Tour de France: Scottish Cycling chief Nick Rennie targets race for Scotland

Cycling
Riders in the UCI world championship

Scottish Cycling chief executive Nick Rennie hopes the successful staging of the World Championships will lead to the Tour de France coming to Scotland.

Scotland hosted what is regarded as cycling’s biggest event over 11 days.

More than 500,000 spectators are estimated to have watched the events in Glasgow and other parts of the country.

“There are a lot of conversations which are hugely exciting – even something as huge as the Tour de France might be an option for a few stages,” said Rennie.

“I hope that the success of this huge event will just further raise the credibility of Scotland as a fantastic venue for cycling events.

“This is the biggest event, but Scotland has a great heritage and track record of hosting World Championships and World Cups in cycling.

“It takes a long time to put the packages together and convince the decision makers they should go with Scotland.

“Fingers crossed, I’m sure in the next few weeks we’ll hear some announcements.”

The 2023 event was the largest UCI championships held in one place, with more than 8,000 cyclists from 151 nations taking part.

Great Britain topped the medal table comfortably, with 23 gold, 12 silver and 21 bronze for a total of 56 – 24 clear of second-placed Germany.

GB also finished the para-cycling track competition with more than double the number of medals – 30 in total including 18 golds – than closest rivals France, who claimed seven golds in a 14-medal haul.

“To see British cyclists topping the medal table is fantastic and I think we captured the imagination of the Scottish public coming out in record numbers,” added Rennie.

“I really hope we’ve inspired people to dust that bike off, get on the bike for the first time or ride it a bit more.”

Meanwhile, Scotland’s Katie Archibald will seek to learn the lessons from the World Championships as she looks ahead to next year’s Paris Olympics.

Archibald was not at her best on home boards in Glasgow, which was understandable after a traumatic period since her partner Rab Wardell died suddenly at home 12 months ago.

The 29-year-old had said she wanted to use the championships to honour Wardell’s memory and, despite not being at her best in the omnium, helped Great Britain to a first women’s team pursuit world title in nine years.

“I certainly put a lot on the fact it was home, and just everything about these worlds and I guess what it had meant for me as a goal for so long,” Archibald said.

“The fact that my life has changed quite a bit since I first envisaged that goal, it’s just forced these constant reflections.

“I’ll learn from it, I suppose. It’s not as simple as saying ‘don’t stress as much’ but learn from it and move forwards.”

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