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Thanks
Five of the best
Past Vélo d’Or winner Alberto Contador
With the pro road race season finished, now is the time to look back and reflect on the past season. I don’t want to spend winter doing endless retrospectives and lists of the best this and that. But hindsight does allow us the chance to review things.
Soon Vélo Magazine will publish the winner of the Vélo d’Or award (“golden bike). In football the Ballon d’Or prize is one of the most prestigious awards and this sister prize too must be one of the best awards in cycling. They ask cycling journalists around the world for their best five riders of the season and add up all the contributions to see who has come out on top. It is hard to pick five riders from a cast of thousands but for the fun of it I thought I’d see who I’d rate right now.
UCI and Tour de France considering smaller teams
The opening week of the Tour de France was marked by several crashes that took out many riders including several favourites for a podium spot. Nobody wants this, even TV producers who might get a thrill from the carnage realise that decimating the cast of contenders isn’t good for their viewing figures over three weeks. A formal review from the UCI has suggested reducing size as a solution.
Geox team future in doubt (updated)
The Geox-TMC team looks set to stop at the end of the year after its main sponsor pulled out at the eleventh hour. The squad’s management have been filing paperwork with the UCI as part of the registration process to ride in 2012 but when the matter of depositing the bank guarantee for the 2012 season arose the sponsor Geox refused to provide the necessary funding. Without this the team cannot continue.
Bringing the Tour to your city… or village
Regional newspapers are big in France, selling more than the national dailies. Open a local newspaper and you don’t have to turn many pages before you find the latest on the grape-picking harvest or minor traffic accidents. It reinforces the pleasant idea that not much happens in rural France, there just isn’t enough bad news to report.
For many places in France the passage of the Tour de France is the highlight of the year or even the decade. In a great piece Le Monde today reports on the importance of a stage visiting French towns. There are 36,000 mayors, from Paris down to tiny villages, and most of them would love to see the race visit their corner of France.
What is Holczer doing?
Imagine the scenario. You run one of the biggest budget teams in the sport but sadly the results haven’t followed. Some riders have done well but in general things haven’t gone to plan. Maybe it’s time to change managers, who do you call?
Relegation tales
Ag2r-La Mondiale are in the UCI World Tour. This status guarantees the French team entry to all the big races. But this position is under review given their low rankings.
To summarise, any team sitting in 14-18th place in the UCI’s internal rankings sees the position in the top flight under review. Right now Ag2r, the new Lotto-Ridley team, Katusha and Geox sit in this “relegation zone”. Dropping down to Pro Continental status is not automatic, simply the position reviewed and set against the arrival of new applicants.
2012 Tour de France route
The leaked route proved true but only the summary details came out last time. This is a race of 3,479km but it comes down to a few strategic points and today’s presentation showed where these will be.
Monday Shorts
Sprechen sie Deutsch?
Skil-Shimano will become Project 1t4i in 2012, a holding name until the new sponsor is named. They revealed their kit over the weekend.
This is worth watching as the squad is trying something new. Once a small Dutch squad, they’ve got ambitions for more. They aim to create a team based in one place with open access for fans and the media. The new sponsor will be a “European multinational” but its identity is not yet known. But the team’s press releases come in four languages: English, French, Dutch… and German.
Rumours say it’s likely to be Bosch, the German industrial group that owns the Skil brand amongst others. Speculation aside, Skoda and HP are on board as well as Shimano. Despite Kittel’s wins the team probably doesn’t have enough points for the top league for 2012 but hopefully this is a long term story.
2012 Giro d’Italia route unveiled
5 – 27 May 2012. The route was leaked but unlike the Tour de France people were not talking about the Giro as much last week, perhaps because fewer details emerged via the leak and also because RCS, the Giro organisers, had already printed some information the Gazzetta dello Sport, their house journal.
Yesterday saw the route unveiled in a TV-friendly format. There was a tribute to Wouter Weylandt and news that the race number 108 is retired from the competition in memory of the Belgian rider who passed away on the Passo del Bocco.
We had an audience of officials, journalists and riders and, being Italian TV, two models in pink dresses accompanying the ribbon-shaped Trofeo Senza Fine, the “trophy without end”. And to top this a giant mirrorball was lowered on to the stage and Alberto Contador stepped out from the dazzling cage to perform Sylvester’s “You Make me Feel Reel”. Actually, I’m joking… but only about the song as the defending champion did emerge from a mirrorball.