News for September 25, 1998

Contracts and Transfers

* Confirmation of the transfers of Gilles Maignan (MUT), ITT champion of France, and the stagiaire Andy Flickinger (ES Sainte-Etienne Loire) to the CASINO team.

* Franck Pencole (23) changes from the Elite team VC Saint-Quentin to Crédit Agricole.

* I had a question mark against Pauly Burke yesterday in the Ipso transfer news. In fact he is a US citizen who has been racing in Belgium for the past couple of years. He regularly spends his winters in Tucson Arizona (USA) for training. He hails from Colorado.

* Colombians José-Joaquin Castelblanco and Victor-Hugo Pena (both Avianca) signed a two-year contract with Vitalicio. Virenque says hello to Willy Yesterday during the live coverage of the Vuelta, the motorbike camera came right up close to Richard Virenque. He looked into the camera and screamed: "bonjour Willie"

Some data

José-Maria Jimenez has already won 4 stages in this Vuelta. Yesterday I reported that the record of stage wins in the Vuelta is held by Freddy Meartens, who won 13 stages in 1977. Maertens is the only rider who is ranked highly in all of the big tours. Some sprinter!

Here is the list:

Tour de France

8 Charles Pélissier 1930
8 Eddy Merckx 1970
8 Eddy Merckx 1974
8 Freddy Maertens 1976
7 Gino Bartali 1948
7 Bernard Hinault 1979

Giro d'Italia

12 Alfredo Binda 1927
10 Learco Guerra 1934
 9 Alfredo Binda 1929
 9 Giuseppe Olmo 1936
 8 Constate Girardengo 1923
 7 Freddy Maertens 1977

Vuelta a Espana

13 Freddy Maertens 1977
12 Delio Rodriguez 1941
 8 Delio Rodriguez 1942
 8 Delio Rodriguez 1947
 8 Rik van Llly 1965
 7 Laurent Jalabert 1994

Its back - Thank God

Bellem, Cyclocross, A Grade:

  1. Sven Nijs (Bel)
  2. Willemsens (Bel)             0.55
  3. Paul Herijgers (Bel)
  4. Van Abeele (Bel)
  5. Danny De Bie (Bel)
  6. Mario de Clercq (Bel)        1.00