Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

roller wrote:maybe they can spend some of that $50M EUR on getting a new jersey design that doesn't include the poo-brown on black colour suite they've been rocking this past while

im_no_pro wrote: That would be nice, is the only thing I dont like about riding a Fuji Team bike

MichaelB wrote:Now that Saxo has stepped in (with SunGard) to help out Riis, who are the other PT teams that are under threat of closing for the 2011 season.

From my understanding, the others are Caisse and Milram, as the sponsors are not renewing and they haven't announced anything yet ?

Any others ?

After months of speculation the Caisse d'Epargne team have announced that communications giant Telefonica will sponsor the team from next season. The Spanish squad will compete under the name of Team Movistar as of January 1, 2011. The team’s budget and the duration of the contract with Telefonica have yet to be made public.

Caisse d'Epargne announced earlier in the year that they were pulling out of the sport. Since then team boss Eusebio Unzué had struggled to find a replacement backer, with a number of his stars, including Luis Leon Sanchez, courted by rival teams. He had indicated that he wanted riders to give him until August 15 before signing with new teams, implying that a sponsor announcement was imminent.

The safety of a new sponsor would now suggest that Sanchez, along with a large contingent of Spanish riders, will remain with the team for at least another year.

Team directeur, Neil Stephens, himself strongly linked with a move away from the team, said that he was pleased a sponsor could be secured, but was unaware of both team budget and the length of the sponsor involvement.

“The news isn’t a complete surprise as there have been rumours here and there in the press. I knew that we were on the verge of signing and that there were just a few details. It’s great for the future,” Stephens said.

seddo wrote:Carlos Sastre has signed with Geox

Mr Squiggle wrote:Menchov signed with Goex also. Could be some interesting team dynamics there....

bella26 wrote:Article from Cyclingnews.com http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/hushovd ... ns-in-2011
This sounds worrying for Cervelo...I wonder if they are planning on winding up their team for 2011...

bella26 wrote:Seems like Cervelo are gone...http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/cervelo ... cling-team

Richard.L wrote:If Garmin picks up the big names of Cervelo they would have too many leaders? and one big gap in their budget?(for any team)

NUsport added that four riders – Thor Hushovd, Heinrich Haussler,
Andreas Kilier and Britain’s Roger Hammond, are expected to move across to Garmin-Transitions next season.

The decision to end the Cervélo TestTeam male squad helps explain why the team,
which currently races under a Professional Continental licence,
didn’t figure on the recently published list of teams that have applied for ProTour status next year,
as well as why Carlos Sastre was not offered a renewal of his contract.

Directeur Sportif said "... It was now a question of how the team’s demise would be managed,
saying he expected it to cease totally, but at the moment could not add anything meaningful