Latest Cycling News for May 24, 2005

Edited by Anthony Tan

New wings for the Falcon

By Les Clarke

Looking contemplative
Photo ©: Sirotti

It's been three long years since Paolo Savoldelli tasted Giro success, and in that time there's really been nothing to cheer about. Broken bones and illness have replaced racing and kept the Italian off the bike for most of his stint at T-Mobile, and the disappointment has grown for this 32 year old. Now at Discovery Channel and leading the Giro, the man who flies downhill may finally be finding some luck and form that go his way and not against.

Plagued by injury and illness for the last two years, 2002 Giro d'Italia winner Paolo Savoldelli has shown that those lean years are well and truly behind him as he commands this year's edition of the Giro. 'Il Falco' sits atop the general classification after stage 15, with 25 seconds to countryman Danilo Di Luca in second. With a new team, and the experience of recovering from major crashes, Savoldelli has trained hard to become a clear favourite to take overall honours in Milan this Sunday.

Savoldelli's win in 2002 came in similar circumstances to those he now finds himself in - after keeping himself close to the action during the early stages, he has proven his ability in the mountains to capture the lead after some tough climbing. In 2002 he maintained a stranglehold through the mountains and into Milan, and in 2005 he looks strong enough to repeat his feats of three years ago.

Events during those years in between are unforgettable for all the wrong reasons - spending more months than not recovering from accident or illness, especially after his training accident in 2003 while training with T-Mobile, the team he joined following his Giro win. He hit a moped head-on at speed on a descent and was left with multiple facial fractures, putting him out of action for months. This ruled him out of the Giro, so, focussing on the Tour de France became his main objective - this was shattered when he developed a serious virus and had to miss La Grand Boucle. Last year his Giro and Tour hopes were dashed, again, when he broke his wrist at the Tour of Cologne in April. Even early in 2005 he was recovering from a broken collarbone - it seems luck went missing for the youthful-looking lad from Bergamo.

It's something that still lingers in his mind, telling La Gazzetta dello Sport's Gigi Perna late last year, "When I won the Giro, I was convinced that I could be a top stage race rider but with my crash in 2003, I've wasted two of the best years of my career." At 32, time compounds any feelings of disappointment, but other aspects have helped when the going's been tough, "The experience has made me think...and the birth of my daughter Mariko has helped me too," he also said after sealing his move to Discovery Channel and becoming their leader for the Giro when Yaroslav Popovych, another Giro contender, signalled his intention to concentrate on the Tour de France.

Click here to read the rest of the story.

T-Mobile on Petacchi: "He fears nobody"

With the Fassa Bortolo train in full motion coming into the final kilometres of yesterday's shortened Stage 15 of the Giro, it seemed there could only be one winner.

Sure enough, Alessandro Petacchi won again, but T-Mobile's Erik Zabel took his best stage place of the tour, finishing second to the La Spezia speedster. However, Zabel's team is realistic when it comes to challenging Petacchi in a flat-line sprint.

"Erik did everything right in the critical phase of the race, and managed to get on Petacchi's back wheel. But in the end it just wasn't enough," said the team's directeur sportif Valerio Piva on the team's website, t-mobile-team.com.

"With Petacchi in this form, there is just no way past him - he is in a class of his own and when the Fassa train is well-oiled, he fears nobody."

RAGT reflects on Tour non-selection

While their non-selection for the upcoming Tour de France came as no surprise, with just the one wildcard spot awarded to Ag2r-Prevoyance, RAGT Semences team manager Serge Barle is nevertheless greatly disappointed, and believes the future for many Pro Continental Teams is in doubt.

"We were expecting it. But like lots of other things in life, you have to keep your hopes up, we still believed it was possible," said Barle.

"I get the feeling that things are not quite as healthy as they should be. There is no reason for this type of team to exist any more. I regret that the big French teams in the first year of the ProTour did not lend a helping hand to the smaller structures such as ours. As for RAGT, I am nevertheless aware of how lucky we were last year to be able to take part in all of the big events without ever having made ourselves looks ridiculous."

Barle cites the Giro d'Italia as a case in point, in that four stages have been won by riders from Pro Continental Teams (Ceramica Panaria-Navigare and Selle Italia-Colombia have two stages each), and asks the question: "What better indication could there be that it is the riders who make the team and not the team that makes the rider?"

There is also the problem of a lack of competition as a result of not getting a chance to ride most of the major races, adds Barle, meaning that when they do get the opportunity, the Pro Continental riders find it difficult to perform. "Being a pro rider in our division is a bit like coming out of the Conservatoire with a certificate of merit and never being allowed to play in an orchestra," he says.

"Frankly, starting [the year] without having taken part in the Paris-Nice already created a big gap. Being deprived of Le Dauphiné Libéré is just adding insult to injury. I'm not even mentioning our absence from the Tour de Suisse or the Tour of Romandie. The direct consequence is that we are not taking part in the Tour [de France] - a real shoot down. How is it possible to conceive that our riders stand a chance of doing anything decent in stage races, as they don't get chance to even take part?"

However, although unhappy with his team's current situation, Barle hasn't given up completely: "I hope that the team will prevail and that we will be able to ride well through to the Tour de l'Avenir, where I hope we will do as well as we did last year."

RAGT Semences's upcoming calendar will be as follows: Tour de Belgique (May 25-29), Grand Prix de Liodo (May 29) and the Euskal Bizikleta (June 1-5).

Ullrich good, but room for improvement

After finishing 18th overall at the Volta a Catalunya, T-Mobile captain Jan Ullrich is satisfied with his progress, but acknowledges he must now build on his current form in order to be competitive at the Tour de France, which begins less than six weeks from now.

"I have seen that I am in fairly good shape - but that there is also room for improvement," Ullrich said on t-mobile-team.com.

Directeur sportif Mario Kummer was also happy with their Spanish rider Francisco José Lara's performances at Catalunya. On the sixth stage to Pallejà, 'Paco' Lara was part of the successful 10-man breakaway, eventually placing seventh, and also finished the race 11th overall.

Ullrich will now head straight back into training mode for two weeks, before racing two back-to-back one-day races, the GP Schwarzwald on June 4 followed by the GP Aargau the following day. One week later, he will turn his attention to the Tour de Suisse, scheduled from June 11-19.

"Judging by how it went for me here, I can say that the training is Tuscany has proven fairly effective for me. I am quite happy and let's hope that I can continue building up my form in this manner," he said.

One step at a time for Klöden

Another of T-Mobile's 2005 Tour hopefuls is Andreas Klöden. The 29 year-old has had a rather inauspicious start to the year, where he pulled out of his last race at La Flèche Wallonne, now over a month ago.

Since then, last year's runner-up at the Tour de France has been focusing on his endurance, training for six and a half to seven hours a day around his home base in Switzerland, and says he is improving with each ride.

"If I think back to Flèche Wallonne and compare my fitness levels then with now, I can be satisfied with the progress I have made. Of course, I am far from my peak form, but I need to bide my time," Klöden said in an interview on the team's website. "I have been training with steadily increasing intensity, as I am well aware that my performance levels are not just going to improve overnight."

Asked where he's at in terms of his Tour de France preparations, Klöden said he will need to start racing in order to determine where he's at: That is hard to say," he said. "I have got to start racing again to get back into it. One step at a time. But I am happy with the way things are going at the moment."

As reported previously, Klöden will make his return at the five-day Tour of Bavaria (Bayern-Rundfahrt) in his home country tomorrow, and will use the race to develop his speed, endurance and power. Afterwards, he will resume light training, before tackling the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré from June 5-12.

Gerolsteiner for Bayern-Rundfahrt

German ProTour team Gerolsteiner will send the following riders to the Bayern-Rundfahrt, which takes place this week from May 25-29: René Haselbacher, Uwe Peschel, Michael Rich, Torsten Schmidt, Ronny Scholz, Marco Serpellini, Markus Zberg. Hans-Michael Holczer will be the team manager.

SA names four for Junior World's

Cycling South Africa's national selectors have announced the names of the squad to contest the Junior World Road Championships in Austria in August this year. The four riders are: Jacques Janse van Rensburg, Jaco Venter, Johan Nothnagel and Duncan Viljoen.

Two of the riders will take part in the time trial on August 12 and all four will race in the road race two days later on August 14.

LA heatwave claims cyclist as victim

Record temperatures in Los Angeles, California over the weekend may have contributed to the death of 49 year-old cyclist Robert John Stoffel of La Cañada Flintridge, who died last Sunday.

Temperatures soared above 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) in the Woodland Hills area, and were in the 90s in La Tuna Canyon near Glendale, where Stoffel was riding, said Los Angeles police Sargeant Teresa Coyle to the Los Angeles Daily News.

The cyclist began his training ride at around 7:30am with two other friends, but his companions turned around because of the extreme heat. When one of Stoffel's friends noticed he was no longer behind them, she returned to find him slumped over his handlebars, but unconscious.

By the time Los Angeles Fire Department personnel reached the scene at 9:45am, Stoffel was dead; however, it is still unsure whether his death was related to heat exhaustion.

Previous News    Next News

(All rights reserved/Copyright Knapp Communications Pty Limited 2005)