After the first half of the professional road cycling season, the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) provides an update on initiatives to protect the safety of riders in women’s and men’s professional road races.
The UCI’s initiatives concerning safety are implemented following recommendations from SafeR, the structure dedicated to safety in women’s and men’s road cycling, bringing together representatives of all road cycling’s stakeholders: organisers (Association Internationale des Organisateurs de Courses Cyclistes - AIOCC), teams (Association Internationale des Groupes Cyclistes Professionnels - AIGCP), riders (Cyclistes Professionnels Associés – CPA, and CPA Women) and the UCI.
In the lead up to the Tour de France (5-27 July), the UCI announces the stages which will benefit from an extension of the so-called ‘three-kilometre rule’. As a reminder, under this rule, riders entering the zone leading to the final sprint who are victim of a duly recorded incident (e.g. a fall, mechanical problem or puncture) in the last three to five kilometres of a road stage (excluding summit finishes), are credited with the time of the rider(s) they were with at the moment of the incident. The aim of this measure is to take account of the increasing number of traffic calming devices (e.g. speed bumps, curb extensions, road narrowings) - sources of danger for the peloton - within an ever-greater radius of the race finish sites in urban centres. Extending the zone in which the rule applies reduces the pressure on riders during the phase of the race leading up to the final sprint.
At the 2025 Tour de France, the three-kilometre rule will be extended at seven stages as follows:
Stage 1: Lille – Lille, +5km
Stage 3: Valenciennes – Dunkerque, +5km
Stage 4: Saint Méen-le-Grand – Laval, +5km
Stage 9 : Chinon – Châteauroux, +5km
Stage 15 : Muret – Carcassonne, +4km
Stage 17 : Bollène – Valence, +5km
Stage 21 : Mantes-la-Ville – Paris Champs-Élysées, +5km.
The UCI today also provides an update of the yellow card system introduced at the beginning of the season. So far this year, this has been implemented at 173 race days for men and 62 race days for women (UCI WorldTour, UCI Women’s WorldTour, UCI ProSeries and Continental Championships). It is worth noting that of the 159 yellow cards distributed by Commissaires so far, less than 50% have been imposed on riders (42%). Team staff (including mechanics and Sport Directors) account for 37% of yellow card issued, media/TV representatives (15%) and other motorbikes (6%). In June, for the first time, a rider received two yellow cards in the same event, resulting in an exclusion from that event and a seven-day suspension.
Three types of behaviour that have led to the most yellow cards being issued are unsafe driving in races, unsafe behaviour of team staff in feed zones, and riders in sprints. As a reminder, the list of yellow card recipients is updated weekly on the dedicated page of the UCI website.
The UCI would also like to give an update on the race incidents analysed by the SafeR Case Management Committee and recorded in the UCI Race Incidents Database since the beginning of the year. In the last six months, the Committee has identified and analysed 297 incidents at events on the UCI WorldTour, UCI Women’s WorldTour and UCI ProSeries (men and women) calendars. Of these, 203 causes have been identified. The most common cause – or main contributing factor - is the riders’ own mistake (29%). Upcoming points of interest, where teams and riders are positioning to be at the front (such as cobbles, sprints and climbs), are at the root of 12% of incidents, as are wet or slippery roads. Other incidents stem from descents, traffic infrastructure, sprints, road configuration and conditions, feed zones and other riders’ mistakes.
On the recommendations of SafeR, the UCI will carry out a test at the end of the season to limit the maximum gear ratios. The aim of this measure is to limit extreme rider speeds which are a risk factor for their safety. Tests at all stages of the Tour of Guangxi in China (14-19 October), will restrict the maximum gear ratio to an equivalent of 54 x 11 (10.46 metres per crank revolution). This end-of-season test will be followed by a rider survey and will enable this measure to be studied in detail ahead of any further testing in 2026.
When it comes to feed zones, SafeR continues to monitor the situation with a view to allowing flexibility with the arrival of the summer heat at European races. Measures will include allowing feeding on categorised climbs for example.
Moreover, on the recommendations of SafeR, the UCI has introduced a Restart Protocol for road cycling after an interruption due to extreme weather or safety conditions. This provides guidelines in the case of an event being stopped or neutralized, including a maximum stopping time (15 minutes), the provision of food and warm clothing for riders, the decision to restart the race, calculation of time gaps, grouped restarts, and communication and coordination.
The UCI and SafeR have also established a Protocol for a Way Out and Way In system in road races, to improve the control of vehicle flows and the safety of riders and race personnel. This protocol provides guidelines for managing alternative routes that enable vehicles to leave the race route and rejoin the front of the race in a controlled manner. This system is designed to provide smooth and safe movement of marshals and vehicles, and avoid dangerous overtaking of the peloton, thus reducing the risk of accidents caused by interactions between motorbikes, support vehicles and riders.
Finally, the UCI is leading a project to introduce rider tracking, which it plans to introduce at the 2025 UCI Road World Championships in Kigali, Rwanda, in September. To this end, SafeR experts were present at the Tour de Suisse Women and Tour de Suisse earlier this month to observe and assess the testing and development of GPS technology used by the organisers to track riders and alert a security centre in the case of abnormal signals. For future seasons, the UCI will collaborate with stakeholders on the broader implementation of rider tracking to ensure organisers, medical services and UCI Commissaires are provided with relevant data in real time throughout the race.
UCI President David Lappartient said: “Rider safety continues to be an important priority for the UCI and all cycling’s stakeholders. In the first half of the road cycling season, we have implemented measures recommended by SafeR that were subject to a test phase last year. In parallel, the SafeR Case Management Committee’s weekly analyses of race incidents identify dangerous and sensitive situations and their causes, enabling us to study and test potential solutions. This is possible thanks to the joint efforts of riders, teams and organisers, all of whom are working towards a common goal: to make road cycling events safer for everyone on the race route and on the sidelines.”