The Cyclists Alliance has renewed its requires the UCI to replace the medical programme for Girls’s WorldTour groups in order that athletes bear a compulsory screening for REDS – Relative Power Deficiency in Sport – and bone mineral density testing yearly.
The decision comes after a Tour de France Femmes, which introduced points surrounding REDS, disrupted menstrual cycles, weight and efficiency firmly into the highlight, proper from steps to lift consciousness and educate on the problem by way of rider activism to questions centered on points surrounding rider weight at post-race media conferences.
“We’re always working in the direction of making skilled biking a sustainable and fulfilling profession for ladies,” Cyclists Alliance President Grace Brown stated in an announcement. “Rider well being and wellbeing are very important for profession longevity.
“The present system is just not set as much as defend feminine well being, so I consider it’s our responsibility to proceed educating and advocating for higher requirements that permit girls to carry out with well-fuelled, sturdy, and blissful our bodies.”
The alliance famous that it was upset that ladies in sport obtain a disproportionate quantity of scrutiny about their our bodies in comparison with their male counterparts and that it was dedicated to “encouraging optimistic change within the peloton and to taking sensible steps to make that occur”.
One of many sensible steps that the organisation has been making an attempt to encourage is the introduction of the obligatory screening for REDS and of bone mineral density by way of UCI rules, having put ahead a proposal in November final yr to incorporate this within the medical programme for UCI Girls’s WorldTeams.
“We right this moment invite the UCI to rethink our proposal, and we provide our help and experience,” stated an announcement from the Cyclists Alliance, which put collectively a screening protocol when it first made the suggestion in 2024.. “Whereas we respect that this may increasingly require some work to make sure applicable implementation, we consider that it’s greater than definitely worth the effort to introduce some type of protocol for each feminine and male cyclists racing professionally underneath the UCI.”
Cyclingnews has sought remark from the UCI.
The difficulty is just not a brand new one, with the Worldwide Olympic Committee placing out a consensus assertion, knowledgeable by a panel of specialists, on REDS in 2023, emphasising that it hoped it could stimulate motion from sports activities organisations and different stakeholders. The Worldwide Federation of Sports activities Climbing launched a coverage with a multi-faceted screening process at the beginning of final yr, however there hasn’t precisely been a rush of different federations following swimsuit.
The Cyclists Alliance would love that to vary the place biking is worried and is continuous its work on the problem. Earlier this yr, the impartial voice for ladies’s skilled biking put collectively a working group of riders and specialists within the subject to look at the problems surrounding the subject of vitamin, (low) power availability and REDS in biking. The organisation may also be launching an training and consciousness marketing campaign on rider well being and wellbeing in autumn.
“Rider well being and elite efficiency should go hand in hand,” stated the assertion from the Cyclists’ Alliance. “The game right this moment has greater than sufficient scientific information, perception and human expertise to create sustainable, moral performances which don’t compromise rider well being.”
