(Reuters) - Teams will be reduced from nine riders to eight for next year's three Grand Tours while the 2018 Tour de France will start a week later to avoid clashing with the soccer World Cup. The International Cycling Union (UCI) said in a statement on Thursday that its Professional Cycling Council (PCC) applied the change which would come into effect in 2018. The 'Grand Tours' consist of the the Tour de France, Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a Espana. The move to reduce the size of teams has been on the agenda for some time to make races less predictable and too easy for leading teams to control and also for safety reasons. Next year's Tour de France will start on July 7, meaning it will only overlap with the World Cup in Russia by a week.

Source: The Star June 22, 2017 20:26 UTC