IT has always been something of a curiosity that for all the world-class bike riders Scotland has produced, this country has never been home to a professional cycling team.
Sir Chris Hoy, Robert Millar and Graeme Obree are just a few of the names who established themselves as some of the greatest riders ever, while at the top of the sport currently are the likes of Olympic gold medallists, Katie Archibald and Callum Skinner.
Yet the draw-back for Scottish riders, particularly those who ply their trade on the road, has been that if they wanted to pursue a career as a professional cyclist, they had to leave these shores.
That may be about to change though.
Cairn Velo is the brainchild of Graeme Herd, a former Scottish national coach and director sportif of women’s pro team, WNT.
His newest project though, in collaboration with a number of his compatriots, is Cairn Velo, which, if things pan out as Herd hopes, will become Scotland’s first-ever professional bike racing team.
Things are still in the very early stages but Herd, from Barrhead, is optimistic that the plans they have put in place give the project the best possible opportunity to work out. Currently, most pro teams rely almost entirely on sponsorship whereas Cairn Velo will operate as a business selling bikes, with all profits going towards funding the team. It is a somewhat revolutionary approach, but one that Herd believes is vital if they are to develop a team that will survive in the long-term.
“The theory is that makes doing it like this more things far more secure,” he said.
“You look at how volatile the environment can be in cycling and when you’re totally dependent on sponsorship, things can blow up so quickly. I don’t see how it can be done sustainably any other way than something like this - riding the bike is the easy part, it’s getting the backing is the hardest bit.”
Cairn Velo have also launched a kick-starter campaign to help get the team off the ground and Herd is confident that with the expertise involved, all bases will be covered. Scottish international riders Eileen Roe and Evan Oliphant have also been involved in forming the team and Herd is effusive about how valuable the pair’s input will be.
“They’re an integral part of this team because it’s not just about what they can do on a bike, it’s also about them using all the knowledge they’ve learnt while on a bike and how they can use that,” he said.
“In a few years, you won’t be looking at Eileen Roe bike rider any more, you’ll hopefully be looking at Eileen Roe director sportif.”
Herd has made attempts in the past to form teams, on the women’s side particularly, but for one reason or another, they’ve not quite come to fruition. The vision for Cairn Velo is to start with a women’s team, expand to a men’s team and while it will be Scottish-based, Herd and his partners are not being parochial. If the team is a success though, Herd is optimistic that this could be huge for bike racing in Scotland and the development of riders.
“It’ll be a Scottish team but we’re not looking at exclusively Scottish riders,” he said.
“If you look at Scottish riders who are currently doing well, they do well in spite of where they come from and not because of it. At the moment, if you don’t want to ride on the track, you have to find a team in Belgium or Holland or somewhere like that.
This means that for Scottish road riders coming through, they have somewhere to go that will enable them to compete at a high level. This would be huge for Scotland. What the recent Commonwealth Games shows is that we have people who can ride bikes well enough to win stuff so that’s a pretty good start. So it would be fantastic for things to work out.”
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