[crankles]

Originally Posted by rain dogs

As much as I would love to see anything that heps cyclocross grow as a sport, I think the Olympic bid idea might be tough.

The IOC really shys away from sports dominated by one or two nations, and with few nations that participate at the elite level - and that's exactly 'cross is.

This is a Dutch and Belgian sport really. Sure, absolutely, there are riders from many nations, but the podiums in Elite womens would highly likely be entirely Dutch (save Blanka Vas (Hungarian) upending things) and the Men's would almost cetainly be just the Dutch and Belgians fighting it out.

Yes, there are riders like Rochette and Honsinger who could get lucky with the course and have a "legs of my life" day... but we're still talking what? 5, 6 nations with ANY real chance? Even the common points upperleaderboard cycling nations of Italy, France, Spain, Germany, Australia, GB, Colombia, Denmark in various Olympic disciplines have no one or next to no one in elite men's or women's 'cross. Team GB might be the next strongest challenger with Pidcock, Anna Kay and Evie Richards ... and even then, that's only 3 athletes and I think they'd be happy with any single medal against 14 Dutch and 14 Belgians.

Road/Track/MTB are much more diversely represented even if the Dutch and Belgians are still powerhouses.

There's a bit of a chicken/egg thing going on...*IF* it looks as if cyclocross has the possibility of becoming an olympic event, it opens the door for the various countries governing bodies to put some more money into development. Majority of USA Cycling money goes to the disciplines that have an olympic presence.