How Professional Cycling Climbed To The Top Of Endurance Sports
Published on
by Dominic Mills
In this article, we analyse how professional cycling has climbed to the top of endurance sports and showed that it can go on to become one of the most popular sports in the world.
In this Insight:
Sport has been one of humanity’s favourite pastimes for centuries, but when it comes to answering which sports are the most popular it can be a rather challenging task, filled with guesstimations and somewhat optimistic or pessimistic (depending on your personal bias) data from sometimes questionable sources.
Whilst it is largely accepted that football (soccer) is the most watched sport in the world, followed by cricket, there is greater uncertainty about the subsequent sports and the order they fall in.
Thankfully (at least from the author’s point of view), this article is not intended as the ‘Final Boss’ of this popularity contest, but instead seeks to highlight the global growing interest in a sport which has long been the cream of the crop of a somewhat niche segment of professional sports, endurance sports.
In this article, we analyse how professional cycling has climbed to the top of endurance sports and showed that it can go on to become one of the most popular sports in the world.
Professionalism
Since the invention of the modern day bicycle in the late 1800s, bicycles have, with a few exceptions, steadily grown in both production and usage throughout the world.
The early wide scale accessibility of recreational cycling had a major impact in shaping the professional history of the sport. As bicycles became a more popular mode of transport in the late 19th century, manufacturers and newspapers wanting to sell advertising space to manufacturers started to invest in organised racing to show the public the benefits of the product.
This mutually beneficial bond between sponsors, investors and cycling as a sport was ahead of its time and has shaped not just cycling, but many other sports today.
Professional cycling team’s understanding of the importance of finding sponsors that want to develop the sport as much as they want to grow their brand is crucial.
These mutually beneficial partnerships are the foundation of professional cycling and as the global sports industry is growing ever more commercial and more sports look for investment, this historic sponsorship understanding that is ingrained in the sport will be crucial in continuing to help the sport grow.
Accessibility
Today, there are an estimated one billion bicycles in the world (Worldometer), making it the world’s most popular mode of transport.
Statistically speaking, this means that there is a bicycle for every 8th person in the world. Whilst in reality that is almost certainly not the case, and a number of factors such as the geographical spread of the bikes factor should be accounted for, the wide scale accessibility of bicycles should be seen as one of, if not the biggest opportunities for professional cycling as a sport.
The challenge lies in turning the accessibility of bicycles as a transportation method into sporting participation and recreational viewing.
Investment in cycling from bicycle manufacturers and newspapers in the late 1800s and early 1900s showed that there is a correlation between cycling accessibility and the popularity of the sport.
Now, over 100 years later, this investment can still be seen with Western European countries such as Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain all having a strong cycling infrastructure, both as a mode of transportation and as a sport.
The opportunity today lies with countries such as China, who account for almost half of the bicycles in the world, but have a relatively small racing footprint. In 2025, China will host only one of the highest ranked men’s races (UWT) and two women’s races (WWT), compared to a more historic cycling country such as France, who will host five UWT races and three WWT races.
If cycling can manage to turn accessibility into participation and recreational viewing, the sky's the limit for the sport.
Entertainment
Although it may be a relatively young sport compared to some of the old timers such as wrestling or running, cycling taps into one of the most fundamental aspects of sporting nature: the thrill of the race.
In a world where subjectivity is growing ever stronger in sport, there is something incredibly appealing about the simplicity of crossing the finish line first and winning a race - and even more so when the moment is captured with the supreme scenic backdrops cycling often provides.
But it's not just the sight of the peloton cruising through a picturesque countryside that is drawing in fans, racing sports such as cycling and motorsports are enjoying a somewhat of a new dawn in recent times, attracting a unique and high value audience.
This has been heavily driven by the emergence of sports documentaries such as Netlflix’s “Tour de France: Unchained” and “Formula 1: Drive to Survive”. The docuseries provide fans with increased levels of entertainment as camera crews are given behind-the-scenes access to all the action - skyrocketing engagement, loyalty and drama.
And with a racing calendar that spans 10 months of the year, with 36 UCI World Tour events and 29 WWT events across 17 different countries, cycling fans have all the entertainment right at their fingertips.
Innovation
Sport has long been a driver for innovation and technological advancement. Whether through the development of data analytics and biomechanics or innovations in sporting equipment and safety gear, the pursuit to be the best in sport has almost always led to new ideas and practices.
Professional cycling’s close history with bicycle manufacturers and other sponsors has meant that constant innovation and technological advancement is ingrained into the sport’s ethos.
From early inventors such as John Dunlop who created the first pneumatic tyre for bicycles - now widely used in a wide range of vehicles, including cars and airplanes - to modern pioneers such as Sir Dave Brailsford whose ‘Marginal Gains’ theory elevated data and statistical analysis and impacted beyond cycling, notably in the business and education sectors.
This forward thinking way of working continues to push cycling today with teams working with the latest artificial intelligence (AI) to optimise every aspect of their performance, including training programmes, team dynamics, fan engagement and future talent scouting.
With the battle for consumer and fan attention becoming more challenging, with fans needing newer concepts and fresh ideas to keep interest in a competitive market, cycling’s ability to innovate and develop is perhaps its biggest strength and one that could help see it break into the most popular sports in the world.
