavyweight ASO, with which differences have only just been settled. In addition, as the only African team and with riders like Mark Cavendish, Dimension Data is also very important for the publicity of cycling. For this reason, the PCC (Professional Cycling Council), which includes representatives of the association as well as race organizers and spokespersons for teams and riders, met yesterday to discuss the situation in Geneva.
[blog style=”def” cols=”2″ display=”specific” specific=”50433″ posts_per_page=”0″ offset=”0″ pagination=”no” ad_id=”0″ ad_count=”3″ ad_repeat=”yes”]A reform of the reform could now be announced today: Accordingly, the reduction to 17 teams will be dispensed with and 2018 WorldTour licenses will be awarded up to and including the 18 season. Only in 2019 will the number drop to 17, and in 2020 to 16. The originally planned "league system" in which teams between the two highest classes would be promoted and relegated annually - depending on the number of points achieved - is no longer mentioned in today's announcement for the time being. It remains to be seen whether this deep incision will also be introduced later than planned.