Viewing 17 posts - 1 through 17 (of 17 total)
  • Racing lincences.
  • donsimon
    Free Member

    How many of you have the British Cycling racing licence?

    What races can/can’t you use it with?

    I know nothing about the British racing (XC) scene and am probably going to spend a couple of months in the UK next year and will want to race. Is there a national racing series? Or regional? Are things like Merdida Marathons licenced?
    For those who have a British cycling licence, what benefits do you get? 74 quid seems alot for 2-3 months!!!

    Thanks.

    GW
    Free Member

    it’s not worth buying a BC license unless you are Elite level IMO

    SpokesCycles
    Free Member

    What GW said. Unreasonably expensive, you get nothing for them except “points” which don’t get you anything unless you’re elite and need it to show the sponsors and BC don’t really give a stuff about MTB anyway.

    Unless you’re racing Elite you don’t need one to enter races and you’ll still get ranked in your category in the series. You’ll also still be able to enter the Champs as a Sport rider.

    There are no other “benefits” at all except some bonus discount at wiggle, which obviously you won’t want.

    xcwanabe
    Free Member

    If you want to race more than one of the BMBS rounds in a recognised cat (Elite/Expert/Master/Sport) you’ll need a BC licence. There are plenty of reginal races throughout the country (check out xcracer.com for more event info) and as the guys have already said you won’t need a licence to acrue championship points.

    most/all enduro events can be entered with out a licence.

    There other benefits to having a licence apart from wiggle discount, third party insurance, bike insurance, legal aid etc.

    Hope this helps
    Rob
    reluctant BC licence holder and 47th Master!

    mtbmatt
    Free Member

    Unless you’re racing Elite you don’t need one to enter races and you’ll still get ranked in your category in the series. You’ll also still be able to enter the Champs as a Sport rider.

    Not true. You need a Racing License to compete in any category at BMBS events, excluding “Open” category where no points are available. I think you can enter 1 event of the series without a license, but you wont be eligible to earn points.

    In some regional races you can get a day license and some races you don’t need a license at all, like the Gorrick series.

    Coleman
    Free Member

    You can get a free provisional race licence with Bronze, Silver and Gold British Cycling membership. The link below indicates which type of licence is required for races staged in the UK.

    http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/membership/article/mem-st-Racing-Licence-Prices-0-Need-a-Racing-Licence–0

    crazy-legs
    Full Member

    For those who have a British cycling licence, what benefits do you get? 74 quid seems alot for 2-3 months!!!

    Unlike a lot of other National Federations, BC splits the cost of Membership and the cost of a licence. You can have a Membership without a licence (well, it gives you a Provisional one automatically), it’s the actual Membership which gives you the insurance benefits, discounts etc – there’s a link here to the offers and benefits:
    http://new.britishcycling.org.uk/membership/article/memst-Money-Saving-Offers

    The licence is an extra £32 on top of whatever membership you buy (most people go with Silver at £36/year) so a total price of £68. If you buy a licence after July, it’s half price cos there’s only 6 months of the year left. 🙂
    2011 licences are available to buy from 1st December.

    As for MTBing some races require one, some don’t. It’s much more relevant to Road & Track racing TBH.

    missingfrontallobe
    Free Member

    Just get ride membership, nearly all the benefits of bronze through gold but at a fraction of the membership. Got MFL jr membership too mainly for third party liability in case he runs into a parked car or something stupid like that.

    offthebrakes
    Free Member

    Some European events require you to have a licence from your own national body. I’ve never done a race in the UK that’s needed a licence but I’ve twice ended up paying for one to race in France or Italy.

    donsimon
    Free Member

    Lots to think about, so people generally don’t have licences then? Here in Madrid, we have regional federations and licences, it’s obligatory to have a licence for racing in Madrid. The licence entitles you to race, covers insurance and repatriation if I need hospital or burial(!!! 😯 ) in the UK. The Madrid federation has recently sanctioned lots of riders with a 1 month ban from competition for racing in an unauthorised/ non-federation race, so licences are important from my point of view.

    For mountain bike racing there is no need for a licence to race in regional races?

    For BMBS, you need a licence, correct?

    After a quick look at the BMBS site it seems that the races draw fair crowds and the level will be quite high, no?

    XCRacer.com is the best resource for racing info?

    Slightly, but less tahn before, confused, Madrid.

    Thanks so far.

    donsimon
    Free Member

    Some European events require you to have a licence from your own national body. I’ve never done a race in the UK that’s needed a licence but I’ve twice ended up paying for one to race in France or Italy.

    British Cycling say that, and I quote, “All Full licences issued by British Cycling are UCI recognised therefore can be used to race outside of the UK”, and that, “Any licence holder racing outside the UK would also need to request a letter of authority from British Cycling for the specific country in which they are racing.”

    This is something that I’m looking at too as I know some folks who want to race over here, but knowing how the Madrid Federation is….. 😥

    offthebrakes
    Free Member

    Letter of authority? Never been asked for one of those, but then I wasn’t doing anything UCI-sanctioned.

    crazy-legs
    Full Member

    Letter of Authority again usually applies to Road (and often CX) racing abroad – it’s very common for UK riders to go to Belgium and France to gain experience of bigger races where the standard is considerably higher than here. The rider phones or emails BC and requests the Letter. It’s just emailed out as a pdf, says that the rider is a paid up member of BC, insured for racing etc. Sometimes foreign race organisers ask to see it, sometimes they don’t.

    Spanish Federation has been forced to crack down a bit following the Contador case and numerous other anti-doping infringements by Spanish riders so they’ve begun to get their house in order a bit and start doing things by the book…

    donsimon
    Free Member

    Spanish Federation has been forced to crack down a bit following the Contador case and numerous other anti-doping infringements by Spanish riders so they’ve begun to get their house in order a bit and start doing things by the book…

    I’m talking about the Madrid Federation and not RFEC, which is one of the reasons I don’t fully understand the British set up.
    Assuming you race crazy-legs, do you race abroad and, if so, have you had to pay for two licences?

    njee20
    Free Member

    No, the whole point of the BC license being UCI certified is that it’ll do you abroad. The UK system is far easier than the Spanish really.

    You have non-ranked races, notably the Gorrick series in the South East, no national ranking points are on offer, but anyone can race any category. You could buy your first bike and race elite the next day.

    There are ranked regional races, which require a licence for elite and expert, and if you have one in other categories you accrue points for your national ranking.

    There are National (BMBS) races where you need a licence for all categories except open if you race more than one event. You can’t even race one even in expert or elite without the appropriate license. You will not be ranked nor gridded in the series without a license.

    Basically… If you’re here for a couple of months and want to do an XC race you don’t need one, you probably won’t do more than one BMBS, you’re not going to be able to race expert or elite anyway, as they’ll only issue you a sport licence. That’s no real use in itself unless you want to gain points and become an expert.

    SpokesCycles
    Free Member

    Only BMBS requires a license at top level. I doubt you’d need one to just compete in sport- the Scottish series doesn’t.

    Any other races (except the DH series) doesn’t require one at all.

    donsimon
    Free Member

    Thanks all.

Viewing 17 posts - 1 through 17 (of 17 total)

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