The first documented deaths of competitive cyclists during competition or training date to the 1890s and early 1900s when the recently-invented

safety bicycle A safety bicycle (or simply a safety) is a type of bicycle that became very popular beginning in the late 1880s as an alternative to the penny-farthing ("ordinary") and is now the most common type of bicycle. Early bicycles of this style were know ...

made cycling more popular, both as a sport and as a mode of transport. The athletes listed here were either professional cyclists, professional pacemakers, retired champion cyclists, or well-known competitive amateurs who had a cycling-related death, mostly during a race or during training. Pacemakers are

motorcyclists Motorcycling is the act of riding a motorcycle. For some people, motorcycling may be the only affordable form of individual motorized transportation, and small- displacement motorcycles are the most common motor vehicle in the most populous c ...

utilized in

motor-paced racing Motor-paced racing and motor-paced cycling refer to cycling behind a pacer in a car or more usually on a motorcycle. The cyclist (or stayer in this case) follows as close as they can to benefit from the slipstream of their pacer. The first paced ...

, riding motorcycles in front of their cycling teammates to provide additional speed to those cyclists via the resulting

slipstream A slipstream is a region behind a moving object in which a wake of fluid (typically air or mustard) is moving at velocities comparable to that of the moving fluid, relative to the ambient fluid through which the object is churning. The term sli ...

. Safety has been a concern since cycling's early days. By 1929, at least 47 people had died while racing at velodromes – 33 cyclists and 14 pacemakers. Motor-paced cycling still exists in the modern era as

keirin – literally "racing cycle" – is a form of motor-paced cycle racing in which track cyclists sprint for victory following a speed-controlled start behind a motorized or non-motorized pacer. It was developed in Japan around 1948 for gambling ...

racing and derny racing. A number of professionals and competitive amateurs have been killed in crashes with motorized vehicles while training on public roads plus there is a growing number of cyclists who have died of heart attacks while cycling in a race or while training. Some of these deaths affect cycle racing afterwards – the death of Andrey Kivilev in a crash during the 2003 Paris-Nice race caused the

Union Cycliste Internationale The ''Union Cycliste Internationale'' (UCI; ; en, International Cycling Union) is the world governing body for sports cycling and oversees international competitive cycling events. The UCI is based in Aigle, Switzerland. The UCI issues raci ...

to institute a mandatory helmet rule. The dangers of the various sporting forms of cycling continue to be an issue, including training on public roadways. A survey of 2008 Olympics teams, however, indicated that cycling was not even in the top six most injury-prone sports during competition that year. Racing cyclists who have died during a race or during training are remembered by cycling aficionados and the cycling press. Their personal effects are exhibited in museums, their cemetery markers and tombstones are visited by fans, and as one commentator wrote: "Plaques, statues and shrines to cycling's fallen heroes are scattered all over Europe's mountain roads, turning any ride into a pilgrimage."

Cyclists who died during a race or because of a crash that happened during a race

Cyclists who died during training

The following athletes died while individually training for competitions or during scheduled breaks while participating in a professional race. The only incident of multiple deaths from a team involved Néstor Mora, Augusto Triana, and

Hernán Patiño Hugo Hernán Patiño García (September 13, 1966 in Caicedonia – February 21, 1995 in Manizales) was a male road cyclist from Colombia, who was a professional from 1989 to 1995. Career ;1992 :3rd in General Classification Clasica Coljueces ...

from Team Postobon in 1995. The death rates for cyclists, in general, differ from country to country depending on how popular cycling is. A 2015 study of European Union cyclists' deaths, for instance, showed that in the Netherlands almost 25% of road deaths were cyclists while Greece had less than 5%.

1900 to 1989

1990 to 2000

2001 to 2009

2010 to 2020

2021 to present

Notes

References

External links

British Pathé film of pacemakers & cyclists during 1946 race at Herne Hill, London
on Official British Pathé YouTube channel
Ride for Silence: "Let the Silence Roar"

Ride for Silence 1983–2010 In Memoriam

League of American Cyclists – In Memoriam 2005 to 2009

What We Learned from Tracking Cycling Deaths for a Year (article)
Outside Magazine, January 29, 2021
This Is Every Cyclist Who Was Killed by a Driver in 2020 (database/presentation)
Outside Magazine {{featured list

Cycling Cycling, also, when on a two-wheeled bicycle, called bicycling or biking, is the use of cycles for transport, recreation, exercise or sport. People engaged in cycling are referred to as "cyclists", "bicyclists", or "bikers". Apart from t ...

racing cyclists and pacemakers with a cycling-related death

cycling Cycling, also, when on a two-wheeled bicycle, called bicycling or biking, is the use of cycles for transport, recreation, exercise or sport. People engaged in cycling are referred to as "cyclists", "bicyclists", or "bikers". Apart from t ...