The Latvian Cycling Federation claims a UCI commissaire told them Mathieu van der Poel would not face penalty for breaking the rules during the World Championships road race because it “wouldn’t be good for the sport”.
Van der Poel, the 2023 World Champion, rode on a walkway at speed and in close proximity to spectators during Sunday’s race before sprinting from a small group to third place and a bronze medal.
Latvia’s Toms Skujiņš finished just behind in fourth-place and his national federation subsequently went to the UCI commissaires after the race to seek an explanation as to why Van der Poel had received no punishment for breaking their rules (UCI Cycling Regulations 2.12.007: Race Incidents Relating to Road Events Rule 7.6).
While the UCI’s official rules, as explained by our Ronan McLaughlin yesterday, do leave wiggle room for the UCI to not throw Van der Poel out of the race, there has not yet been an explanation from the sport’s governing body as to why the Dutchman didn’t receive even a fine and/or a yellow card or why neither Marlen Reusser (Gent-Wevelgem 2024) nor Luke Rowe (Tour of Flanders 2018) received similar leniency to the former world champion when they broke this particular rule.
In an open letter published on Wednesday morning, the Latvian Federation said they’d been told all of the commissaires had “seen the situation, deemed it not dangerous and something to be penalised”.
When the Federation remonstrated that the same rules should apply to everyone they said a commissaire told them it “wouldn’t be good for the sport” and so the commissaires were interpreting the rules as they saw fit.
“It seems that some are more equal than others, especially when it comes to unpopular decisions to be made,” Latvia’s open letter reads.
“As a relatively small Federation, we are deeply concerned about this decision. If van der Poel had crashed into a spectator on the road, would that have been good or bad for our sport? We urge the UCI to apply its rules consistently to ensure the safety and integrity of cycling and not to leave this kind of potential accident without response, just because it would be so-called damage of reputation.
“We, as a part of the cycling world, expect the UCI to publicly explain the decision of commissaires to avoid similar situations, as paying no attention to this situation creates a ground for greater risk to racing in the future which is something no one wants.”
The UCI has so far not responded publicly to Latvia’s statement but in response to a request for comment from Escape Collective, the governing body said:
“The UCI acknowledges the open letter published by the Latvian Cycling Federation.
“The UCI Commissaires Panel are responsible for the sporting oversight of events and, in the present situation, determined that it did not warrant the application of the sanctions under point 7.6 of article 2.12.007 of the UCI Regulations. In regards to such rule, it shall be underlined that disqualification is not the ordinary sanction – which is the imposition of a fine and a points deduction – and only applies in ‘serious cases of advantage, endangerment, repeated infringements or aggravating circumstances’. The situation in question not deemed as such a case, the UCI Commissaires Panel’s decision was to not issue any sanction.”
If you were wondering what the UCI considers a bad look for the sport of cycling, Frenchman Julien Bernard was fined 200CHF at this summer’s Tour de France Hommes for “inappropriate behaviour during the race and damage to the image of the sport” as the race travelled along his home roads and he stopped to kiss his wife as local supporters descended upon him.
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