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news
Amael Moinard - officially a very handsome rider (CC licensed image by Laurie Beylier:Flickr)The best cyclists are more handsome, says research using Tour de France cyclists
Research published in the Royal Society’s journal Biology Letters says that both women and men rate successful Tour de France cyclists as more attractive, even when they don’t know who they are.
Erik Postma of the Institute of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, at the University of Zürich, Switzerland wanted to know if variation in endurance performance was associated with variation in facial attractiveness.
To find out, he used an online survey to show photos of riders from the 2012 Tour de France to 816 people, 72% of whom were female, and asked them to rate the riders for attractiveness, masculinity and likeability. Their scores were excluded if they recognised the rider.
Dr Postma said: “I found it indeed is the handsome guys who finish first.”
There was a significant correlation between riders being rated as handsome and their success in the Tour.
"To my initial surprise, I found a positive relationship between the two and it was actually quite strong," he told BBC News.
"If we took the 10% best riders and compared their performance to the 10% worst, we found the best were on average 25% more attractive than the worst ones."
"We don't know what people are picking up in the faces that is signalling the riders' performance."
However, that year’s winner, Bradley Wiggins, was not included among the 80 riders people were asked to rate because he was wearing sunglasses in his race portrait.
“This association between looks and performance is in line with human endurance performance having been shaped by selection in our evolutionary past,” Dr Postma said.
“Across cultures, women place a lot of value on the provisioning ability of their prospective partner.”
The implication is that women have been programmed by evolution to find attractive men who are physically talented. And not just women. When Dr Postma pulicised the survey and asked veryone he knew to pass it on, some men said they couldn’t do it.
“I got lots of emails from men that were almost offended,” Dr Postma told NBC News. “They said ‘No way I can judge the attractiveness of other men’.”
But he a couple of hundred men took part anyway. “It turned out they know very well what women find attractive,” he said. “If you think about it, it is probably not so surprising.”
Not only do men need to know who the competition is, but it’s useful for the survival to know who to help catch dinner.
However, the correlation between success and attractiveness isn’t a hard and fast one. The rider rated best-looking among the 80 in Dr Postma’s sample was Amael Moinard of the BMC team, who finished 45th in the 2012 Tour.
The paper, 'A relationship between attractiveness and performance in professional cyclists' is available in full on line.
John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.
He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.
Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.
John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.
He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.
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24 comments
[[[[[ Does this theory extend to other sports? I'm thinking Mike Tyson, John Terry, Wayne Rooney...
P.R.
Apparently so.....
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Football/Pix/pictures/2011/6/30/1309...
[[[[[ Yes, FARRELL, I did think of him---but couldn't remember his name, and still can't, since he disappeared....
P.R.
Seems that I'm not alone in my Fabian mancrush. And Kittel, he's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Makes me weep.
Think cause and effect might be a bit back to front here. More attractive people tend to have more confidence (on account of their lives being slightly, shall we say, charmed) and this could lead to them being given opportunities and taking chances that other people don't.
The conclusions of this reseach do strike me as a wonderful example of putting 2 and 2 together and getting some good headlines.
A more logical conclusion might be based on the following postulates;
1) Confidence is attractive
2) Confidence is apparent in people's faces (and the way they carry themselves, act.....)
3) People in the process of placing highly on GC in the TDF are likely to be confident (not least becuase if they're not confident in themselves, they won't be placing highly on GC.
Therefore, whilst there may well be a relationship between confidence, attraciveness and success, this does not mean there is a causal relationship between attractiveness and success.
There are definitely a few mooses in the mix though. And what about Hinault?
Not sure that the good Dr Potsma quite understands bike racing. In fact I seem to have gone on a bit of a rant about the subject...
Surprised no-one's suggested that this research means you can tell if people must be taking drugs by how ugly they are!
Wow I must be faster than I thought!
So they excluded the team Sky riders because they were wearing sunglasses. Yeah, that's the reason
I am not sure how they defined who 'won' the TDF between 1995 and 2010. That would be more interesting research.
I knew I was slow
- Does this now make me ugly too? 
It does. Though on the flip side, you get prettier the faster you go. Science!
I don't think Wiggins is a bad looking fella. I know a fair few people who find him attractive. Froome and Cadel are a bit more 'niche interest' however.
+1 on Cancellara though. Huuuuunk
Interesting research, but I feel it should be been completed for both genders. And that all reports on said research should be illustrated with pictures of Emily Batty.
I know he was later stripped of his title but Floyd Landis???
I think Cadel Evans funded this research.
I must admit neither Wiggo nor Froome do it for me. Now Cancellara ....
As for the macho, I'm-too-oozing-with-testosterone-to-tell-if-another-guy-is-good-looking argument (yes, despite having ovaries I'm going to tackle this one
) even my hubby admits that he can tell when another guy is attractive/would do well with the opposite sex. Being straight doesn't mean that you're legally blind, just color coordination challenged 
Seriously though, I rather question this highly scientific theory. Eddy Merckx was totally dominant but that didn't translate into his appearance. Just goes to show, beauty is in the eye of the hypothesis generator.
Godammit, with my chiselled looks and handsome features i should be the worlds greatest grand tour rider
Not so sure about this. I love Froomies style but I'm always reminded of this guy:
"men rated faster cyclists as more attractive."
I knew all the sexual expletives shouted at me by motorists mask a deeper motive.
um, has anyone looked at wiggins or froome? They aren't exactly attractive looking blokes. What about Cadel, i'm not sure the massive chinned wonder would be deemed attractive.
As I suspected...
Just need to get quick now.