The question “Who is your favourite Tour de France cycling team?” is tricky to answer because of cycling’s labyrinthine naming conventions.
If your top team happened to be team Trek-Segafredo in women’s racing, all good. Google can find that team for you, and you can see the lineup and buy their kit to show support if you want.
But if you are a fan of the men’s Trek-Segafredo team, you’re out of date as it no longer exists. As of May 2023, that team is now called Lidl-Trek – a change so on the down-low that even our very own Dave Walsh didn’t know about it. And Dave is a walking, talking cycling encyclopedia.
Oh, and, if this isn’t confusing enough, women’s Trek-Segafredo was called Lidl-Trek for the first three years of its existence, until 2018.
Welcome to the weird world of team evolution in cycling.
What’s in a name?
What's in a name? In a word: money.
At least in cycling, unlike, for example, football. Manchester United is called Manchester United and has been since 1892, though it did start life as Newton Heath LYR Football Club in 1878. Football teams have lots of ways to make money, namely in their share of TV broadcasting rights, but also ticket sales, merchandise and, yes, sponsorship.
But a top football team,with matches broadcast globally on multiple channels like Sky sports, puts those team shirt sponsor logos in front of an audience of hundreds of millions, (billions if you count fans wearing the kit).
In cycling, it’s very different:
The three biggest cycling events, Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and Vuelta España have all rights controlled by ASO, a French media organisation. ASO takes a more conservative approach to TV rights and isn't interested in signing deals with the likes of Sky Sports. As a result, globally recognised mega brands like Coca Cola, Nike or Red Bull have no interest in paying for TV ads with the reach these cycling events have.
But what’s all this got to do with the names of cycling teams?
