{"id":183395,"date":"2025-10-01T20:46:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T20:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/183395\/"},"modified":"2025-10-01T20:46:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T20:46:08","slug":"israel-competes-at-the-european-cycling-championships-heres-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/183395\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel competes at the European cycling championships, here\u2019s why"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Wednesday, all the top cyclists in Europe hit the streets of Southern France \u2014 and so will the Israeli national team. If you scanned the start lists for the road races, you might wonder why Israel is racing in the European championships.<\/a><\/p>\n

If you recall high school geography, Israel is in Western Asia. However, political tensions with neighbouring countries have shaped its participation in sports for decades. In the 1970s, Israel was effectively expelled from the Asian Football Confederation, leaving it without a regional federation. To continue competing internationally, Israeli teams joined European organizations. Nowadays, the State of Israel participates in UEFA football competitions, European basketball leagues, and tournaments in sports such as volleyball, handball, judo, and gymnastics. Even cultural events like good ole Eurovision<\/a> follow the same pattern.\u00a0 However, that may change.<\/p>\n

This arrangement allows Israeli athletes to compete at the biggest events\u2026.despite the geographic difficulties, though it also means longer travel and sometimes unusual qualifying routes compared with neighbouring Asian countries.<\/p>\n

In professional cycling as of late, the spotlight has been on Israel\u2013Premier Tech. The team is co-owned by Israeli\u2013Canadian Sylvan Adams and registered in Israel. While the State of Israel does not officially sponsor the team, three Israeli riders are on the roster, and Adams has described himself as the team\u2019s \u201cself-proclaimed ambassador of Israel.\u201d<\/a> Several Canadians are also part of the squad, including, in theory, Derek Gee. The Osgoode, Ont., rider submitted a letter of termination on Aug. 9 for undisclosed reasons. IPT, however, maintains that he remains under contract. Additionally, the title sponsor and bike supplier Factor have said the team must rebrand.<\/p>\n

The 2025 European road championships in France run from October 1 to 5. Israel will enter competitors in all three men\u2019s age categories \u2014 juniors, under-23, and elite. The announcement follows weeks of uncertainty after pro-Palestinian demonstrations disrupted the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a. Israeli cyclists are set to race in Dr\u00f4me-Ard\u00e8che, prompting organizers to reinforce security and coordinate closely with authorities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Vuelta incidents highlighted the need for special precautions,\u201d an organizer told L\u2019\u00c9quipe. \u201cBefore the Vuelta, most organizers hosting Israel\u2013Premier Tech had already taken measures. What changed was the scale required to prevent disruptions. We\u2019ll strengthen cooperation with state services and align with anything they deem necessary. So the riders can compete safely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israeli riders will not participate in the time trials, considered the riskiest events. \u201cIt\u2019s a relief for me as an organizer that we don\u2019t have Israelis in the time trials,\u201d he said. At the Vuelta, protesters tried to block the road for the Israel\u2013Premier Tech squad. Time trials are especially difficult to protect since riders race alone rather than in a rolling enclosure.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Remco Evenepoel of Belgium and Marlene Reusser of Switzerland both won the TT. But, well, they are are world champions so they can\u2019t even wear the sharp white-and-blue jerseys they got. Still nice for the collection.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Wednesday, all the top cyclists in Europe hit the streets of Southern France \u2014 and so will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":183396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[92426,49,48,635,1258,79251,82],"class_list":["post-183395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-2025-european-road-championships","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-israel","tag-israel-hamas","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}