Rider safety has been in the spotlight again this week, with competitors from the weekend’s Trofeo Alfredo Binda complaining about the race organisation on social media. Some were left high and dry in traffic having only dropped a short way off the bunch in the closing stages of the 140km race in Italy.
Lidl-Trek rider Brodie Chapman raised the issue on X, saying: “Riders who were out of the front group yet less than a few mins back with … 1.5 laps to go were confronted with opened roads, passing traffic, red lights and busy roundabouts. We were forced to stop the race and were rewarded with a DNF.”
Fellow rider Eglantine Rayer of the DSM-Firmenich team reported a similar experience, also on X.Â
“Trofeo Binda, 25km to go, job done, I’m in a group of seven, 20 seconds behind the bunch; the commissaire comes to tell us we have to stop. OK. We decided to stop. But they opened traffic just after the peloton passed.”
She added: “I’m not angry at the fact that they didn’t respect the 8% time limit, and therefore, didn’t respect us. I’m angry because our last ride was SUPER dangerous. We were simply in traffic, and Italian at that.”
The race was won by Chapman’s Lidl-Trek team-mate Elisa Balsalmo.
Rider safety in both men’s and women’s racing has never been far from the news in recent seasons. In last year’s Tour de France Femmes, a motorbike rider was fined after clipping rider Kathrin Hammes. Just a month before that, in the Tour Féminin International des Pyrénées, riders were branded “spoiled children” by organisers after refusing to race the final stage on safety grounds.
Chapman reported that the issue had been raised with race organisers, with a less than satisfactory response.
“The organisation … said they were considering the athletes who could score UCI points and stopped the riders who wouldn’t get back to the front group,” the Australian rider wrote.
“So only the lead group gets to have closed roads and finish races now? What about the riders who worked their arse off at the front for the first 100km to contribute to the outcome of the race? Can’t see them on TV anyway I guess. “We love your race,” she wrote, “but we don’t wanna risk our lives competing in it.”
The Trofeo Alfredo Binda is organised by Italian company Cycling Sport Promotion. Cycling Weekly has asked it to comment on the issues raised by Chapman and Rayer but has so far received no response.
