Black pro cyclists.

[ufkacbln]

They - as in black: in my eyes i'm no different to a 'black guy' etc.. ive got 2 arms just like them, i've got 2 legs just like them, I can breath and see, just like them, in fact I and my brother - mr black man (what a ficking rediculous term) are soo similar I CANNOT TELL THE DIFFERENCE...

Ive never gone for this 'talking about them as though they are an insect or a bloody alien...

CAUSE AS FAR AS I'M CONCERNED - THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE !



If you label/seperate - then that in itself is being rascist END OF !

There is a line between the two that need not be crossed.

I certainly see a difference in the approach to cycling from other ethnic groups, and it is a difference that can be observed without being racist or bigoted in any way.

In fact the opposite is true if you do not recognise the differences of other racial or ethnic groups then you are trying to impose your stereotypes.

Now whether the difference is cultural, physical or genetic - there in no danger in recognising it and asking why the deficit?

The Major Taylor organisation has tried to overcome many of the cultural and economic barriers but still has still not introduced its members to professional level cycling - Why?

 

[Mr Pig]

Sprinters, climbers and domestiques all need different body types, so I would agree with you that the absence of black riders from all categories must be economic.

It may be a factor but it can't be the only reason. After all, there are many black Americans who excel at sports, they don't come from a poor country. Great black athletes come from many developed countries where money and infrastructure would not be a barrier to taking up cycling.

I think it's more likely that there are other reasons. Perhaps cultural, with so many role models in athletics they simply don't think about cycling. Maybe there are physical differences that are not obvious that help in athletics and hinder in cycling. I don't know what they might be there could be. Some physical issue that gets in the way of black athletes being brilliant at cycling. As I said, at the top level it wouldn't take much.

 

[purplepolly]

It may be a factor but it can't be the only reason. After all, there are many black Americans who excel at sports, they don't come from a poor country. Great black athletes come from many developed countries where money and infrastructure would not be a barrier to taking up cycling. .

They're not from a poor country but they do come from a country where is a huge gulf between rich and poor. Sport is a big thing in american colleges and sports scholarships provide many students from deprived backgrounds with the means to go to college and improve their lives.

 

[Danny]

Actually Danny, i think you'll find that its cycling thats ignoring the fact that they appear to be the colour-blind (BTW) do you want me to take offence on the fac that you use colour-blindness with no respect to me as I, am colour blind - no, i dont expect you too !!!

Many apologies for the inappropriate use of language.

But no apologies for challenging your general point, which is quite frankly rubbish. I am sure there are all sorts of complex reasons why more black people are not involved in cycling, but to pretend it isn't an issue is just burying your head in the sand.

 

[purplepolly]

But no apologies for challenging your general point, which is quite frankly rubbish. .

that's why he's in the urban dictionary

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=yen-rod

 

[Flying_Monkey]

Some of you are hilarious. Chrisz got it largely right. There are important genetic differences between people, but most of this is about money and the realities of day-to-day life, personal and infrastructural - as RR also showed with regard to the conditions that cyclists face in Nigeria.

But if you are going to try to talk about physiological differences, some of you might want to educate yourselves a little first, for example: 'black' is not a genetic category that any scientist in this area would understand. 'Africans' are also not a meaningful category in terms of either genetics or culture. Neither are 'Brazilians' a race... etc. etc. etc. Some of you do talk utter, and yes, racist, crap without even realising it. After all, ignorance is generally the basis of most common forms of racism.

 

[DJ]

I saw the same programme mate - an interesting but irrelevant conclusion! By this logic I should be able to run/cycle whatever quite happily in the nice warm weather we are having at the moment but I should not be able to cope with the -45 cold that we often encountered in the Arctic!

As it happens I thrived quite happily in arctic conditions - but then I also loved working in the jungle. Acclimatisation is the key - not genetics!

If I took half a dozen people from the UK and dumped them in Northern Norway in winter time they would suffer just as much as a Ghanaian!

The reason some races seem to have an advantage in sport is often actually due to exercise and diet history, social upbringing/lifestyle and motivation rather than genetics.

The average Kenyan runner can earn enough from one good season in Europe to support his (often rather extended by western standards) family for many years. Given that there are very few other opportunities for people from some areas to make anything of themselves is it any wonder they seem more motivated to succeed? Combine this hightened level of motivation with a lifelong history of running up and down hills/mountains each day, walking many miles, a healthy low-fat diet, a lack of smoking or alcohol, the muscle development (slow twitch fibre) that comes with years and years of aerobic work and it's little wonder that Ethiopians and Kenyans seem to have an advantage.

Negros tend to be under-represented in sports like cycling because of the high costs involved. Look at many other high cost sports (water sports, motor sport etc.) and you will see a similar pattern.

The few sports where negros tend to excel are those that require little in the way of outlay (cost of equipment & training facilities).

These are socio-economic factors not genetics.

Trying to account for differences in performance is a dangerous practice - Adolf tried it, others before him have tried it and so have black extremists.

For some people it's easier to blame race or genetics on good or poor performance and thereby ignore the root cause.

I like this answer, I would hate to think of my son, who (shock horror) is not pure British decent and infact nor am I but you would'nt know by looking at me, of not being able to achieve anything that he would like to achieve simply due to racial history!!!!

It's my personal belief that people who bang on about different physiologies in people are showing a level of ignorance on a par with any form of rascism it is a kind of rascism that the perpetrator of that belief trys to disguise in some kind of mythological scientific beleif.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

It's my personal belief that people who bang on about different physiologies in people are showing a level of ignorance on a par with any form of rascism it is a kind of rascism that the perpetrator of that belief trys to disguise in some kind of mythological scientific beleif.

Well, like I said, people who talk about 'black people' or 'Africans' having different physiologies are being racist even if it's just the result of ignorance (and mostly, it is). However there is physiological variation within humanity, which it is equally ignorant to deny, but it is very important to know exactly what you are talking about before you start claiming 'people X' are better at 'sport A' because...

 

[Globalti]

If you're going to discuss this in racial terms surely you need to lose your fear of the word negro? A few years on here I was soundly bollocked my several contiributors for daring to use this un-PC word yet here we have Chrisz (who I assume to be black from his posts) using it twice in one post without censure! Thanks Chrisz!

Anyway, back to my original point - money has to be the issue: it costs nothing to run around Kenya or Ethiopia but a fortune in African terms to buy even a Flying Pigeon Chinese-made utility bike. There is also the cultural issue whereby cycling is seen as poor man's transport by people who aspire to a 504 at the very least.

On a recent trip to Syria I was driving along a wide empty country road with my agent who is a young and intelligent Syrian. To my amazement we came across a cycling team out training, complete with support van. They had matching gear and were on matching Giants. One guy was riding alone and quite far out from the gutter to find smooth tarmac. My agent crept up behind him, slowed down until his bonnet was inches from the cyclist's wheel and then gave the poor bloke a blast on his horn. I was shocked and gave Riad a piece of my mind. His response was equally shocking; he shouted angrily: "He is blocking the road for me; he forces me to move out into the next lane where I might be hit by another car! He should not be riding on the public road!"

I've known Riad for 20 years, he even stayed at my house for 3 months whe he was younger and I thought I knew him but this shattered me.

 

[papercorn2000]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tour_of_Eritrea
Google is your friend - possibly due to their colonial past? (See India/Pakistan and cricket)

 

[Flying_Monkey]

If you're going to discuss this in racial terms surely you need to lose your fear of the word negro? A few years on here I was soundly bollocked my several contiributors for daring to use this un-PC word yet here we have Chrisz (who I assume to be black from his posts) using it twice in one post without censure! Thanks Chrisz!

Eric Hobsbaum, the eminent left-wing historian used the word 'negro', largely because he got fed up with trying to keep track of the many changes to what was or was not acceptable. He noted that all of the most progressive civil rights leaders used the word (which just means 'black' after all).

It still doesn't help us with any physiological argument, because being 'black' isn't an explanatory factor. Culturally it can be, but that depends on the place we're talking about.

 

[Mr Pig]

'black' is not a genetic category that any scientist in this area would understand.

But were not scientist. We're just having a general discussion and using terms understood by most people. If I refer to people as black the majority of readers will make a correct assumption about who I mean. There's really no need to be more specific right now.

I also reject the idea that using the term black to identify a people group is racist. They do it themselves! MOBO awards, Music Of Black Origin, is one example. Would I be offended if I were in a black community and people identified me as the white guy? No, why would I?

I detest this politically correctness crap. It causes problems where there are none. Often I think the people who accuse others of being racist are the ones with the issues.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

But were not scientist. We're just having a general discussion and using terms understood by most people. If I refer to people as black the majority of readers will make a correct assumption about who I mean. There's really no need to be more specific right now.

I also reject the idea that using the term black to identify a people group is racist. They do it themselves! MOBO awards, Music Of Black Origin, is one example. Would I be offended if I were in a black community and people identified me as the white guy? No, why would I?

I detest this politically correctness crap. It causes problems where there are none. Often I think the people who accuse others of being racist are the ones with the issues.

Mr Pig, as usual you fail to get the point entirely and end up with a rant that has nothing to do with what I was talking about.

The point was this:

If you make a claim about physiology (or genetics) and then apply it to 'blacks' or 'Africans' or 'Brazilians' (or 'whites' or 'Americans'), it will probably not make much sense. Do you understand why?

There are physiological differences but they do not fit these categories.

Culture, in any particular context, is an entirely different matter, as I have already said...

Perhaps you should try reading what people actually write and taking some time to understand it, rather than going off on one.

 

[ASC1951]

I saw the same programme mate....
If I took half a dozen people from the UK and dumped them in Northern Norway in winter time they would suffer just as much as a Ghanaian!

No, they wouldn't, that was the whole conclusion of the programme. Of course there are great individual variations but there are some physiological differences between racial types which no amount of personal acclimatisation will outweigh.

Evolutionary pressure will incorporate that acclimatisation eventually - everyone alive originated in central Africa 70,000 years ago - but not over one or even a dozen lifetimes.

I would hope everyone agrees that all races are morally/intellectually/socially identical but to go to the other end of the scale and insist - as some here do - they are all physiologically identical is simply stupid. Where physiological differences have an advantage, for instance in sport, that will affect racial representation even after other factors are taken into account. If there was ever an event where it was a disadvantage to have red hair, you wouldn't have as many competitors who originated in Western Europe.

Going back to the OP, Chrisz, I'm sure you are right that in the case of professional cycling the reasons are economic and social; and that was what I said.

 

[PaulB]

I'm so glad my original question has proved to have united the board.

I wasn't really questioning why people from African nations haven't become leading lights in cycling but why so few non-white cyclists are at the top of the profession. Some have said the expense but tennis is often regarded as an expensive and elitist sport yet we've had some superb black tennis champions. The same in golf now so how come none of the major trade teams have seen fit to include a black rider on their rostas?

When Britain, the United States and numerous other nations are represented at a wide range of sports by people of all skin colours, why is cycling almost unique in being dominated by white riders of European descent?