'Podium Girls' in pro cycling...

I do genuinely think that to replace the podium girls with female cyclists would be problematic because of the context... if there was no history of women being used as decoration in the sport it might not be a problem... so, yeah, agreeing with The_Seldom_Killer

re. whether it'll effect or boost the coverage of female cycling it may just be a super long term thing... The more women who get into the sport, the more equal the gender balance... you never know... but at the moment - if you are a young girl who likes cycling, you watch the tour de france and you see the girls wearing pretty dresses you don't exactly see any female role models who are cyclists... you see female role models who are models.. so it's a long game thing..

I'm unsure about the the fact that flowers and awards are being handed out by women who kiss the winner is a serious/determining factor in spoiling the experience of watching pro cycling races for many people, male or female.

as a female cyclist i can wholeheartedly say that watching a (lovely, i'm sure but) not-even-tangentially-related-to-cycling (by appearances) woman kiss a man and hand over flowers for a totally arbitrary reason is depressing. it lowers people's expectations for women, however subliminally. if you think "no it doesn't", explain why you don't have some buff male models giving winning female cyclists flowers and kisses? it is all linked - if women were accorded the same rights and expectations as men (appreciating and accommodating, of course, the inherent differences as well) starting with things on the podium, i really believe things would change - less sexualised verbal abuse towards female cyclists on the road (my favourite bugbear), more women's races, more women racing, more coverage of these races. consider it a cyclist's theory of intersectionality.

personally, if i won a race i'd rather my flowers were presented by the race organiser, or a sponsor representative because sponsors are a huge part of pro racing, or the delightful idea of a local school or cycling proficiency/club. i want equality for men and women and everyone in between and i don't see why that's so much to ask, but it will need a lot of momentum. i'm really glad it's being talked about.

Wether or not Leye herself explicitly condemns Sagan is not really of interest to the case, I would say. An argument like this often occurs when social practices are addressed by people demanding change; a member of the affected group claims it does no harm and is now supposed to have spoken for the entire group. Besides this, it also implies that only this affected group can be the final arbiter of the matter. This is not true.

While related via our concepts of sexuality, gender and the way gender is used to prescribe social practices, there is a difference between the matter of groping a female body and the display of female bodies as trophies. It is this last issue that the OP wants to address, I believe. This is not so much about spoiling the experience, but constitutes a demand to change a social practice that arises out of culturally constructed gender dynamics that we no longer want to see performed. The performance of these dynamics is what constitutes them and vice versa, this is the paradox of culture.

The argument arising from this is that by consciously removing a certain performance from the public space the perception of the relation that the practice depicts can also change. This would finally mean that the practice becomes meaningless. We don't now thank the Egyptian God Ra for a victory because we do not believe this to be significant. We might in the future just award someone a trophy and leave it at that.

Finally, you are right that this may not incite people to suddenly cheer on female professional cyclists. I can only say that this is (hopefully) not the aim of this campaign, as it would severely complicate a relatively straightforward request. Yes, @Van_Damage, a long game. As has been indicated, it can be rather stifling to examine every expression of inequality at once. Having one race change it's ceremony would be the most powerful statement at this point! :)