Lance Armstrong continues to stimulate USA Cyling membership figures

Lance Armstrong has boosted USA Cycling memberships since 2002.
In 2011 Armstrong will probably do the same with USAT memberships.
Photo by Hase from Wikimedia Commons.

After a three-year lull in membership growth corresponding Lance Armstrong's retirement from cycling, USA cycling's membership numbers have made a comeback in 2009 along with Armstrong's pro cycling career. USA Cycling expects to reach an all-time high in enrollment by the end of 2009, reaching 66,600 members (up from 63,273 in 2008). This membership growth of five percent matches USA cycling's growth rate between 2002 and 2006 (the peak of Armstrong's cycling fame, up to the year following his retirement). After Armstrong retired from professional cycling, USA Cycling's growth was stunted to only 3.3% in 2007 and 2008, before returning to its former robustness as Armstrong donned the Astana kit.

"Sports need people," Armstrong told Cycling News. "It's important to have those stories so people pay attention.... People look at my story and you can say they’re interested because he’s a strong cyclist or because he’s a cancer survivor. Anytime you create a movement, it has to begin with a person." Armstrong, who compares his effect on cycling with that Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, and Michael Schumacher', says that it is the responsibility of the current generation of cyclists to develop new talent that will keep the public interested in the sport and keep cycling alive in years to come.

"Certainly the ‘Lance effect’ has been a factor," USA Cycling's director of communications, Andrea Smith told Cycling News. "It’s like a momentum that Lance has created around his success and comeback from adversity and we are so happy to be apart [sic.] of it, it’s been great for us."

If Armstrong has nearly singlehandedly raised cycling from obscurity, then triathlon (and especially Ironman) can expect to see a similar spike in growth when Armstrong tries the Ironman in 2011. While USA Triathlon's 100-thousand-strong membership is already 1.5 times greater than USA Cycling's, expect to see even more members when Lance brings the limelight to triathlon. For the first time, triathlon may go from being a participation sport to a spectator's sport.

While the sponsorship opportunities that Armstrong will bring to triathlon will benefit pro's and race directors, mid-pack triathlon veterans are likely to suffer. With more triathletes, races will sell out even more quickly, and qualification-only events like the world championships in Kona and Clearwater will become out of reach for more and more athletes as qualification slots are spread thinner and thinner across more and more North American races.

What many triathletes enjoy about the sport is that the age grouper must overcome the same challenges on the same days as the pro's. With a sharp increase in triathlon participation, the sport will almost certainly need to stratify based on ability, bringing the common age grouper farther and farther from the elite level, until Kona, Clearwater, and the classics like Wildflower and Escape from Alcatraz become elite-only events like cycling's grand tours and one-day classics or ITU's World Cup circuit.