What would it take to get the pro tour to ireland?

mickmcl09

Lots of questions here.

Stage race or 1 day classic?
What time of year?
Prize money? What level of prizemoney is there for the smaller European classics and stage races such as Turkey, Romandie etc.
Appearance money?
Sponsors / financial backing?
It's probably not all about the money either, so what other considerations are there?

I'm sure there's lots more topics to be considered in relation to getting a top level pro stage race or 1 day classic back to Ireland.......

TinyExplosions

If you have enough cash you could get it here, simple as. Everything else would be worked out provided there was funding

RobFowl

From past experience it seems to be extremely expensive and a sure fire route to going bust !!!

I'd prefer to see more UCI 2.2 and some 1.2 level races initially and let them build form there.

Blasphemy I know but IMO some level of co-operation with the UK and a shared race series would reduce costs and help attract decent fields as well.

mickmcl09

What's enough cash (approximately)?

Chips Lovell

You need a big enough sponsorship. That's why the Tour of Ireland stopped running after 2009.

Lumen

The NAMA Tour of Ireland.

Chips Lovell

mickmcl09 wrote: »

What's enough cash (approximately)?

From here:

However, the global recession which has hit Ireland particularly badly has now ensured that the Tour of Ireland race organisers could not find the sponsorship required to stage this year’s race. According to race director Rushton it takes €1.5 million to make the race a reality.

calerbass

I remember back in the late nineties their were a very strong possibilty of the world championships being held in Killarney at some point......but events in the 98 tour put an end to that and helped by the sunday tribune if i remember right.........:cool:

mickmcl09

1.3 mil for a week long, sorry 3 day as it was back in 2009 if I remember.
So, would it be fair to say 500k for a 1 day event?

It wouldn't be impossible to raise circa 300k IMO, but would you get the level of interest in order for the sponsors to get a kick back from their investment at that level?

Hail 2 Da Thief

Lumen wrote: »

The NAMA Tour of Ireland.

That could actually work you know. They could carry Sean Fitzpatrick around the route on the back of a lorry & let spectators throw objects at him @ €1 a pop. It would pay for itself! :pac:

Junior

Vancouver pulled out of WC bidding when costings were in the region of 10 million I think. Must try dig out that report.

mickmcl09

Where are these guys coming up with 1.5mil for a tour of ireland?
Also surely the tourism and economic sectors would get better bang for their buck with a one day instead of a stage race.

15million to hold the championships, I assume a large portion of that is related to the privilege of holding such an event.

Does anybody have an idea of the breakdown of these figures?
Any time somebody loses money, there's someone else who's coining it?

Back to the original post
What constitutes good prizemoney? Exclude team sponsors bonuses to their cyclist. Would 50k, 30k and 15k be enough for the 1st 3 and 50k max for additional prize money be excessive? Would it be enough to attract the big teams without having to pay them additional moneys to simply turn up.

Does the UCI have to be paid money for the privilege of having essentially their members take part in our event?

mossyhayes

Fill in all of the pot holes first i suppose!!! lol

Chips Lovell

This forum isn't for personalised attacks against people. Let's play nice.

Thanks

ROK ON

mickmcl09 wrote: »

Back to the original post
What constitutes good prizemoney? Exclude team sponsors bonuses to their cyclist. Would 50k, 30k and 15k be enough for the 1st 3 and 50k max for additional prize money be excessive? Would it be enough to attract the big teams without having to pay them additional moneys to simply turn up.

Does the UCI have to be paid money for the privilege of having essentially their members take part in our event?

Gilbert won €40k for LBL. However I have a suspicion that prize money for a new race in a new location would need to be much greater than the prize money in a Monumnet or other one day classic.

I would try to get a fair few conti and pro-conti teams and then try to add teams with an Irish interest (The Shack, HTC, Garmin, AG2R). Also throw in Sky and a few Brit conti teams.

Then you have the makings of a good race. No real stars (ie no need for Cav, Wiggo etc).

ednwireland

and try and get funding commitment for at least 5 years, the tour of britain was pretty shaky but seems to be gaining interest now

fat bloke

There are going to be pro riders in Sneem in September if you want to come down and cheer them on!

thebouldwhacker

I reckon politics could be a big factor too, you need to be able to get the right people on board. Even picking a route could be a mine field re getting permissions and sponsorship.
That said cycling in Ireland has never been so big, if Roche or any other Irish cycling pro won something big the momentum and public interest could push something like this along.
I would say don't go for the jackpot in the first shot. Get a good organisation up and running, staging solid, well sponsored, well supported smaller gigs first (ie pro women's as mentioned by Fat Bloke) young up and coming riders will then WANT to come back when successful and then in a few short years you got yourself an event which the 'industry' wants to take part in.
I think for Ireland you would need a course which is unique, like Paris–Roubaix, something that grabs the imagination. Europe is filled with routes which are nicer, hillier, flatter, warmer, better populated, more interested in pro cycling etc so I think to get the teams, riders, media etc interested in paying attention to it it would need an edge which others do not have. I'm not suggesting putting a tar road up Croke Patrick (though that would be pretty cool) but something which would make people WANT to cycle it again and again. Paris–Roubaix is famous for the cobble stones, perhaps Ireland could go with its newly emerging pot holes!
Completely on a side bar (but perhaps linked):
I have always thought it a shame that cycle events are not organised to run off an hour or two before city marathons, imagine the interest in belting about Dublin, Cork, Limerick or Belfast without traffic and people who are normally shouting insults out their car windows are cheering you on, cycling through the Jack Lynch tunnel in a group and having all that smooth motorway for miles.... class.

If you take inspiration form this post,make millions organising pro cycling in Ireland and dont make me rich I'll sue....:pac:

garminguy

i think you have to have 4 or 5 main sponsors rather than one major one, i.e. failte ireland, so if one of them has to pull out for what ever reason, it doesn't leave a huge financial hole to fill.

avoid the mistakes of 2008 and 2009 and try not to spend a huge chunk of your budget on some top names who have no interest in winning overall, a mixture of young and upcoming teams,

proper routes that don't have grass growing in the middle , its just not safe!

a smaller version of the publicity caravan that precedes the tdf,
fom my experience this is the highlight of a lot of the roadside fans at last years tour de france,

a stage involving donegal,

find a place on the uci calendar that needs a mutliday race,

the head of uci is irish,its never gonna be a more oportune time to seek/ask favours or requests from them,

there are still some huge irish companies making decent profits , so 1 to 3 million is just a drop in the ocean to them, i.e kerry group, guiness, ryanair, etc, approach them for sponsorship

from personal experience at the tourof britain for the last few years, the route is announced in april as well as the teams taking part, compare that to the the tour of ireland in 2009 being announced in july for august ,its seems obvious that the orgainisers are much better prepared from earlier on.

Junior

I actually wouldn't bother with a stage race, I think we have the parcours to make a good decent semi classic, however to do that it can't start in Donegal or somewhere odd, you need ease of access for teams, i.e. they can fly in/out quickly, the boat isn't too far away for buses mechanics etc and plus it needs to be accessible to fans.

thebouldwhacker

Junior wrote: »

it can't start in Donegal or somewhere odd,

LOL

Jawgap

Derry to Dublin via the coast, Belfast and the Mournes? Would that be do-able as a one-dayer?

You'd have the iconic imagery of the pelothon zipping by the Giants Causeway; the "hook" of it being an all-island event; relatively decent roads etc.

Call it "The Race of Peace" with the tagline "This time it really is a war!" (this last bit is not serious:))

ednwireland

a coast to coast might be a good usp, dont know how the parcours would work

as i said you'd have to be in a position to fund it for 5 years

starting in donegal would be great

its only 181km from donegal to dublin so that gives some room for theroute for a 1 day race


still, it will never happen

Beasty

Similar thread here covering the one-day idea

garminguy

it wouldn't do any harm to involve some of the guys running the ras,
they seem to know a thing or two about running a multiday event for around the last fifty years rather than 2 and a half.

ednwireland

i was at the tour d l'ain last year (shame the an post team was a no show)
this was an event with teh same UCI classification as the tour of ireland

it was 5 days, had all the major teams involved (mainly with their young riders) from radioshack, htc to ag2r, caisse d'erpagne etc

the thing was there was an hour long publicity caravan of local companies ( i have a bag of pens sweets baseball caps thrown at me at the side of the road)

and the crowds were pretty big from the start to the climbs to the finish.

dont know what the tour of ireland was like in that respect but in france even this felt like you were at a 'proper' race