Hypothetical Team Africa cycling (discussion)
Discussion
How about this for a long term strategy for a company looking for future advertising and sporting glory - I'm not planning to do it, it's just a fun debate.
Given that there are lots of East Africans who can run a bit and have the special legs/lungs/diet/training ethic or whatever it is that makes them so good, if the company set up a training camp with bikes, coaches etc and picked some decent athletes, could they in 10 years clean up in international cycling?
Clearly there's a lot more to cycling that being fit and knowing how to crank the pedals round all day, but Mercx, Wiggo, Indurain etc weren't born knowing about tactics, they learnt it and if they can learn how to do it there's presumably no reason why, if they start fairly young, Kenyans can't learn it as well. They didn't know how to win a marathon 30 years ago, but they seem to have picked up the idea of that quite well!
Not having good enough roads in Africa could be a problem but given how much a team spends they could afford to build some roads - this isn't a low budget plan!
Bear in mind that if you'd gone to the middle/long distance coaches at UK athletics 40 years ago and told them they need to get a long term plan or else they'd be thrashed by a load of Africans one day they'd have laughed at you!
Discuss!
Given that there are lots of East Africans who can run a bit and have the special legs/lungs/diet/training ethic or whatever it is that makes them so good, if the company set up a training camp with bikes, coaches etc and picked some decent athletes, could they in 10 years clean up in international cycling?
Clearly there's a lot more to cycling that being fit and knowing how to crank the pedals round all day, but Mercx, Wiggo, Indurain etc weren't born knowing about tactics, they learnt it and if they can learn how to do it there's presumably no reason why, if they start fairly young, Kenyans can't learn it as well. They didn't know how to win a marathon 30 years ago, but they seem to have picked up the idea of that quite well!
Not having good enough roads in Africa could be a problem but given how much a team spends they could afford to build some roads - this isn't a low budget plan!
Bear in mind that if you'd gone to the middle/long distance coaches at UK athletics 40 years ago and told them they need to get a long term plan or else they'd be thrashed by a load of Africans one day they'd have laughed at you!
Discuss!
Sadly its unlikely the idea would get much traction because middle and long distance running is so deeply rooted in their culture. Like every kid here wants to play football in the premier league, every African child wants to be a runner in the same way that the Caribbean kids only care for sprinting.
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