The UCI recently announced the second edition of the Women's WorldTour with four new events bringing the total to 21 races in 2017. The expanding calendar sees the Aviva Women's Tour start three days after the Philadelphia International Cycling Classic causing participation concerns for the American one-day race.
Last year, the Aviva Women's Tour began 10 days after the Philadelphia race. Robin Mortin, co-founder of race organisers G4 Productions, says that bringing the two events closer together will make it hard for teams to commit to travelling to both, and she is concerned that her one-day race might lose racers.
"Aviva Tour has moved a few days closer to our event in Philadelphia, and that could be impactful for us, in terms of travel for the teams," Morton told Cyclingnews. "That necessitated us making a change in the race schedule for next year."
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For the past two editions, the Philadelphia Cycling Classic has made their women's event the marquee show, starting at noon, while the men's UCI 1.1 event starts early in the morning. But because of the calendar changes, G4 Productions decided to move the women's event back to its original early-morning slot to allow for teams and riders to book international flights out of Philadelphia to London on the same day.
"The riders will get to London on Monday, and the race starts on Tuesday [Wednesday - ed.], so I don't know if that will be impactful on some teams and maybe they will choose not to come and race in Philly. We will see how that goes.
"At least our schedule change gives the riders an opportunity to leave on Sunday night, on a direct flight from Philadelphia to London.
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