TALKESPORT

British Cycling has agreed to a two-year partnership with virtual racing and training app Zwift, which will include an “eRacing” national championship next year, open to everyone.

Both women’s team Canyon-SRAM and men’s WorldTour team Dimension Data have used Zwift competitions to “talent spot” riders in the last two years.

In 2016 Leah Thorvilson earned herself a contract with Canyon-SRAM, while Tanja Erath did the same last year. Ollie Jones also won a contract with Dimension Data’s under-23 development team last year, and British Cycling will use their “indoor national championships” to help find any potential future stars, too.

“The esports market is particularly exciting for cycling as it enables so many more people to participate and be active,” Jonathan Rigby, British Cycling’s commercial director, said on the federation’s web site.

“We’re thrilled to be exploring this new territory with Zwift to innovate in cycle sport. Their technology and our cycling expertise will together allow communities of cyclists to get more out of riding bikes for competition and for fun.

“We’re also excited about what this could mean for identifying talent,” Rigby continued. “We’re proud to have a wealth of gifted riders competing on the world stage and are confident that Zwift technology will enable us to unearth more future stars.”

The competition, which is set to start in February or March 2019, is open to all riders, who will have to race through a number of qualifying events before the country’s best meet to battle it out through a number of different race formats, with a national champion’s jersey awarded to the winner. However, to qualify for the finals, you have to be a member of British Cycling.

International Cycling Union (UCI) President David Lappartient told Cyclingnews in September  of the cycling governing body’s intention to launch what would be a similar esports world championships.

The Chongqing Major has been the home to the largest controversy in DotA 2 in 2018. Carlo “Kuku” Palad, a DotA 2 player from TNC Predator, was banned from attending an upcoming tournament after he made racist comments against the Chinese team during a public game.

Palad was accused of typing the phrase “ching chong,” usually used derisively to mimic the Chinese language. Palad did so in a public game with Chinese players in November 2018. However, his team TNC refused to bar him from participating despite outrage from Chinese stakeholders.

DotA 2 developer Valve announced in a statement that it was banning Palad from participating in the upcoming Chongqing Major DotA 2 tournament in China in January 2019.

“TNC has mishandled the situation on multiple occasions, making the situation much worse than it needed to be,” the company said in its statement.

Valve previously criticized Palad’s statements but refused to step in. In its most recent statement, the company explained that TNC’s refusal to discipline their player forced them to change their stance on the controversy.