I regularly have a problem with how RL is reported by the major media, it often doesn't get the coverage its attendances deserve.

For instance, Leeds games are often the biggest sporting event in the country on a Friday night, yet are rarely reported well enough.

However, when there are other bigger events or games on, we can't complain. As I said, if we want more coverage than the cycling then we need to get more people at the games than at the cycling.

Both my clubs and my bike haven't been out of my garage in 12 months.......m

Could that be because you've spent all your waking hours annoying London Broncos fans, Gutterfax?

Cycling is hardly anything like golf.
However only one is totally inclusive no matter what sex or age you are, only one of the two has deep reaching positive effects on our social environment, enables disabled people to get from a-b unaided, net benefit in population health and health costs, reduces polution levels etc etc.. and cycling doesn't have to cost the earth, doesn't require you to dress in any special way, no special equipment needed, no silly hats or trousers.
For the cost of a single golf club you can have endless hours of freedom and free exersize, and if you want to spend more so what, isn't that what people do when they can afford to in any aspect of life?

I'd start a facebook page if I were you

Nobody??? You mean a couple of people on a rugby forum find it boring

nice exaggeration there.

I just don't get the whole cycling thing. Last year when it all kicked off in Yorkshire, loads of my mates from work were getting giddy over sittout out and watching it. Not 1 of them could tell me who won it and I expect that was the case for the tour de Yorks, no real knowledge or emotion or passion of anyone who is in it but Cheer randomly for Bradley Wiggins right? Its a tame spectator sport in my opinion but this country is sublime for jumping on a bandwagon.

I just don't get people who don't get it!

Some people get excited about a woman they have never met having a baby.

I have a passing interest in it, I always keep an eye on the grand tours and enjoy watching the mountain stages in the TdF. But then I will watch literally anything and cycling is not a good spectator sport. You can go for hours with nothing happening barring maybe a crash. So it does kind of baffle me why so many people seem to be interested in it now.

I'll pop you a new sarcasm detector in the post, shall I?

It's all in the marketing !
A brand new event on the back of Le Tour last year and 1.5million folk turn out to watch.

We could do with cycling's marketing guru to help RL.

Having said that, as a spectator sport, give me RL ever time, even when Wakey are playing

True.

How many of those people out on the streets watching over the weekend would've sat and watched it on TV if it was Tour De 'insert any other county's name here'.

FFS - it's world class, international sport taking place here, in our towns and cities, on our roads. You can get close up to the riders, have a chat, get a photo/selfie, have a good look at the bikes and it's free! Does it matter if people don't understand the tactics or know the names of all the riders? It's like the London Olympics: I know someone who was chuffed to bits to get tickets for the dressage or something like that. She knows sweet FA about riding, show jumping and the rest and hardly knows one end of a horse from the other but she was there and she loved it! It's like Ascot, the grand National, the boat race, even international RU - they're events, out of the ordinary, something to celebrate if they float your boat. If they don't grab you, don't go but don't be sanctimonious about those who do!!!

You should keep it for yourself if you think what you wrote constitutes sarcasm.

So some people enjoy it regardless and we shouldn't therefore voice our opinion about it......

......ok shut down this message board then.

As for sanctimonious, isn't a large part of the audience who are now 'in to' cycling only so because they can say at their middle-class dinner parties whilst comparing their mortgages and couple of kids that they watched the cycling. It's reached that level that tennis and golf have.....you get a mortgage and 2 kids, you start like cycling/tennis/golf because you're a respectable middle class person.....not because it actually entertaining sport.

"Ohhhhh Barry, did you watch the TDY, did you see how so-and-so peddled for that 30 secs.....it was like watching Lionel Messi on a bike, pure magic"

If you didn't include crashes then a highlights reel of cycling would just be what you see by looking out your window when driving. Dire.

Can't help but be inclined with ThePrinter.

No problem with you voicing your opinion, I just think it would be better if it weren't based on ignorance and crass generalisation.
I was in Wakefield for the start of Stage 3 of the TdY and your suggestion that a large part of the people who were there were middle class "Barries" taking time out from the golf club and planning their next dinner party menu shows that you don't really know what you're talking about (and you obviously don't know Wakefield either). I don't think think my "sanctimonious" comment was too far off the mark to be honest.
Your last sentence just shows that you don't understand cycle road racing but please don't make the mistake of thinking that everyone else shares your lack of understanding. Enjoy whatever floats your boat and let others do the same. You'll be a much happier person.

People get irritated because it's cycling - F1 is broadly the same but slower, and that doesn't seem to attract the ire of the mini Jeremy Clarkson's, who believe that it's fashionably edgy to despise cyclists because they get in the way, don't pay tax, jump red lights, or whatever other spurious nonsense he's come up with over the years. As every cyclist knows, we are powered by smugness; people in cars hate us because we have great legs and can go to the front of the queue at traffic lights.

Meanwhile, the reality is that the TdY was a fantastic event for the County, and if RL had someone with even a small share of Gary Verity's talent, we wouldn't be a chippy, Northern-centric, minority sport teetering on the brink of financial meltdown; enjoy the event or not - that's your call - but you have to admire the application.

I'm sure it was well organised but it's a hell of a lot easier to do something like that as a 1-off on the back of a massive, worldwide event like Tour de France that only needs people to basically stand outside and watch for free rather than actively engage people to make a conscious, positive decision to watch a team sport over and over again. Especially a sport that struggles for media coverage (even in its own heartlands, thanks to the centralised nature of media) and struggles for financial stability.

Just what was it that made you so bitter and twisted?

Not bitter or twisted at all. The subject was about cycling (as a spectator sport btw, not those who cycle in general, and I repeat I enjoy the track cycling) I gave an opinion that I find it a boring sport to watch and seemingly their's anger that somebody could think such a thing.

It can only possibly be because I don't understand the sport people argue, their's no other logical reason for not loving it......no, it's just simply because it's boring. In the process of defending cycling other posters have critisiced football and F1.....am I to assume that these posters don't truely understand those sports and their tactics, as surely that's the only reason you couldn't possibly love a certain sport.

A quick glance at SKY Sports w/e 19th April shows that Premiership football, Championship football, darts, a pac/mayweather documentary, cricket in the windies, scottish soccer, European Union, Champions league football featuring spanish, german, portuguese and french sides and WWE wrestling were all watched by more people than those who bothered tuning in to SL.

I am with you, CYCLING is akin to watching paint dry, but like a great many other sports that we don't "get", the British viewing public seem to be happy to tune in regardless.

Rugby League has many a failing as we often see debated on here.....

However as I pointed out at the start, I was purely talking about MY VIEW on cycling as a spectator sport (and not lambasting others for following it, until I was met with cries of disbelief). Also not comparing it to RL or any other sport.

I should have read all your posts...my bad