Bet on Cycling

Posts Tagged ‘Andy Schleck’

Andy Schleck – the man who just might be proclaimed winner of the Tour de France – says he believes Alberto Contador and his claims that his positive test from clenbeturol came from eating contaminated meat.

Schleck, second to Contador by 39 seconds, told the Spanish daily Marca that he’s swapped messages with Contador and said he hopes the Spanish rider is able to clear his name.

“I have wished him luck and I have told him I hope he can demonstrate his innocence,” Schleck told Marca. “I believe in his innocence and hope it’s like that. I hope that Alberto is innocent and he can demonstrate it. I am not a doctor or a specialist … but I don’t believe he did anything wrong.”

Echoing comments to VeloNews during last month’s Tour de France presentation, Schleck said he would not like to be named winner of the 2010 Tour if Contador is handed a racing ban and stripped of his title.

“I don’t want to win via a desk, I want to win arriving in Paris with the yellow jersey over my shoulders,” he continued. “I don’t know what will happen, but I am second.”

Schleck also said that the financial support for his new team is coming from a wealthy individual from Luxembourg who is backing the Schleck brothers to create an elite team capable of delivering the Tour de France victory.

“It’s a person from Luxembourg, a millionaire who put down the money to get it started and who’s made a very strong bet for cycling,” he continued. “We have small sponsors, but the title sponsor still isn’t decided. The team is beginning similar to how Garmin or High Road from a few years ago.”

Schleck said the Tour will be his top objective next season, but also said the month of April will be equally important, with the Tour of the Basque Country and Liege-Bastogne-Liege as top goals in the spring.

Schleck also said he has some contact with former boss Bjarne Riis, but said there was “another way to punish us” than being ejected from the Vuelta a Espana, along with Stuart O’Grady, for arriving late back to the team hotel after allegedly having a few beers after a stage.

He also criticized calls by some anti-doping officers to have surprise tests during the middle of the night.

“That’s ridiculous, it’s too much,” he said. “It’s only from midnight to 6 in the morning that they cannot come. I don’t want anyone waking me up in the middle of the night.”

Britain’s Team Sky announced Wednesday that Saxo Bank’s Bobby Julich is joining the team as a race coach for the 2011 season.

The 38-year-old Julich is the latest in a flood of riders and staff to announce plans to leave Saxo Bank, an exodus that began before the Tour de France, when both Frank and Andy Schleck revealed plans to form their own team, based and financed in their native Luxembourg.

Julich finished out his road career at Saxo Bank in 2008 and joined the team in a management position, focusing on technical development, testing and time trial coaching, as well as the training and development of new young riders.

A solid time trialist in his own right, Julich worked closely with Andy Schleck at Saxo Bank in 2010 on his time-trialing, playing a key role in the Luxembourger’s much-improved performance in the penultimate stage of this year’s Tour de France.

Julich, however, is expected to play an expanded role on Team Sky, according to race coach Rod Ellingworth.

“Bobby is going to work alongside myself and help develop the coaching role at Team Sky,” Elingworth said. “We have a long-term view and a coaching structure that we are aiming to work towards. Bobby is the first new person to be taken on with that in mind. The role is very much to be a one-on-one coach with a few of our key riders.

“Race coaching is everything to do with the athletes’ lives. It involves so much; planning, supporting the riders whenever they need it – whether it’s time trialing, positional and tactical work – basically whatever is needed to help them in every area. It could even be getting them back on track after an illness.”

Ellingworth said the coaching role is especially important at Sky.

“In a way we want to try and broaden many people’s views of what coaching actually is,” he said. “We are available as a coaching team 24/7 to these bike riders; you have to live the life with them a little bit. It’s a big role, a real key one. You are the day-to-day contact for that bike rider – so if they need anything they come through the coach first and then the coach delves into all the support staff around them to make sure it happens rather than the athlete having to go and speak to 10 or 15 different people.

“Bobby hasn’t ever worked in this style before so that’s going to be his challenge but he’s completely up for that and is really looking forward to it. He’s come here and had a good look around and can see that it works.

“We obviously also want to make sure that he has his input. He’s got some great experience – and we want to learn from that – so he’ll be a good member of the team.”

Julich said he is pleased by the prospect of working at Sky.

“I am extremely excited to be joining Team Sky. I have been in the same system for seven years and look forward to learning a new one and meeting new people.

“I think I will fit in perfectly with this team and hope that my experience will help this team progress and reach its goals for the future.”

Tour de France champion Alberto Contador, who is provisionally suspended following a positive test for clenbuterol, said Wednesday that he is happy his case is finally being handled by the Spanish cycling federation (RFEC).

“I’m happy that the case is being handled by the federation because that means we can now move forward,” said Contador, who potentially faces revocation of his 2010 Tour de France win and a suspension of up to two years.

Contador has claimed his positive result for trace amounts of clenbuterol, following a test on the Tour de France in July, was due to eating contaminated meat – although skeptics suggest he may have inadvertently put clenbuterol back into his system through a blood transfusion.

Earlier Wednesday a report in AS sports daily claimed the RFEC would take “at least two months” to decide whether it would sanction Contador or not.

The final decision of the RFEC’s Competition Committee on the Spanish rider “will not be known before two months,” the federation’s chief, Juan Carlos Castano, said.

“Everything depends on arguments that Contador will present and input the Competition Committee will seek from neutral experts to look into the veracity of the evidence presented,” AS reported.

Under UCI anti-doping rules, the RFEC has a maximum of one month to deliver its decision, but national governing body rules allow up to three months.

Provisionally suspended by the UCI, Contador’s future is hanging in the balance. If suspended for two years, he has threatened to quit the sport.

Contador, who also won the Tour de France in 2007 and 2009, in August signed a two-year contract with the Saxo Bank team.

Luxembourg’s Andy Schleck, runner-up behind the Spaniard in the last two editions of the race, has recently quit Saxo Bank and set up a new team with his brother Frank and many other members of the Danish outfit.

This could take a while

Spain’s cycling federation (RFEC) said it will take at least two months to decide whether to sanction Tour de France winner Alberto Contador for alleged doping violations, a Spanish newspaper reported Wednesday.

The final decision of the RFEC’s Competition Committee on the Spanish rider “will not be known before two months,” the federation’s chief, Juan Carlos Castaño, said in comments reported by the sports daily AS. The decision could even take three months, AS said.

“Everything depends on arguments that Contador will present and the checks that the Competition Committee will seek from neutral experts to look into the veracity of the evidence presented,” AS said.

Under the anti-doping rules of cycling’s interntional governing body, the UCI, the RFEC has a maximum of one month to deliver its decision.

The UCI “sets a rule of a one-month deadline to take a decision in doping cases … but under Spanish anti-doping rules, which is what will be followed, the authorized period is three months,” Castaño said.

Contador, 27, won his third yellow jersey in July, but it was later revealed that he tested positive for trace amounts of the banned substance clenbuterol during the second rest day of the Tour de France at Pau on July 21.

Contador claims he ate contaminated meat, although his critics suggest he may have inadvertently put clenbuterol ? a weight-loss and muscle-building drug ? back into his system via an illicit and performance-enhancing blood transfusion.

Provisionally suspended by the UCI, Contador’s future is hanging in the balance. If suspended for two years, he has threatened to quit the sport.

Contador, who also won the Tour de France in 2007 and 2009, in August signed a two-year contract with the Saxo Bank team.

Andy Schleck, runner-up behind the Spaniard in the last two editions of the race, recently quit Saxo Bank, leading an exodus of talent to a new Luxembourg-based team.