News for March 2, 2000

No more Argentina for Fuenlabrada and Mapei

The riders of Saúl Morales' team Relax-Fuenlabrada, who was killed by a truck on stage 7 of the Vuelta a Argentina, have decided to never race in Argentina again. The organizers have, according to Fuenlabrada's Argentinean rider Martín Garrido, gravely neglected the security during the race. "My Spanish companions have decided never to race again in Argentina", he said.

The team abandoned the race as soon as they learned about Morales' fate and left the country on the same flight that carried Morales body to his homeland. The world of Spanish cycling gives the organizers the full blame for the accident: "It is not the act of a single person that caused the accident, but a culture with little respect towards the cyclists and the lorry driver was irresponsible and reckless," said Fuenlabrada's director, Maximino Pérez.

In addition, the Italian team Mapei decided to abandon the race and go home of safety reasons. Roberto Damiani, who managed the squad in Argentina, said that the death of Morales came after "a great number of irregularities."

Last year the Vuelta a Argentina was in chaos. Local organizing clubs were not paid by the Vuelta management and at one occasion a local sports director blocked the road with his car accusing the race management of fraud. Cyclists came to places were no hotels were booked and a stage was cancelled since the riders hadn't got any sleep the night before. Fuenlabrada, with its local rider Garrido, was the only European team that came back for this year's race. But never again.

Sicilian weekend

Nineteen teams, totalling 184 riders, will rally in Sicily this coming weekend for the third category races, Trofeo Pantalica on Saturday and the Giro della Provincia di Siracusa on Sunday. Mario Cipollini will try to take his fourth victory for the year aided by, among others, Savoldelli and Conte. This will be a difficult task since Mapei's colours will be defended by World Champion Oscar Freire, Paolo Bettini, Johan Museeuw, Tom Steels and Andrea Tafi. Davide Rebellin, one of Italy's best one day riders, will also be there as leader of the Liquigas-Pata team.

The teams:

Alessio-SGM (Miceli)
Alexia-Alluminio ( Della Santa, Minali)
Amica Chips-Tacconi Sport (Arvesen, Basso, Simeoni)
Cantina Tollo (Di Luca, Colombo, Baronti, Sgambelluri
Credit Agricole (Voigt)
Fassa Bortolo (Ferrigato, Baronti)
La Française des Jeux, (Guid)
Lampre-Daikin (Camenzind, Piccoli)
Linda McCartney (Sciandri, Richard, De Pasquale)
Liquigas-Pata (Rebellin)
Mapei-Quick Step (Freire, Bettini, Museeuw, Steels, Tafi)
Mercatone Uno-Albacom (Podenzana, Fontanelli
Mobilvetta-Rossin (Berzin, Quaranta)
Nectar-Selle Italia (Gonzalez, Buenahora)
Panaria-Gaerne (Axelsson)
Saeco-Valli&Valli (Cipollini, Savoldelli, Conte)
Team Colpack (Zinetti)
Team Polti (Blijlevens, Celestino)
Vini Caldirola-Sidermec (Vainsteins, Bortolami)

Riis quits - again

We have seen it before, but this time it is the Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad that writes that Bjarne Riis wont race anymore. A knee injury finally ends his career. Riis is 35 years old and an operation is needed to get the knee in shape again. At this age a comeback after an operation would be extremely difficult.

Bjarne Riis became in 1996 the first Scandinavian to win the Tour de France, and the following year, he won the Amstel Gold Race with a record margin. Injuries have followed him since. He suffered the last one last June when he fell and broke his arm on the way to a stage of the Tour de Suisse.

Bianchi-Albacom present

Felice Gimondi's Bianchi-Albacom Mountain Bike team had their presentation yesterday in Milan. The new sponsor, Albacom is also the co-sponsor of Marco Pantani's Mercatone Uno team, but have recently moved into mountain biking. Bianchi, the team's main sponsor produced over 500,000 bikes last year.

The team has as it's main riders, Nadia De Negri, Dario Acquaroli, Gregory Vollet (Fra) and Cecile Rode (Fra) in the senior ranks, and José Antonio Hermida (Spa) and Nicolas Filippi (Fra) in the under 23's. The team believe that five out of the seven are possible Olympic prospects. Filippi and Rode will probably not be targetted for the games.

In addition, they have the following juniors: Colleoni, Gualeni, Lanteri, Quadroni, Savoldi and Zanetti as part of a development squad, and have a "school" of 43 young riders based in Bergamo, according to team manager Felice Gimondi. They have had 10 wins already this year, and plan to head to Montagnetta di Milano for a big weekend of racing.

Farm Frites leave out Van Calster

The tribulations of the Dutch Farm Frites team continue. Although they are currently contracted with the team, former director and PR manager Hendrik Redant and Guido Van Calster have been shunned in the past month by the rest of the team. The team wishes to shed the last vestiges of the doping affair that caused them so much trouble in the 1998 Tour.

Van Calster has reputedly had recent contact with ex-boss, Cees Priem, and this may have been the reason behind his "suspension". However, he declined to comment on this when asked yesterday.