A Spanish professional cyclist has been disqualified from a race in China for an “inappropriate” post on social media.
Mario Aparicio, riding for Burgos Burpellet BH, was competing in the 2.2 ranked Tour of Mentougou where after finishing the first stage, he captioned his Strava file with two emojis of a pig and a flag of China.
Aparicio (credit: Mario Aparicio/Strava)
A social media storm then erupted as Chinese social media criticised Aparicio for the “derogatory” post.
Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported that the word for pig – ‘cochino’ – slang meaning dirty or filthy – was first picked up on by Chinese people living in Spain, and the subsequent outrage was based on the association between the word and Aparicio’s caption.
The organisers of the Tour of Mentougou subsequently announced Aparicio’s disqualification from the race saying that Aparicio’s post “violated the spirit of sportsmanship, damaged the image of the race, and caused a serious negative impact.”
But the team defended Aparicio’s post, which have since been deleted from his Strava account, saying: “Mario posted the pig emoji as a joke toward his teammate who had won the stage, something without malice and unrelated to the Chinese people.
“Just an unfortunate coincidence. However, people saw it and took it out of context, misinterpreting it since the Chinese flag appeared next to it.”
Aparicio Vuelta 2025 (credit: ASO/Unipublic/Antonio Baixauli/Cxcling Creative Agency)
Aparicio, a 25-year-old professional, has spent his entire career with the ProTour Burgos team and made his Grand Tour debut at the Vuelta a España last month where he appeared in several breakaways and finished 91st overall.
He previously took his only professional victory in China at the Tour of Qinghai Lake last in 2024 where he also won the Mountains Classification. He has also won the mountains jersey at the Tour de Langkawi and finished in the top-10 overall at the Presidential Tour of Turkey.
It is not the first time that riders have been removed from races in China. In 2023, Intermarché-Circus-Wanty removed Madis Mihkels and Gerben Thijsen the day before the start of the Tour of Guangxi after Thijsen filmed his teammate making a racist ‘slanted eyes’ gesture on Instagram.
Both the team and the riders subsequently apologised and donated to the team’s junior academy who they mentored.
Despite Aparicio’s disqualification, Burgos Burpellet BH dominated the three-day race, taking a clean sweep of the overall podium and winning the points, mountains and team classification. Clément Alleno won the race ahead of Carlos Garcia Pierna and Antonio Angulo.