Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national teams

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Bicycler
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Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national teams

Post by Bicycler »

Watching the road race, I noticed that many of the pro riders were wearing equipment (helmets mainly but arm warmers and other items were also spotted) in their pro team colours and carrying sponsors names. As the riders are competing for their country, not the commercial team, should this be allowed?

This ties in with my pet peeve; national championship jerseys splashed with sponsors' logos or largely obscured by team colours. I'm really not a fan of that.
nicmarsh
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Re: Cmmonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and National team

Post by nicmarsh »

I expect technically it's not meant to be, but if today you needed arm warmers and your team had none available (imagine they wouldn't need any for August) then you'd use "your own' which of course are those supplied by your usual employer!
Bicycler
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and National tea

Post by Bicycler »

nicmarsh wrote:I expect technically it's not meant to be, but if today you needed arm warmers and your team had none available (imagine they wouldn't need any for August) then you'd use "your own' which of course are those supplied by your usual employer!

I somehow doubt that the nations which make such efforts to design special colour co-ordinated kit for all their sports teams all managed to forget about helmets for the road race. As for other miscellaneous bits of forgotten kit, I doubt that non branded kit would have been hard to acquire at short notice. I'm sure it was deliberate and I assume it was approved/tolerated.
thirdcrank
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and National tea

Post by thirdcrank »

Bicycler wrote: ... I somehow doubt that the nations which make such efforts to design special colour co-ordinated kit for all their sports teams all managed to forget about helmets for the road race. As for other miscellaneous bits of forgotten kit, I doubt that non branded kit would have been hard to acquire at short notice. I'm sure it was deliberate and I assume it was approved/tolerated.


I think you may be overestimating the amount of dosh slopping about in cycling. The BCF, which must currently be financially better off than many Commonwealth governing bodies, is presumably responsible for any number of nations like the Isle of Man, Guernsey, Jersey as well as the four larger ones. To be buying helmets etc that would only be worn in an event taking place every four years does seem a bit extravagant with money that could otherwise be spent developing the sport. I read somewhere that there were objections to GB track helmets being worn (from the same quarter reported to have objected to the Red Arrows including red smoke in their fly past.)

Over the years, there have been all sorts of tails about BCF riders being the poor relations in international competition. I remember a report in the comic that Bill Bradley had represented GB in a jersey which had had to be pinned up with safety pins to prevent its being caught in his rear wheel.
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pjclinch
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by pjclinch »

I thought it was quite handy in a way: "Ah, that'll be Alex Dowsett as it's a Movistar hat", as opposed to "It's someone from England!"
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Bicycler
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by Bicycler »

I'm afraid I was more of the opinion that it looked downright stupid and ruined the look of the specially designed kit. White and red topped with a blue and green blob :shock: Maybe Millar's fitted in better - I didn't see.

Thirdcrank, I take your point about a lack of money to burn but I can't really accept that all those pros wearing their pro-team branded apparel was purely an economy measure.
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Si
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by Si »

A number of them did have tape over various parts of their logos, e.g. Movistar had tape over the word but the green squiggle was still visible. Strangely though the most prominent one was the SKY logo.
thirdcrank
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by thirdcrank »

Lots of the finance must come from the manufacturers. I'm thinking here about things like football boots. Some manufacturers have been very successful in getting their stripes etc widely displayed and must surely invest a lot more than donating the actual kit. Helmets have in common with footwear the scope for incorporating an immediately visible logo or distinctive design. Perhaps helmet manufaturers would be happy to supply "their" riders with any livery they wanted. They do seem to be able to provide yellow and rainbow helmets at short notice. However, even at the Worlds, where the prestige of competing is arguably a tad greater than the Commonwealth Games, riders only ever seem to wear a national jersey over their ordinary trade team kit.

We've also seen some policy swings in this area. Not a million years ago, Super Mario was regularly fined for wearing his own matching shorts for the green jersey. I've even heard it suggested - perhaps in jest - that he carried some in a polka-dot design, just in case. Now, it's considered perfectly normal for the maillot jaune to be in yellow from top to toe and why not?

For many years, the RTTC maintained a rigid "no advertising" rule, probably helped by most competitive cycling being run under their rules in those days. There was also the long-running manoeuvring between national and trade team formats in the TdeF. At one time, the organisers were so powerful that they could insist that riders rode anonymous yellow bikes.
whoops
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by whoops »

By all means cut out advertising and let's go back to being a Cinderella sport along with swimming as we both were many years ago. I'm afraid. As in the words of the song: "Money Makes The World go Round" it is a sign of the times.
It was very noticeable that Thomas had miraculously [unseen on my TV at least] managed to pull up his warmers fully from around his wrists to show off his sponsors name the correct way up when he bent his arms in victory. It would appear that Sky's the limit when it comes to advertising revenue. At least Chris Boardman never kept name dropping like the other commentator did when he referred to "a Garmin Sharp Rider" several times. I was beginning to think no other national teams were competing.
PS. And viewing the closing ceremony it's obvious that the Gold Coast has been told that the "Thighs the Limit" for their budget if they want to use Kylie again.
Bicycler
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by Bicycler »

By all means cut out advertising and let's go back to being a Cinderella sport along with swimming as we both were many years ago. I'm afraid. As in the words of the song: "Money Makes The World go Round" it is a sign of the times.

My understanding of advertising is that you get paid by a company for increasing its brand's exposure. Regardless of the good or evil of commercially sponsored cycling teams in professional cycling, the riders are not competing for them in the Commonwealth Games. They are competing on behalf of their nations who presumably aren't seeing a penny of revenue from this advertising.

Now, call me an idealist, but I don't think that national colours should be sullied by sponsorship. However, if others think that it is acceptable for sportspeople to be walking billboards at these competitions then surely the sponsorship revenue from those billboards should belong to the nations. If finances are truly as dire as Thirdcrank suggests then maybe the extra money would be very useful.
whoops
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by whoops »

Couldn't agree more. But I'm telling it as it is: not the way I like it! I have a sneaking feeling costs come from governments. The Olympic Organisers for example, can't go on building venues all over the Globe from their funds! Surely, that's down to the countries who make the bids to hold the events.
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cdugher
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Re: Commonwealth Games: Commercial sponsors and national tea

Post by cdugher »

Found it interesting that during the triathlon all the bike manufacturers names were taped over but during the cycling events the brands were clearly on show. this doesn't happen during the world series triathlon events so not sure why it did during the commonwealth games tri
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