News
7th
March 2007
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Unibet.com
to take legal action against the ASO for a start at the
Paris-Nice
As
the start of the Paris-Nice draws ever nearer, Unibet.com
have went to the French courts in a last ditch attempt at
gaining entry to the race organized by the ASO who also
run the Tour de France.
As
a ProTour team they had expected to gain automatic entry
to all the races on the ProTour calendar but that apparently
is not the case.
In
a press statement released earlier today the Green Cycle
Associates AB who own the Unibet.com cycling team said,
"The rules of competition law, the internal rules of
the UCI and the contractual arrangements with the Unibet
Team have been blatantly violated."
THe
statement goes on to say, "The Unibet Team will therefore
undertake the necessary steps to enforce it's rights, both
in summary proceedings as in proceedings on the merits."
ProCycleNews
will bring you more on this story tomorrow in our daily
news coverage...
Team's
announced for the Tour of Flanders
The
organizers of the Ronde van Vlaanderen [Tour of Flanders]
have announced a 25 team list who have been invited to their
race on the 8th of April.
All
20 of the UCI ProTour teams will be on the start line with
an additional 5 wildcard selections, all of which are Pro-Continental
squads. Those teams that have received wildcard selection
to the ProTour classic event are Dutch team Skil-Shimano,
Italian/Russian team Tinkoff Credit Systems, German team
Wiesenhof-Felt, and the Landbouwkrediet-Tönissteiner and
Chocolade Jacques-Topsport Vlaanderen teams from Belgium
where the race takes place.
The
teams who have been selected are: AG2R Prévoyance (Fra),
Astana (Swi), Bouygues Telecom (Fra), Caisse d'Epargne (Spa),
Chocolade Jacques-Topsport Vlaanderen (Bel), Cofidis (Fra),
Crédit Agricole (Fra), Discovery Channel (USA), Euskaltel-Euskadi
(Spa), Française des Jeux (Fra), Gerolsteiner (Ger), Lampre-Fondital
(Ita), Landbouwkrediet-Tönissteiner (Bel), Liquigas (Ita),
Predictor-Lotto (Bel), Quick Step-Innergetic (Bel), Rabobank
(Ned), Saunier Duval-Prodir (Spa), Skil-Shimano (Ned), CSC
(Den), Milram (Ita), Tinkoff Credit Systems (Ita), T-Mobile
(Ger), Unibet.com (Swe) and Wiesenhof-Felt (Ger).
Team
Barloworld take a close second at the end of the 1st day
of the Giro del Capo
A
5,5 kilometer time trial opened the 2007 edition of the
Giro del Capo yesterday, a stage where South African Barloworld
rider Robbie Hunter just missed the win by the slenderest
of margins.
One
second was all that separated Hunter from first place and
the leaders jersey at the end of the time trial with the
win going to Microsoft MTN rider Daryl Impey.
Three
more of Hunters Barloworld team-mates managed to break into
the top 20 making it a strong team performance at the end
of the first day of competition. Italian rider Fabrizio
Guidi finished 20th on the stage with Alex Efimkin placing
11th and Hugo Sabido 8th. The other Barloworld riders competing
finished 30th and 54th, namely Felix Cardenas and Ryan Cox
respectively.
The
performance meant that Barloworld won the team prize on
the day while Hunter will start stage two wearing the points
leaders jersey even though he is placed second in that competition
behind stage winner Impey.
Today's
stage will see the riders setting out on the 129 kilometer
stage from Paarl. Will we see a Barloworld rider in the
overall lead by the end of the stage?
Crédit
Agricole and CSC announce their team's for the Tirreno-Adriatico
Two
ProTour team's, the French Crédit-Agricole squad
and Danish team CSC have both named their starting lineups
for the upcoming Tirreno-Adriatico stage race in Italy that
runs from the 14th to the 20th of March.
In
the green and white colors of Crédit Agricole will
be: Mads Kaggestad (Nor), Thor Hushovd (Nor), Sébastien
Hinault (Fra), Julian Dean (NZl), Fransesco Belloti (Ita),
Laszlo Bodrogi (Hun), Yannick Talabardon (Fra) and Nicolas
Roche (Irl).
Undoubtedly
one of the strong teams in the field will be the CSC squad
who will be represented by: Lars Bak (Den), Matti Breschel
(Den), Fabian Cancellara (Swi), Allan Johansen (Den), Marcus
Ljungqvist (Swe), Lars Michaelsen (Den), Stuart O'Grady
(Aus) and Jens Voigt (Ger).
Astana
name their team for the Tour of Murcia
Swiss
registered team Astana will be lining up at the Tour of
Murcia in Spain which kick's off with the first stage later
today.
Vuelta
podium finisher Andrej Kashechkin will start his first race
of the season and will be joined in the powerful team by,
among others, ex-two time Giro d'Italia winner Paolo Savoldelli.
The
complete Astana roster for the race will be: Andrej Kashechkin
(Kaz), Alexey Kolessov (Kaz), Eddy Mazzoleni (Ita), Steve
Morabito (Swi), Daniele Navarro (Spa), Paolo Savoldelli
(Ita), Michael Schär (Swi) and Yevgeny Sladkov (Kaz).
Liquigas
and Saunier Duval-Prodir for Saturday's Milano-Torino
The
Milano-Torino race this coming Saturday will see a strong
lineup of teams who will be sending powerful squads looking
for results at the Italian race. Liquigas and Saunier Duval-Prodir
are just two of the teams who have named their squads for
the 199 kilometer race.
Already
Liquigas have made a winning start to the season and both
Danilo Di Luca and Vincenzo Nibali will look to continue
this trend. The complete Liquigas team for Saturday's 1.HC
race will be: Leonardo
Bertagnolli, Eros Capecchi, Danilo Di Luca, Francesco Failli,
Enrico Gasparotto, Vincenzo Nibali, Andrea Noe', Roberto
Petito, Alessandro Spezialetti and Charles Wegelius.
As
for Saunier Duval-Prodir, their lineup for the race will
be: Riccardo Riccň, Manuele Mori, Luciano Pagliarini, Guido
Trentin, Ángel Gómez "Litu", Peter Mazur, Rubens Bertogliati,
and Raivis Belohvosciks.
Strong
lineups named by Saunier Duval-Prodir and Lampre-Fondital
for the Paris-Nice
Saunier
Duval-Prodir have named a strong starting lineup for the
Paris-Nice stage race in France, the first ProTour race
of the season which starts on the 11th of March, running
to the 18th.
The
strong lineup that will be managed by Joxean "Matxin" Fernández
and Sabino Angoitia will feature Britain's David Millar
and Basque rider Iban Mayo, both riders who are well capable
of producing a winning ride at the week long stage race.
The
complete squad for the Paris-Nice will be: David Millar
(GBr), Francisco Ventoso (Spa), Iban Mayo (Spa), Jesús del
Nero (Spa), Alberto Fernández (Spa), Iker Camańo (Spa),
Christophe Rinero (Fra) and Remmert Wielinga (Ned).
For
Italian team Lampre-Fondital, their starting lineup will
include on-form sprinter Daniele Bennati who was recently
going head to head with Milram star-sprinter Alessandro
Petacchi.
"We'll race with a team characterized by good quality
and a lot of experience," explained the teams sporting
director Guido Bontempi. "We want to realize good performances
in this race that last year gave us satisfactions such as
Vila stage victory and his second place in the overall standing.
There will be many strong teams because this is the first
very important race in this season: for the overall standing
we have Vila and Valjavec; Bennati will work with the aim
to prepare in a perfect way Milano-Sanremo, also because
he will be able to observe closely his opponents for the
Spring Classic."
The
Lampre-Fondital lineup will be: Fabio Baldato (Ita), Daniele
Bennati (Ita), Claudio Corioni (Ita), David Loosli (Ita),
Massimiliano Mori (Ita), Daniele Righi (Ita), Tadej Valjavec
(Slo) and Patxi Vila (Spa).
T-Mobile
announce their lineup for the Driedaagse van West-Vlaanderen
Seven
of the T-Mobile team who competed in yesterday's 'Le Samyn'
semi-classic race yesterday in Belgium will return to action
this Friday at the Driedaagse van West-Vlaanderen stage
race, running from the 9th to the 11th of March in the Flanders
area of Belgium. In fact the only rider from not competing
from yesterday's lineup will be Britain's Roger Hammond.
T-Mobile
sporting director Jan Schaffrath said, "We had originally
planned to use André Korff for the Belgian week,
but he didn't recover in time from a cold. Fortunately,
Roger Hammond was able to answer the call and replace Korff
at 'Le Samyn', but he will be starting Paris-Nice on Sunday."
That
will most likely leave the T-Mobile team one man short on
the start line with seven riders rather than eight. Schaffrath
continued, "If we do draft in another rider, it will
be a last-minute call."
The
seven riders who are currently rostered for the Flemish
race are therefore: Eric Baumann (Ger), Mark Cavendish (GBr),
Scott Davis (Aus), André Greipel (Ger), Adam Hansen
(Aus), Aaron Olson (USA) and Frantisek Rabon (Czh) - Team
manager will be Jan Schaffrath.
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