Great Britain and it’s cycling set up desperately needed a boost after recent negative press. Now they seem to have it. Yorkshire won the bid to host the 2019 UCI cycling world championships. This will give them the perfect chance to put behind them allegations surrounding their poster boy Bradley Wiggins.

In recent weeks many experts have questioned Team Sky’s use of TUE (Therapeutic Use Exemption) with star riders such as Wiggins and fellow Tour de France winner Chris Froome. The Sky team are closely linked with GB cycling, itself facing allegations coach Shane Sutton of sexism and bullying. Sutton subsequently resigned, emphasising the turbulent year it has been for British cycling in general, despite huge success in the Olympics and Froome’s victory in the Tour.

Whilst Yorkshire’s dream victory will not be realised for another four long years, the fact the road race world championships will be returning to Britain for the first time since 1982 is a huge step for cycling in this country. The governing body, the UCI, could have easily avoided awarding Britain the championships in the current climate, but they didn’t.

This picture perfectly encapsulates why the 2014 Grand Depart for the Tour de France in Yorkshire was so popular. Imagine the scenes from the 2019  UCI World Championships. Photo copyright Liverpool Echo/James Maloney.

The Tour de France began in Yorkshire in 2014, drawing rave reviews from all involved and huge crowds engaged with the sport for the first time in the case of many. An annual Tour de Yorkshire was subsequently set up by the ASO, organisers of the Tour, again cementing itself as a hugely popular event on the cycling calendar.

For these reasons it seems entirely logical therefore to award it to Yorkshire, despite British cycling taking a battering recently after years of tremendous growth. Outside of allegations made thanks to Russian hackers, this growth is still increasing and the pledge to spend £15 million on hosting the championships is a huge step forward.

Ten years ago spending this amount of money on cycling would never have happened. A lot has changed in the past decade, and who knows how much further the sport will have grown by the time the event takes place in October 2019. I will be one of the no doubt many fans stood amongst the Yorkshire hillside cheering on the riders as the go past.