The Women’s Tour Is in Danger of Cancelation
Due to a loss in sponsorship, one of the premier events on the women’s racing calendar is in jeopardy to the tune of a £500,000 funding shortfall.
The five-day Women’s Tour—whose route was just announced on Thursday by its organizers, SweetSpot—is a favorite amongst the women’s peloton. However, according to Telegraph Sport, the race has recently lost some of their biggest sponsors, including their official car partner and mountain jersey sponsor, the Czech automaker Škoda.
In announcing the race’s route, which is schedule for June 7 through 11, SweetSpot said the race needed income “urgently” in order to ensure the event for this year.
In addition to title sponsorship for the event, which has been run in England and Wales since 2014, sponsorship for three of the race’s four jersey classifications remain available. Those being the leader’s jersey, the aforementioned mountain jersey, and the best young rider jersey. On top of that, individual stage-naming rights and other stage partnership packages have been launched to aid in creating potential revenue streams.
Škoda’s exodus is a particularly large blow, as one of the biggest expenses in operating a multi-day stage race is the provision of support cars. According to the statement SweetSpot released on Thursday, “The search for an auto partner to supply vehicles also continues.”
Women’s cycling has been gaining major headway of late, with the Tour de France Femmes’ huge success last year and massive hype going into this year’s Tour; with more women riders publicly fighting for and winning battles for minimum salary requirements and equal pay; and for the normalization and embrace of pregnancy and motherhood in the women’s peloton. Losing the Women’s Tour would also mean losing its prize purse, which has in the past equaled the men’s purse for the Tour of Britain, evidence of the event’s push for gender equality.
The organizers have about a month to find the money and sponsorships, as the final decision as to whether to host or cancel the race needs to be made by mid-April in order for requisite planning and execution time.
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