The UCI is already monitoring sports betting and potential manipulation in cycling races

The growth of sports betting and the cases of match-fixing that have occurred in other sports have put the UCI on alert, considering it a threat to cycling similar to that posed by doping or technological fraud.

Intensive monitoring and stricter regulations, UCI measures to prevent illegal betting

Illegal sports betting has become a real problem in some sports, as demonstrated by the recent scandals uncovered in the NBA and the U.S. Baseball League. Cycling, due to its ease of manipulation, could be a sport vulnerable to being influenced by illegal betting, which is why the UCI has decided to take action and closely monitor any suspicious situations.

As of today, cycling represents a relatively small market for sports betting; however, the characteristics of this sport make it easy to manipulate certain moments of the race: which cyclist reaches the top of a climb first, a cyclist who lets themselves be beaten in a two-person breakaway in a more or less disguised manner, a team that starts pulling without any stakes to break up a breakaway, cyclists negotiating during the race to let each other win… these are situations as old as cycling itself that, however, sports betting could make much more common, affecting the image of a sport that has had to deal with the scourge of doping for years.

RECOMENDADO

New Rockrider Race 940 S 2026: more setups, same frame, and ready for any World Cup

Several teams are looking to attract Premier Tech after leaving Israel

What is the winter bicycle and why is it disappearing

The Israel team loses its main sponsor but asks the cyclists not to leave

Crispy Rice with Marshmallows Bars, the recipe that triumphs in the peloton

A road bike to win the European Cyclocross Championship

To prevent this as much as possible, the UCI is monitoring the types of bets offered by different platforms, seeking to relate them to what happens in competition to try to find unusual patterns that indicate illegal betting is taking place.

In fact, the UCI has had an article in its regulations since 2019 that refers to sports betting, prohibiting all license holders of any kind from organizing bets on cycling events and betting, either directly or through intermediaries, on events in which they could participate, under penalty of a two-year sanction.

Now the UCI is tightening its policy on sports betting by prohibiting some easily manipulable types of bets, such as head-to-head bets where one bets on which of two cyclists will achieve the best result. Additionally, the highest governing body of cycling has regulated sponsorship by betting houses so that teams cannot give visibility to these betting companies to avoid the risk that the interests of these companies could lead to manipulation of the races.

Although no abnormal situations have been detected in cycling so far, the UCI, after seeing what has happened in other sports, has preferred to anticipate and harden its stance regarding betting to avoid any scandal that could damage the always precarious image of cycling.