Alba RT At The Tour Of Britain
The 2025 Tour of Britain will return as a four-day race, from 5th – 8th June. Starting in the Dalby Forest in the heart of the North York Moors National Park, and concluding in Scotland with a finale in Glasgow. The Alba Development Road Team, being a Scottish born team, means this will be a very poignant and exciting opportunity to race on home roads.
The Women’s Tour of Britain has had a storied history, and in the past few years, when the rise in women’s sport is moving and growing, this event has still faced difficulties.
The Women’s Tour began in 2014 and has been part of the Women’s World Tour since 2016. However, in 2020 the event was cancelled, and postponed until later in the year in 2021. In 2022, the race held six stages but in 2023, the whole tour was cancelled due to increased running costs and a lack of sponsorship – showing how far women’s cycling still has to come. British Cycling took over the Tour of Britain Women in 2024, after the former organisers went into liquidation and financial difficulties.
Since its inception in 20214, the race has been won by female cycling legends such as Marianne Vos (2014), Lisa Brennauer (2015), Britain’s Lizzie Deignan (2016, 2019), Kasia Niewiadoma (2017), Coryn Labecki (2018), Demi Vollering (2021), Elisa Longo Borgini (2022) and last year, Lotte Kopecky (2024).
This week a record breaking field of 19 teams, a total of 114 riders, will begin the race. For the Alba Development Road Team, it’s their second appearance in the event. They will go up against the best UCI World Tour Teams: Canyon//SRAM xondacrypto; Lidl-Trek; Team SD Worx-Protime; Team Visma | Lease a Bike; EF Education-Oatly; FDJ-Suez and more. Racing along side the best UCI World Tour teams, is a huge opportunity for the women. A chance to learn from the best women in the sport, but also not to be intimidated and to go and race, and put their own skills, abilities, and the teams to the test.
Ahead of the 2025 Tour of Britain, we talk to Bob Lyons the Performance Director and Team Manager of Alba Development Road Team, about what it takes to run a cycling team. 
We often see the cyclists, the results on the road, but we don’t know what goes on behind the scenes to make it all happen and what it costs.
Alba Development Road Team, are exactly what they say – a development team with a strong ethos about creating a supportive pathway for riders to thrive and grow, hopefully helping them to take the next step in women’s professional racing.
Bob Lyons has had a clear differentiation from the start, putting the riders first, and creating development opportunities and a stepping stone for women to make the transition from domestic racing into one of the European or World Tour teams. He’s always been passionate about this.
“From a performance perspective and being driven to win. Obviously, it’s a competitive sport, so winning and results are important and particularly when there’s money and sponsors involved. I can understand it, but that drive to win and success should not come at the expense of developing riders.”
Lyon believes that is you put the athlete first and create a rider-centric atmosphere, the ride front and centre and the focus in on development of those riders. If you get the structure in place and give the athletes support, and get the development piece right, then the results will follow. Alba have certainly demonstrated this quite a few times. Even as the team has grown, and athletes have come and gone, the ethos has not changed. This has created an interest within the cycling community, as to what Alba are doing and creating. Last year they had over 150 applications to the team, and from women all over the world. Whilst they focus on mainly British cyclists, they do bring in international athletes, if they fit with the right balance of the team. Not everyone is at the same stage of their development, or journey. Some athletes are green, just starting out,
“some are maybe three years away from making the next step, some are ready to make the next step.”
Lyons feels a squad of 12 is about the right number for the team. If you go too big, you can’t give everyone the chance to race, but too small leaves you vulnerable to cover all the races, especially if you get a few injuries. (UCI Continental Teams can have up to 16 riders, but you can go up to 20 with ‘specialists’. A ‘specialist could be a track cyclist, cyclecross or other disciplines.)
Once you have the squad it’s then selecting the right season of races, which give the riders the opportunity to learn and grow.
“a lot of younger rides, get all excited and want to go the big races, and yes occasionally it can be a nice experience, but at the same time there’s absolutely no point in going to a race where you get dropped in the first 5km, and spend the entire rest of the race clinging on to the back, because you are not learning anything.”
Getting the balance between the British domestic elite national racing and the European UCI races, is key to allowing individuals and the team to develop. Rider may not necessarily win but they can comfortably race and learn. But performing at home is also key and a great platform. In 2024 Alba Development Road Team rider, Eilidh Shaw won the National Circuit Series and the team were the top team, and currently in 2025 are the top team. Shaw then went on to secure a contract with UAE Development team.
Entry into can also be tricky. In the UK you are able to just enter, but for the European races you have to be invited. You therefore lobby a lot and show your interest to the organizers. Not only that there’s the mix of one day races and stage races, with the different experience and learning to gain from each. Then a mix of hilly and flat and different terrain.
So lets talk money!
Cycling is a unique sport, in that it relies 100% on sponsorship. There are no tickets or gate receipts as there is no stadium. There is no share in the television revenue either. Some races may contribute to expenses, and as you move up to the bigger races, they provide more in the ways of accommodation etc. but most of the time you are covering the costs yourself. Any prize money won by the team, goes to the riders. Obviously, therefore, cash sponsorship is ideal, but some partnerships will be product only, or even just a discounted rate. All still needed to survive.
To start there are UCI Licence Fees. For a UCI Conti team, this is currently about €6000, but then there are quite a lot of regulations, mainly around insurance that you have to comply with. There is also a Bank Guarantee you have to lodge, which protects the riders if the team folds. This is likely to be a minimum of €20k
A huge part of the budget is travel costs. For some races, costs may be covered, but it still costs money. Being based in Scotland isn’t ideal from this respect either, as the team has four hours of driving to get to where most people are based in the UK. With this in mind, the team tries to plan blocks of racing, limiting the travel. However, this is also tricky as often races aren’t confirmed for the team, by the organisers till late in the day, making it difficult to book flights travel and hotels. Additionally, this year, there have been a lot of races cancelled (women and men’s), making harder to plan and budget accordingly.
As for staff, for a Pro-Conti team, you need four fully salaried members of staff, one of which needs to be a DS and one needs to be a doctor. For Alba they currently run a very lean team, so to be able to spend as much money on cycling as possible. Many of the team have multiple roles. There are only currently two paid staff roles. The Mechanics are one, and the swannies are the other. (Swannies, shortened and informal for the French term soigneur, is a person that provides care and support to the riders especially during the races. Their responsibility can include massage, nutrition, clothing, logistics and more.)
Everyone else in the support team is doing it because they love the sport.
Alba work to a budget of around €180k (€200k would give them a little more breathing space). Of that probably €100k is on travel. Then there are equipment costs if not free (€25k range) and nutrition in excess of €10k.
To put this in perspective, to run a UCI World Tour Team, the budget would be in the range of £1.5m. This covers salaries, as riders have to be on a minimum salary, and your staffing levels go up too.
For Alba, this is in the business plan, to be able to develop into perhaps a two-team structure - a development team and then a ‘winning’ team. Additionally, with the recent announcement that the Tour de France Femme avec Zwift, starting in Scotland in 2027, the appeal to have a team qualifying and racing on that stage is exciting and motivating.
For Lyons, when asked what success looks like, it was simple
“Eilidh Shaw securing a contract with UAE Development team”.
This fits the ethos of the team and the premise behind why it was started by Lyons in the first place. If they continue with the progression they have had over the past few years, then success may also look like having a team on the start line for the 2027 Tour de France Avec Zwift in Scotland.
Parcours have partnered with the Alba Development Road Team, again for 2025, ensuring the team are on the best wheels in the business (no we are blatantly not biased). Having had an insight into the money involved, sponsorships and partnerships are tricky to manage, especially for small teams, but also for small brands.
We’ve heard from Lyons about running the team, now let’s hear from our Parcours team about what a partnership looks like from their side.
“From a sponsor/partner perspective our involvement with a UCI Continental Team ranges from sorting product to technical support and then activation. We are always around for technical support, offering all riders a call to speak more about the brand, the technical support they can receive and how we can help at different races throughout the season. We also try to do as much as possible in terms of activation, for example we will be up in the North of England filming Stage 2 of the Tour of Britain with Alba next week.”
Parcours, are also a little unique and it maybe that they are a small team (but with a big voice), but often are looking for more than just those athletes (or teams) competing at the top level of the sport. They are looking for athletes/teams who bring something different to the partnership and build a quality relationship over time.
“We want quality of relationship over quantity and want to offer full support to anyone we work with. There is always a balance to be struck when it comes to deciding sponsorship/partnerships, as we want to be able to activate any performance athletes as much as possible so we can achieve exciting and impactful partnerships.
For a brand like Parcours, there is also the balance of athletes and teams to work with, be it gravel or road or triathlon. But one thing remains constant throughout, it’s the ethos and values that the athletes and teams bring, to match with Parcours.
“The most successful partnerships are built over time, and this is something that we try to ensure when resigning current athletes and signing new ones. Many of our athletes we have now worked with for several years building mutual respect and ways of working plus incredible results of course. We also want to always have partnerships that are more than just results and one where both parties can add value.
For more information on the 2025 Tour of Britain, the teams and riders, and also how to watch the race – please see the link below.
