SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATE

The news came in yesterday that Steve Peat will retire at the end of the 2016 race season… the year long party can begin now! But we were having a discussion in the Dirt office as to whether Peaty will actually be able to race World Cups next year at all.

This is not backed up with any concrete facts, but Peaty didn’t race World Cups last year due to injury, and therefore doesn’t have any World Cup points. The rules now state that you need 30 UCI points to race a World Cup (up from 20 in 2015), or be part of a UCI trade team (which he is currently not), or be put forward by your national federation (and ride in the national jersey). The national federation route in has been closed, apart from Junior riders. So where does this leave Peaty?

As we say, this is total ‘office talk’, we may be totally wrong. Anyone out there know?

UPDATE:

So we have had news from the UCI via their Twitter account:

“He’ll either need 30 UCI points or he can race in National uniform.”

But we thought that the national uniform way in had been shut down… apparently not.

“The National (uniform) selection option is for Elite too, not only Juniors. No worries then!”

So it appears that Peaty will either have to go and get some points out in Australia in their DH series (or maybe Argentina too), or for the first round in early April in Lourdes (France) he will have to race in the Great British national kit.

From the ‘UCI CYCLING REGULATIONS E0116 MOUNTAIN BIKE 1 PART 4 MOUNTAIN BIKE’ booklet (page 35).

Participation. 4.5.003 UCI mountain bike world cup events are open to riders corresponding to the following categories and criteria:

1. Having obtained at least 30 UCI points in the UCI DHI individual reference ranking .

2. The national federations may enter a maximum of 3 supplementary

riders per category. These riders must wear national team clothing.

3. Women junior riders (aged 17 and 18) belonging to a UCI ELITE

MTB team or a UCI MTB team.

Homepage image: Duncan Philpott.