cheesiest advert ever?

david millar wins paris-nice prologue

david millar yesterday hammered all opposition to take the lead both in the paris-nice and the protour.

however, how can this event be a protour event when not all the protour teams are racing?

unibet denied start by crooked french authorities

it’s official – unibet have been denied a starting place at the paris-nice. a judge has decided that this line of appeal is dead.

but that is not the only problem. the UCI has well and truly stabbed unibet in the back by giving in to the ASO and sanctioning the paris-nice, inspite of the fact that ASO are refusing a start to all the protour teams.

just goes to show how much power and authority the UCI wields – none.

expect pat mcquaid to be bending over in front of a frenchman any time soon.

the UCI blinked.

unibet takes ASO to court

as i thought yesterday, unibet has taken the ASO to court arguing that excluding them from their competitions is damaging their changes in the protour competition.

full story

paris-nice and the UCI

this weekend sees the start of the racing season proper in europe with the paris-nice stage race. and there are problems. big problems.

ASO (who run the paris-nice, the tour de france, paris-roubaix, etc) are refusing to allow unibet.com from taking their place at the start line. this goes against the ideas of the protour which is managed by the UCI.

the protour was set up to get the best teams in the cycling world guaranteed places in the biggest races. everything seems ok with that concept? well, not really. the ASO and other organisers usually invite some teams to their races on top of those with guaranteed places. but the UCI recently upped the membership limit of the protour to 20 teams from 18 the year previous. this means less guest places.

the organisers do not like the way the UCI is saying who can, and cannot ride in their races and feel that the UCI wishes to further control their races and seeks too much power.

the UCI is refusing to back down and the paris-nice is the first protour event on the calender. the UCI had told its protour teams not to start at the race if the situation hadn’t been resolved. but on monday (5th march) a deal was reached. however, this looks like a fudge and unibet may still not be able to ride as french law prohibits the advertising of gambling:

To advertise, directly or indirectly, an activity assimilated to illegal lottery is against the law. I won’t risk putting ASO in conflict with the law.

- ASO president, Patrice Clerc

unibet are obviously not pleased and are threatening legal action.

so, what have we got -

an international federation trying to consolidate its power and establish a premier selection of international races with set teams taking part,

a group of race organisers fighting for control over their own events and who can be invited (mainly the ever-expanding ASO who are looking to take over the vuelta as well as the tour),

a team stopped from taking part due to french law which is ready to take every race organiser and his dog to court,

other teams warned not to start, and then told they can,

riders not knowing if they will be able to race at the top level.

basically – a mess.

it will be interesting to see if cycling can hold back from tearing itself apart for another season.

Marco Pantani

jan ullrich

cycling heroes

agh, fog!

for the second day in a row i have ended up riding through a cloud. after you get over the initial “wow this is beautiful” you soon become cold and covered in dew, and then you get frozen going down the other side of the mountain. funny thing is though, that it was sunny on the other side.

on top of all this i broke a spoke too

no win for nicole…the crowd cries “fix” (well, i do anyhow) :) .

…and rightly so. nicole cooke has acheived more than any of the other people up for sports personality of the year. she has won the most prestigious of the womens’ events, and podiumed at the world champs (let alone being world cup winner). unfortunately a chinless royal type who sits on horses won.

probably to be expected though, the last cyclist to win was tom simpson in 1965 – inspite of britain having the best track cyclists in the world in the 90s in boardman and obree who constantly broke the world hour record in an almost personal battle.

i reckon cyclists in the UK are merely an obstruction on the road for most people.  twats.