Indian Cycling Thread ...

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piranha
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Indian Cycling Thread ...

Post by piranha »

I bought a couple of "Made in India" tubes for my mountain-bike's tyres. And I was wondering if cycling is a popular sport in India. I know that your transportation system is largely based on railways, but you have several car manufacturers, so you also have and public roads, that  cyclists could use too.

Are there cycling teams in India ? Do they have webpages ?
Last edited by jaydeep on Mon Apr 28, 2008 9:02 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Indian cycling ?

Post by sunnyd »

Cycling as a sport (the kind we see at the Tour de France) isn't very popular in India. However, there are people who go cross-country cycling and stuff.

Cycling is a very popular form of transportation for short distances .
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Post by BSharma »

I agree with sunnyd that people in India use the cycle to travel within the city but cross country races are not popular.

India lacks stadium for bicycle races and hence the Indian cyclist do not have proper training facilities. The Indian inter-city roads are not safe for even the cars and hence bicycle racing will be even more dangerous unless the traffic is stopped and raods are properly paved.

The Indian triathlon federation (see link in this forum) has done a good job of training some Indians as part of triathlon, and some of the triathletes are becoming competitive at Asian level competition.

Indian Triathlon
Some discussion about triathlon took place in the Athletics thread.
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Post by PKBasu »

piranha, you did well to buy those Made in India tubes. The Indian tyre industry is strong and growing rapidly -- both in quality and quantity -- although road cycling as a sport hasn't taken off.
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Post by PKBasu »

India is also in the midst of a great road-building program (called the Golden Quadrilateral), the first phase of which is nearly complete. That will provide better opportunities for cycle racing. Also there are some great mountain-biking opportunities in the foothills of the Himalayas. (When I was in high school, some of us once took a 150km cycle ride over a 13-hour period -- starting at night (foolishly) -- in the plains near Darjeeling, where the tea comes from. It was tiring as hell, but a more picturesque route is difficult to find anywhere).
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Post by BSharma »

piranha, visit India this year and then come back in a few years. India is making rapid progress and you will notice a big change. New roads are being built because many multi-national companies want to manufacture goods in India and then export them. These companies want better roads to move the products efficiently. My only concern is the truck drivers who seem to break all traffic laws when driving on Indian roads.
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Post by piranha »

In Romania there is only one velodrome in the entire country (photo below). It is more than a century old and it is paved with concrete blocks that moves when the rider gets on the two turns on high speed (centrifugal forces are pushing them).

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The roads are not far better in India than in Romania. During time-trials, the traffic is not stopped if you can imagine that. You have to perform for a good time while keep out of cars !
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Post by PKBasu »

India probably has more than one velodrome. The first top-class one was built for the 1982 Asian Games in New Delhi (it was good then, but I presume it is now feeling the ravages). There is almost certainly another one in Hederabad, and a few others around the country.
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Post by BSharma »

New Delhi has a velodrome. See it picture in The Hindu newspaper. New Delhi will get a new velodrome for the 2010 Commonwealth Games.
http://www.hinduonnet.com/2002/06/11/st ... 092100.htm

The Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports in Patiala has one.
The Punjab Agricultural University has a velodrome.
Rajiv Gandhi Velodrome in Andaman and Nicobar.
Velodrome at Osmania University in Hyderabad.

The Vallabhbhai Patel velodrome at Worli, Mumbai (built in 1952) was demolished in 2003 to construct an indoor stadium.
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Post by piranha »

The velodrome picture is very nice! Maybe the climate in South-East Asia isn’t the best suitable for road cycling and probably that’s why there are quite many track cycling talents from Asia. Look at that Malaysian who is competing against the all-mighty French Florian Rousseau and Laurent Gané.

The Manukau velodrome in Auckland/ New Zealand was built for the Commonwealth Games too (the winner of the NZ Rally gets the chance here to drive his car on the track).

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I think Romania should host an edition of the Commonwealth Games in order to built a viable velodrome.
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Post by India1989 »

There has been a Mumbai to Pune cycle race. I dont' know what kind of cycle race it is. But it is a kind of cycle race.

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/00 ... 170312.htm

Anyways how many different types of cycle races are there?
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Post by India1989 »

Cool. So how many different types of cycle races are there?
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Post by piranha »

There are two major types of cycling: track and road cycling.

Track cycling is mainly an indoor sport and it is run on velodromes, paved with wood or concrete. There are about a dozen disciplines of track racing: pursuit, keirin, sprint, points addition, etc.

Road cyclists are competing outdoors on public or private roads, on asphalt or on gravel/mud. Competitions like the "Tour de France" are on asphalt only and the bikes used are profiled for hi-speed on flat roads, climbing or descending. Bikes have no suspension and the tires are narrow and inflated to high pressures in order to reduce road ressistance. There are also mountain-bike competitions, on roads whose surface is irregular (it is often to encounter rocks, holes in the road, tough obstacles like fallen trees) and therefore bikes are specially equiped with large tires, suspensions, shock-absorbers. In both ashpalt and mountain-bike competitions there are stages that are run in the pack (the entire peloton is racing together) and there are individual time-trials (each rider is starting alone on a 1 minute interval in his own battle with the clock and himself). The "Tour de France" also has team time-trials, where an entire team is starting at the same time.
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Post by India1989 »

Oh ok. thanks man. Road cycling and Track cycling.
Road cycling has more variety I see. well the cycles they use are crazy though. the cycles we use are not good enough. what we do is street racing. Need for Speed Cycles.
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