Road is dead.”

So goes the morose refrain from local coffee shops to pro team board meetings, all across the United States. People say it with the weighty resignation normally reserved for taxes, or political defeats, or the extinction of the northern white rhinoceros. Regrettable, tragic, but what could we do?

The helpless shrug is amplified by the cycling media up and down the line into a shrill cry of righteous indignation. “Look at all our poor pro riders,” they wail, “scrambling to find rides and jobs after their title sponsors left!” The underlying narrative seems to be that the cycling world has failed to care for their heroes; abdicated their responsibility to provide them with the bikes and kits and team cars and salaries they need to go compete on the World Tour.

All of this, of course, is patently absurd at all levels. Road isn’t dead. There are still bicycles, and America isn’t short on asphalt, last I checked. Dozens of national and local studies have found huge increases in cycling activity of all types. But as long as we fail to face the nature of the reality we inhabit as cyclists, racers, and fans, we’ll continue to witness the decline of American bicycle racing, particularly on pavement.