News for January 10, 2001Lighter French focus for USPSThe U.S. Postal Service team has announced its tentative racing schedule for 2001, just prior to its first training camp in Tucson, Arizona. The team will train in Tuscon from January 10-15, before travelling to Altea, Spain for a two week camp beginning on January 24. The team's first race will be the Volta ao Algarve in Portugal, February 11-15. A Spanish focus will be kept until mid-March, when the European arm of the team travels to Italy to contest Tirreno Adriatico and Milan-San Remo. From then on, the focus is on the northern classics, as well as several Spanish races in the lead up to the Tour. The final two major races for the Posties will be the Tour of Switzerland and Tour of Catalunya in June before the big one in July. Meanwhile, the US based portion of the team will race the Redlands and Sea Otter Classics in March, the BMC series and the First Union series in June, culminating with the USPRO Championship on June 10. The team therefore will only race three times in France prior to the Tour, and this has caused a few ripples in France. No more Tour de Mediterranean, Paris-Nice, Paris-Camembert, Classique des Alpes, Dauphiné Libéré or Route du Sud that were on the program last year. Even more significantly, team leader Lance Armstrong's schedule (posted on www.lancearmstrong.com recently) does not show any racing on French soil at all prior to July. His focus is in Spain, with the Tour of Murica, Semana Catalana, Tour of Aragon and Bicicleta Vasca, before the Tour de Suisse in June. He will of course participate in the charity Ride for the Roses on April 8 in Austin, Texas, and a start in Milan-San Remo is not out of the question. This, combined with a likely move from Nice to Alicante, Spain (partly to be near team manager Johan Bruyneel) could be construed as an avoidance of France, except for the Tour. The obvious reason for this is the recent investigation of the US Postal team by French justice, an enquiry that has not pleased Armstrong and he has publicly said so. USPS schedule, January-July, 2001 Note: Lance Armstrong's races marked with * January February March April May June July Crédit Lyonnais may pull outCrédit Lyonnais, a major sponsor of the Tour de France for the past 20 years, is to renegotiate its contract at the end of this year, according to AFP. Although the current eight year contract worth 35 million francs ($US 5 million) per year is due to expire at the end of 2003, the bank is concerned about the doping problems that still exist within cycling. Crédit Lyonnais, spokesman, Nicolas Chaine wasn't being too oblique when he said that "Doping is not specific to cycling and furthermore it touches all sports in which there is a lot of money. Those sports as well do not seem to be good carriers of the image of big groups like Crédit Lyonnais." After the disaster of 1998, CL affirmed that it would keep sponsoring the Tour and honour its contract. However today it had clearly changed its tune: "What was considered obvious yesterday is no longer," said Mr Chaine. In addition, major sponsor Coca-Cola may be replaced as a sponsor of the white jersey (best young rider), but a date has yet to be determined. However, Coca-Cola has said that it will remain in the race until its contract expires in 2009, and will support the Tour through its current difficult period. Race director Jean-Marie Leblanc said that he was not worried about the sponsorship situation, but stated that they needed "reassuring" after the events of recent years. He was hopeful that several new anti-doping measures to be introduced by the UCI would help, as well as the validation of the new EPO test. Finally, the Société has confirmed that Luxembourg is to be the official starting place of the Tour in 2002, with the date yet to be fixed. Beloki talksONCE's Joseba Beloki, who is now officially free of Festina, has given his reasons for leaving the team in an interview with Spanish paper, AS. Beloki turned down a 5 year, 600 million peseta contract with Festina to ride for ONCE for 3 years and 300 million pesetas. On paper it may have been a backward financial step, but Beloki said that it was more for sporting reasons that he left. As previously reported, he was concerned about being paid via Festina's "shelf" company, the Dutch registered Stichting Omnisport group. Although there is nothing new (or illegal) about financing a company "offshore", Beloki chose to go with the direct approach. He was more interested in being in a good position by the end of the first week of the Tour, and said that ONCE could help him achieve this. ONCE also are good prospects for the team time trial, which would certainly be to Beloki's advantage. The Vuelta is the other major race on his program, which he said he was "very contented" with.
37th Six Days of BremenThe European six day season resumes after its Christmas break with the 37th running of the "Bremer Sechstagerennen". Commencing on January 11 in Bremen's Stadthalle, race director Patrick Sercu has attracted a 12 team field that includes German national champion, Rolf Aldag. His partner is Silvio Martinello and the pair are expected to be amongst the top teams. Swiss dynamic duo, Bruno Risi and Kurt Betschart will be riding together, while Scott McGrory will partner Matthew Gilmore again. The latter two have been keeping their engines ticking over during the Tasmanian Christmas carnival series and will at least have some racing kilometres in their legs. World madison champions Stephan Steinweg and Erik Weisspfennig will also feature in Bremen. There are some other interesting partnerships e.g. Marco Villa (Ita)/Guido Fulst (Ger), Adriano Baffi (Ita)/Juan Llaneras (Spa), and Etienne Dewilde (Bel)/Jimmi Madsen (Den). Last year's winner, Andreas Kappes will be racing with Andreas Beikirch. The official starter on January 11 will be the great Eddy Merckx - winner of 17 six dayers himself, and 15 with Patrick Sercu. Professional teams Stephan Steinweg/Erik Weisspfennig (Ger) Scott McGrory (Aus)/Matthew Gilmore (Bel) Bruno Risi/Kurt Betschart (Swi) Etienne Dewilde (Bel)/Jimmi Madsen (Den) Andreas Beikirch/Andreas Kappes (Ger) Rolf Aldag (Ger)/Silvio Martinello (Ita) Marco Villa (Ita)/Guido Fulst (Ger) Adriano Baffi (Ita)/Juan Llaneras (Spa) Robert Slippens/Danny Stam (Ned) Mario Vonhof/Gerd Dörich (Ger) Lorenzo Lapage (Bel)/Lars Teutenberg (Ger) Frank Corvers (Bel)/Jens Lehmann (Ger) Fassa Bortolo train in TuscanyThe Fassa Bortolo team will hold its next training camp from January 10-19 in Tuscany, at Marina di Bibbona. All team members will be present, including the UCI World Number 1, Francesco Casagrande, and past World U23 Champions Ivan Basso and Leonardo Giordani, Russian Champion Serguei Ivanov, Raimondas Rumsas (winner of the Tour of Lombardy 2000), Alessandro Petacchi (9 wins last year), Nicola Loda (4 wins last year), Wladimir Belli (2 wins last year), Dario Frigo (2 wins last year), the Russian Dimitri Konychev (2 wins with Peschici - Vasto stage in the Giro 2000), Matteo Tosatto (1 stage win on the Paris - Nice and Pink Jersey in the Giro 2000), Fabio Baldato (1 stage win in Paris - Nice 2000), Marco Fincato (1 stage win in the Tour de Suisse 2000), Luca Mazzanti, Andrea Peron, Roberto Petito, Paolo Tiralongo, the Slovenian Tadej Valjavec and the Ukrainian Volodimir Gustov. The other new riders for 2001 will also be present: Filippo Casagrande, Oscar Pozzi and the only neo-pro for Fassa Bortolo this year, the young Luxembourg rider Kim Kirchen. On the 19th of January, all riders will go to Spresiano (near Trieste) for the official team presentation which will be on the 20th of January.
Yates caught shortAlthough French based Credit Agricole pro, Chris Jenner was the clear winner of the recently concluded Tour of Wellington, he believes that he could have finished second, had Junior World Champion Jeremy Yates not lost valuable time while answering the call of nature on stage 3... The race was primarily a battle between the Fuji Xerox team of Jenner and Brendan Vesty, and the Avanti team of Graeme Miller and Jeremy Yates. Stage three was to be a critical one - Miller and Jenner were 2nd and 3rd overall, with Vesty and Yates another 10 seconds back. At one point during the stage, Yates dropped to the back of the pack to answer the traditional cyclists' call - and ended up missing the key break. He lost 2.09 to Jenner on that day, finishing 2.25 behind him on the final GC. "If" is a big word in sport, and is usually associated with "could've, should've, would've" and variants thereof. However, Yates is certainly no fluke, he just made a "tactical error" on that day. Chris Jenner himself said "If Graeme and his Avanti team had looked after Jeremy Yates then Jeremy Yates would have won the tour because he's got better form than me." Miller wasn't too impressed by this calling Jenner's words "childish", adding that Jenner should have gone back to help Vesty when he was dropped on the Wallaceville circuit later in the tour. "At that stage I was the highest person in our team on general classification, so you don't do that. You always fire the first shot from the barrel, don't you?" The race has finished now, after a truncated final day that saw the last stage cancelled due to crowds wandering on the circuit at Frank Kitts Park. Unfortunately, lack of resources meant that barricades could not be obtained for the entire circuit, and race director Jorge Sandoval made the decision in favour of rider and crowd safety.
USA Cycling confirm 'cross teamThe eight cyclists that were unofficially announced yesterday as the USA's World's cyclocross team were confirmed today by USA Cycling. There will be two riders from each category to compete at the World's in Taobr, Czech Republic on February 3-4. Those names again: Marc Gullickson, Dale Knapp (elite men); Ann Grande, Rachel Lloyd (elite women); Alan Obye, Josh Anthony (U23 men); and Jeremy Powers and Aaron Bradford for the junior men's event. Clark Natwick from will serve as the team's coach. Tim Johnson and Alison Dunlap automatically qualified for the 2001 team by capturing the national cyclo-cross titles in December 2000, however both have decided not to compete. Mark McCormack, who placed third at the championships, was nominated to the team but also declined. Team qualification procedures were finalized by USA Cycling in November 2000. Automatic qualifiers included the national champions from each category. Athletes had to finish within at least two minutes behind leader at the National Cyclocross Championships to be considered for world championship team selection.
Jane Cosmetics announces complete lineupTeam Jane Cosmetics has finalised its 13-woman, 9-man lineup for the coming season, and is looking to be strongly competitive on the domestic US circuit. Now in its sixth year, the Jane Cosmetics Cycling Team has grown from a local junior developmental program into a national calibre women's squad, having its first season on the national circuit last year. The team has retained its key riders from last year, including former Saturn climbing star Sue Palmer-Komar; Jenny Eyerman, who rode with the US National Team at the Women's Tour de France; and Caren Spore, a late-season addition who took second in the Manhattan Beach Grand Prix and third in the ill-fated BMC Tour of Arlington. It has acquired talented riders such as Catherine Cardwell (Charles Schwab), Odessa Gunn (Timex), and Julie Hanson (Saturn), resulting in a well-balanced lineup who are "really looking forward to racing together," according to team manager Karen Menge. The women will compete in most of the National Racing Calendar events, including the First Union Liberty Classic, the BMC Software series, the Redlands Classic, and the HP Laserjet Women's Challenge. They also hope to compete in such events as the Grand Prix Feminin du Canada and the Montreal World Cup. The team will start the season with a training camp in San Diego, CA in late February, before tackling the first NRC event, the McLane Pacific Classic in Merced, CA from March 3-5. In addition to the elite national women's squad, the Jane Cosmetics Cycling Team also includes regional/developmental women's and men's programs. The women's lineup includes former Chevrolet/LA Sheriff's member Annelie Chapman and 'converted' mountain biker (1997 Women's 30+ World Cross-Country Champion) Rhonda Quick, while the men's roster is headlined by Belgian based Mark Fitzgerald. Both groups will race extensively in Southern California, with some of the women competing in national-level events as well during the season. Off the bike, the team also has plans: "Given that our title sponsor makes cosmetics aimed at pre-teen and teenage girls, we decided to go with a promotional program different than the norm," said Menge. Instead of appearing at retailers that carry Jane Cosmetics, the team will do presentations for girls' groups across the country, teaching them about the sport. "We've got such an interesting group of women. Not only are they all great athletes, but the team includes moms, PhD candidates, scientists, educators...a great selection for young girls to emulate!" Odessa Gunn agrees, adding that "I feel very strongly that the world needs more females who promote a healthy and realistic alternative to supermodels and magazine models." Team roster Women Catherine Cardwell Men Chris Daggs Jane Cosmetics |