Cycling’s world governing body the UCI has proposed the introduction of GPS trackers at all races to pinpoint riders’ locations at all times.
The plan comes weeks after the death of Briton Fin Tarling following a collision during the Volta a Portugal with a van, which had strayed on to the course as he rode alone.
At a meeting at its headquarters in Aigle, Switzerland, the UCI’s Professional Cycling Council (PCC), which includes representatives of the UCI, riders, races and teams, “stressed the urgent need to put in place, as quickly as possible, a dedicated safety system allowing the real-time location of riders and vehicles to be tracked at all professional road cycling events, starting with those in the UCI World Tour and UCI Women’s World Tour,” said a statement.
The trackers have already been used at last year’s UCI Road World Championships in Kigali, Rwanda – introduced after the death of 18-year-old Muriel Furrer at the previous year’s event, who crashed in woodland but was not located for more than an hour and 20 minutes before receiving medical attention.
The statement added: “Given safety remains an absolute priority, the UCI will therefore establish protocols and a regulatory framework for the use of real-time tracking systems at races.
“UCI president David Lappartient reiterated that, in discussions on safety, stakeholders need to move past any disagreements on certain issues and act together.”
The latter refers to the differing opinions in the sport on how to tackle safety, including the introduction of improved safety equipment such as helmets.
Tarling’s crash is still under investigation by Portuguese authorities, and while it was not necessarily caused by a lack of knowledge of the 19-year-old’s whereabouts, he was riding off the back of an already fragmented peloton.
Sources have told BBC Sport that the location of riders during races is a big issue, with some teams losing contact with riders entirely until they arrive at the end of stages, which can be more than 200km.
Typically one or two support vehicles follow a team of up to eight riders through a race or stage, many of whom will become detached from the peloton, and lose contact with a car’s limited radio frequency.
On Thursday, there were near crashes involving a rider and cars which had strayed on to the course during the fourth-tier Sauerlandrundfahrt race in Germany in which Louis Leidert of Lidl-Trek twice encountered vehicles during his time trial.
