Safety is 'a political issue' in cycling, laments Lefevere

In his Het Nieuwsblad column, Lefevere highlighted the sport’s current debate on the safety technology which is being used at the World Championships in Kigali, Rwanda.

"All riders in Kigali will be equipped with GPS trackers. This measure is intended to prevent tragedies like that of Muriel Furrer. She died last year after a fall and was found only a hundred minutes later by someone who 'happened' to be walking in the woods next to the course," wrote Lefevere in Het Nieuwsblad.

"Any normal sport would welcome a GPS tracker after such a tragedy, but this is, of course, cycling."

The dispute emerged at the Tour de Romandie Féminin in August when the five teams - Canyon//SRAM zondacrypto, EF Education-Oatly, Lidl-Trek, Team Picnic PostNL, and Visma | Lease a Bike - were disqualified for refusing to comply with the UCI's tracker testing protocol.

Lefevere highlighted the concerns raised about the competitive disadvantages placed due to the tracker’s weight and aerodynamic impact.

"Such a thing weighs about a hundred grams, so attaching it to a bike puts the rider in question at a competitive disadvantage," he explained. "For those who think a hundred grams is negligible: there are riders who don't want any colour on their bikes for fear of the weight of the paint."

The teams have now filed an appeal with CAS, claiming the UCI's actions were "disproportionate, imposed without due process, and enforced in a manner that left riders and teams feeling intimidated."

Lefevere believes the dispute is fundamentally about data ownership and commercial interests, stating, "The teams think the UCI will eventually commercialise the tracker's data. It's not unreasonable to think that television is willing to pay for technology that allows them to show every rider's location at any given moment," he wrote.

"The teams want to keep that revenue in-house. A joint venture has been established with Velon specifically to ensure that data such as position, heart rate, acceleration, revolutions etc remain the intellectual property of the teams."

The UCI has referred the five disqualified teams to its Disciplinary Commission and reportedly threatened to revoke their licences.

The teams maintain they supported the safety initiative but requested the UCI mount the devices and designate which riders would carry them. They also sought clarity on liability issues related to potential damages.

"What if attaching the tracker damaged the bike? What if a detached tracker caused a crash? What if the tracker fell to the ground and was itself damaged. Who would be responsible for the costs?" Lefevere questioned.

The tracking technology is being deployed at the World Championships in Rwanda despite the ongoing dispute, with Lefevere concluding: "They can use their trackers at the World Championships and in Romandie, a race owned by the UCI. We won't see them in the other races right away. Or how, in cycling, even safety is a political issue."