Sander SteinsBack in the 1990s, I always bought Wieler Revue, a Dutch cycling magazine that listed upcoming races and where they would take place. Even then, there were only a handful of criteriums featuring women’s races, which meant travelling across the country if you wanted to watch them. At each event you could usually pick up or buy a race programme, while local newspapers often covered the races extensively.
Even then, the men’s races attracted significantly larger crowds. In that respect, things have slowly improved, but there is still a major shortage of women’s races. The number of racing licences and criteriums has been declining in the Netherlands for years. That is not only because organising races has become increasingly expensive and complex, but also because the entire media landscape has changed dramatically.
Twenty years ago, a local organiser could successfully promote an event through:
- local newspapers
- posters and flyers
- regional radio
- cycling clubs
- word of mouth
- a simple website
Visibility may have been smaller, but it was also more concentrated and relatively predictable. Everyone had roughly the same opportunity to be seen, making it possible to bring a race to the attention of the right audience (and sponsors).
The promise of social media
Then social media arrived, promising to become the ideal communication and networking tool.
At first, it seemed fantastic. Instagram became the platform where the cycling world came together. Suddenly, even a small women’s criterium could reach thousands of fans without a large marketing budget. Sponsors welcomed the opportunity, and many believed the playing field had become more democratic. If everyone used the same platform, it would surely become easier to make races visible to spectators and sponsors alike. Local media also appeared to have gained a powerful new tool.
The reality, however, has turned out to be far more complex.
The attention economy
Over the past decade, social media and the increasing amount of in-house marketing produced by cycling teams have fundamentally changed the media landscape.
In the past, a journalist could visit a criterium or road race and write an article about it. That article would be read by almost everyone who bought the newspaper or magazine.
Today, that very same article has to compete with:
- cycling news from around the world
- videos and memes
- content produced by cycling teams
- advertisements
- influencers
- ragebait
- AI-generated content
This creates a fundamentally different media environment, where reaching the people who are genuinely interested in reading that article has become much more difficult. You could argue that the distribution of attention has changed completely.
The reality
The core of today’s challenge is that the infrastructure of the internet has changed dramatically over the past ten years.
Visibility has become increasingly dependent on systems that race organisers have no control over.
- algorithmic selection
- paid visibility
- platform dependency
- constantly changing reach
- AI-generated content filling timelines
- polarising content that generates more engagement than balanced reporting
As a result, a strange situation has emerged.
A volunteer may organise a fantastic women’s criterium. Photographers capture beautiful images and journalists produce high-quality articles. Yet, in the end, a commercial algorithm largely determines how many people will actually see them.
That is a fundamentally different reality from twenty years ago.
The online troll
The culture surrounding online sport has also changed dramatically.
A recent 2026 study concluded that online abuse directed at elite female athletes is a serious, gender-specific issue.
The United Nations has also published figures on this subject, reporting that between 16 and 58 percent of women and girls worldwide have experienced online violence or harassment, depending on the population and research methodology.
This does not mean that everyone behaves badly online. However, we do have to acknowledge that many female athletes now regularly face:
- sexist comments
- personal attacks
- intimidation
- trolling
- anonymous accounts
- constant judgement of their appearance alongside their athletic performance
This undoubtedly affects the experience of female cyclists.
On Instagram, this behaviour also appears to become more visible. Content that provokes strong emotions or controversy often generates higher engagement, giving internet trolls and provocative behaviour more exposure and effectively rewarding them for their actions.
In addition, Meta (Instagram and Facebook) has significantly reduced its moderation teams in recent years, something that is unlikely to contribute to a safer online environment.
A new reality
The public space has not disappeared, but it has largely become privatised.
In the past, newspaper editors decided what was newsworthy. Today, commercial recommendation systems increasingly determine what becomes visible and, as a result, what people perceive as important.
That represents a fundamental shift.
Not only for women’s cycling, cycling teams, journalists or fans, but for every small organisation that depends on public attention to survive.
If a local women’s criterium is no longer competing with the race in the next town, but instead with millions of videos, advertisements, AI-generated content and algorithmically selected posts from around the world, is it really surprising that volunteers are finding it increasingly difficult to attract sponsors, spectators and media attention… and, ultimately, to organise a race at all?
