Cees Priem, coach of TVM, is also interested in Remco van der Ven, the winner of Olympia's Tour 1997. There is a chance Van der Ven will come over during the next season.
- Zenon Jaskula (35) will retire after the World Championships in San Sebastian. He will start as agent for Mapei-GB in Poland. Jaskula startd as a professional in 1990 and has been with many different teams, such as Del Tongo, MG, Aki and Brescialat. He was third in the Tour de France 1993 after Migual Indurain and Tony Rominger. In the 1988 Olympic Games, he won silver in the team time trial with Poland.
AUSTRALIA'S besieged road cycling program, due to be disbanded at the end of the month, may be handed a lifeline by a US car company.
National road coach Heiko Salzwedel was locked in negotiations yesterday with Saturn, a subsidiary of General Motors, to form a joint US-Australian team for next season.
The deal would involve three leading Australian riders - Peter Rogers, Matthew White and Nick Gates - for the 1998 road season, with Salzwedel involved in a managerial capacity.
Salzwedel wants the arrangement in force for only one year, and is still working on finding an Australian sponsor to help establish his own team in 1999. A new Danish team, Jack and Jones, has also been discussing a similar arrangement with Salzwedel.
"I haven't given up on starting my own team, but this is a way of keeping the program alive," Salzwedel said.
"The dream is still to have an Australian sponsor backing an Australian team, that is the proper direction. But that's going to take time, and that's something I don't have."
The road cycling program, based at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra, is due to be disbanded on October 31 after a controversial decision by the Australian Sports Commission and the Australian Cycling Federation.
Since it was established in 1991, the AIS program has produced a string of world-class riders, and this year the AIS team reached 27th in the world rankings - the highest ever for an Australian team.
However, the ASC and ACF maintain cost overruns have left the program with just $11,000 for the 1997-98 financial year.
The program, which this year supported Australia's first serious trade team - a combined Australian-Czech venture - had allegedly run $240,000 over budget, despite repeated warnings to Salzwedel to curb his spending.
But Salzwedel hotly disputes the size of the deficit and will return home from Europe next week to address this.
The program, according to Salzwedel, was at most $161,000 over budget and in recent months had drastically reduced its overheads by shedding riders and officials. It was, he has said, now in a position to run effectively on a much reduced budget, provided it was allowed to enter a joint arrangement with an outside sponsor.
Last month, key sprinter Jay Sweet left the program to join the French trade team Big Mat, while Australia's hottest property, Marcel Gono, is poised to join another French team, Gan, by the end of the week.
Gan sporting director Roger Legeay was to ride in the Australian team car on Wednesday to watch Gono's progress in the under-23 time trial at the world road championships in San Sebastian, Spain.
Although a final decision will not be made until after the race, there is little doubt Gono - ranked second in the world in his age group - will join fellow Australians Henk Vogels, Scott Sunderland and Stuart O'Grady in Gan's colours next season.
"I was hoping to keep our team together, but that's proved impossible," Salzwedel said.
"If I can reach an agreement with someone like Saturn, then at least my main riders will be competing at a professional level next season.
"After that, who knows? But they've all said they would be prepared to rejoin me if I can get an Australian team off the ground. The riders share the same dream as me."
On Tuesday in Spain, Canberra's Michael Rogers took the silver medal in the junior time trial, continuing Australia's recent domination of the event.
In 1994 his brother, Dean, won the gold medal, with Josh Collingwood first in 1995 and Matthew Hayman second last year.
While Rogers celebrated his success, Reuters reports that German winner Torsten Hieckmann's moment of glory was upset by a notorious tune from the past - the former East German national anthem.
Hieckmann's gold medal signalled another triumph for the Berlin sports school which produced Tour de France winner Jan Ullrich.
But the 17-year-old's golden moment was tarnished somewhat for the Germans when the former GDR's anthem was played at the medal ceremony.
German spectators whistled derisively at the sound of the anthem, which vanished with German unification in 1990.
Hieckmann had a nail-biting wait of 20 minutes before he was sure of the title, but his biggest worry, Rogers, clocked 1s slower.
Averaging 46.74km/h over the 28km circuit, Hieckmann timed 35min 56s to give Germany their second medal on the first of the six-day championships.
Rogers had to fight back from a deficit of 15s for silver.
Russian Alexei Markov was the fastest of the 70 riders at two time checks but faded to third.
Compatriot Olga Zabelinskaia won the junior women's title, clocking 19:56 over a 13km circuit to beat German Sylvia Huebscher by 36s, with Spain's Maria Cagigas a further 1s back.
Miguel Induráin has been elected as member of the Road Racing commision, Elite category, by the Directive of the UCI. The president of the Road Racing commision will be Swiss Claude Jacquart, while (ex-cyclists) Induráin, German Olaf Ludwig, Italian Felice Gimondi, Belgian Walter Godefroot (sport director of Team Telekom) and Frenchman Jean Marie Leblanc (general director of the Tour de France) become members.
The UCI government will have Hein Verbruggen as president and Italian Agostino Omini, Germans Werner Gohner & Daniel Baal as vice-presidents and Spaniard Ramón Mendiburu, Irish Pat McQuaid, Chzek Vladimir Holecek and American Mike Plant as members substituting Ian Emmerson, Ignacio Orio, Zbigniew Rusin and Richard de Garmo.
There were other positions that were decided on: For the sub'23 and Women, American Pat McQuald and Ukranian Elena Salumaiaie respectively. Responsible for Track, Australian Ray Godkin. In the medical commision, Italian Francesco Conconi and at antidoping, German Werner Gohner.
Ferretti, who was interrogated already in July, has been suspended, not for participating in the doping, but for having kept everything quiet. Luigi Sarti has also been fined 3.000 Swiss Marks for antidoping violations and for not showing up to the antidoping commision inquiries. Giancarlo Ferretti said after finding out about his suspension: I'm not an illegal or incorrect person. My record shows it, any body that knows me, knows". "There has been talk about this, like if I had killed somebody. Now I don't want to know anything else about it and will only say that I don't deserve the suspension", finished Ferretti.
Day 1:
Elimination:
1. Silivo Martinello (Ita) - Marco Villa (Ita)
2. Urs Freuler (Swi) - Julián Velásquez (Col)
3. Juan Curuchet (Arg) - Gabriel Curuchet (Arg)
Keirin final:
1. Danny Clark (Aus) - John González (Col)
2. Ettiene de Wilde (Bel) - Mathew Gilmore (Bel)
3. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col)
Corre:
1. John Ramírez (Col) - Carlos Silva (Col)
2. Carsten Wolf (Ger) - Gerard Dorich (Ger)
3. Giovany López (Col) - John García (Col)
Kilometre:
1. Danny Clark (Aus) - John González (Col)
2. Andrea Collinelli (Ita) - Giovany Lombardy (Ita)
3. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col)
Pacer:
1. Ettiene de Wilde (Bel) - Matthew Gilmore (Aus)
2. Jimmy Madsen (Den) - Jens Weggerby (Den)
3. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa)
American:
1. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa)
2. Juan Curuchet (Arg) - Gabriel Curuchet (Arg)
3. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col)
Overall after Night 1:
1. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col) 62 points
2. Juan Curuchet (Arg) - Gabriel Curuchet (Arg) 50
3. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa) 32
Day 2:
Derny Heat 1:
1. Jens Weggerby (Den) - Jimmy Madsen (Den)
2. Urs Freuler (Swi) -José Velásquez (Col)
3. Silvio Martinello (Ita) - Marco Villa (Ita)
Derny Heat 2:
1. Lorenzo Lapage (Ita) - Phillipe Ermenault (FRA)
2. Giovani Lombardi (Ita) - Andrea Collinelli (Ita)
3. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa)
Elimination:
1. Silvio Martinello (Ita) - Marco Villa (Ita)
2. Juan Curuchet (Arg) - Gabriel Curuchet (Arg)
3. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col)
Kilometre:
1. Danny Clark (Aus) - John Jaime González (Col)
2. Silvio Martinello (Ita) - Marco Villa (Ita)
3. Urs Freuler (SSUI - José Velásquez (Col)
Keirin:
1. Carsten Wolf (Ger) - Gerard Dorich (Ger)
2. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa)
Overall after Night 2:
1. Urs Freuler (Swi) - José Velásquez (Col) 86 points
2. Juan Curuchet (Arg) - Gabriel Curuchet (Arg) 68
3. Juan Llaneras (Spa) - Miguel Alzamora (Spa) 50