New: Luc Leblanc (Fra), Davide and Simone Rebellin, Giuseppe Guerini, Mirko Celestino (neo), Gerrit De Vries (Ned), Fredric Guesdon (Fra), Quaranta (neo).
Leaving: Roberto Pistore (MG-Technogym), Giovanni Fidanza and Oscar Pellicioli (Carrera), Mario Scirea (Saeco).
Team Manager: Gianluigi Stanga.
Direttori sportivi: Giosue Zenoni and Vittorio Algeri.
The 19 riders for 1996: G. Petito, Pierdomenico, D'Ascenzo, Cembali, P. Valoti, Arzilli, Dante, Di Francesco, Di Rienzo, Di Silvestro, Gentili, Leone, Paluan, Pozzi, Ramacciotti, Recanati, Spinozzi, Hvastija, Rovscek.
Team managers: Bombini, Miozzo and Rosola. Medical team: Mazzoni, Besnati and Sturla (consultant).
Busy schedule for Indurain and Olano.
Miguel Indurain and Abraham Olano have busy schedules even in the off-season. Besides training, they have to make time for receptions, dinners and receiving awards.
On Monday, 18 Dec. 95, both will be present in Madrid when the Spanish king Juan Carlos gives a reception honouring the Spanish cycling team that took two gold and two silver medals at the World championships in Colombia.
Immediately afterwards, Olano will leave for a month of training in the South African summer (with others including Rominger, Cipollini and Furlan).
On Dec. 19, Indurain's home town of Pamplona will present their two Tour de France stages, one finish and one start. Naturally, Indurain will be present.
Indurain will be at the Olympic museum in Lausanne, Switzerland, the following day to receive the Olympic Order in silver, as the first Spanish athlete ever. Eddy Merckx is another cyclist who has received that decoration. Present will be IOC chairman Juan-Antonio Samaranch, UCI boss Hein Verbruggen, Jean-Marie Leblanc from the Societe du Tour de France and the Spanish minister of sports Rafael Cortas Elvira. (The Olympic order in gold is reserved for heads of state and other very high dignitaries.)
How about training then? Olano is as said in South Africa. For 31-year old Indurain it will be the same procedure as the last few years. Between receptions he squeezes in about one hour of riding a day, low intensity, under the control of doctor-trainer Sabino Padilla. It's reported that he will not be in competition until mid-February at the earliest.
Men's Road Team: Neil Stephens (ONCE-ACT), Stephen Hodge (Festina-ACT), Scott Sunderland (Lotto-NSW), Patrick Jonker (ONCE-SA), Henk Vogels (Rabobank-WA), Robbie McEwen (Rabobank-Qld), Damian McDonald (AIS-VIC), Brett Dennis (AIS-Qld), Paul Brosnan (AIS-Qld), Matt White (AIS-NSW), Deane Rogers (AIS-ACT), Jay Sweet (AIUS-SA), Marcel Gono (AIS-Vic), Josh Collingwood (AIS-NSW). Women's Road Team: Kathy Watt (AIS-VIC), Tracey Watson (AIS-VIC), Anna Wilson (AIS-Vic), Lyn Nixon (AIS-WA), Elizabeth Tadich (AIS-Vic), Kathy Reardon (AIS-Qld), Charlotte Pordham (AIS-NSW), Karen Barrow (VIC). Mountain Bike Team: Cadel Evans (AIS-Vic), John Gregory (AIS-Vic), Paul Rowney (AIS-NSW), Rob Woods (GT-NSW), Garry Payne (Pro-Flex-NSW), Janine Feyaerts (AIS-WA), Mary Grigson (AIS-ACT), Alexandra Alty (Apollo-Vic). * The 14-rider men's road team contains six of Australia's seven Europe-based professionals. Number seven, Stuart O'Grady, will compete on the track in Atlanta. * The seven-rider women's road team will be led by 1992 Olympic champion Kathy Watt. It will not be until early next year before it is decided whether Watt should try to race on the road and track in Atlanta, as she did in Barcelona, or concentrate only on the road. * Mountain biking will make its Olympic debut in Atlanta and the nine-rider Australian team named today is led by John Gregory and Cadel Evans. * Team members will fight it out in several selection races over the next few months before the final selection of five men and three women for the road, and two men and one woman for mountain biking is named, probably in May or June of 1996.