Riis: sponsor search going well

Bjarne Riis has said that the search for a new sponsor for his Team Saxo Bank is going well and that he hopes to be able to announce the new sponsor at the Tour de France.

“It looks good, but I cannot say much more than that,” he told the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet. “We have good talks around the table and we are, of course, working on some things.

“First and foremost, it is important to keep calm,” he said.

Last month there were rumours that SunGard would expand its sponsorship to became the name sponsor, with the possibility of an announcement during the Amgen Tour of California. While that did not happen, speculation has been further fired by the fact that the internet name “team-sungard.com” has allegedly been sold, although it does not appear yet on the web.

Chris Anker Sörensen said that he had trust in the team owner. “It is true that he has to find something, otherwise the good riders will look for another team. But it sounds realistic,” he told the Danish website spn.dk. “”I am 100 percent confident.”

It was also announced that Sörensen will not ride another race before the Tour de France. The 25-year-old is worn out from the Giro d'Italia. “Right now I will relax a little. During the last four or five days of the Giro, I had the flu and was pretty much all in,” he said.

He had originally been scheduled to ride the Dauphiné Libéré, where he won a stage in 2008. "We have moved a little away from the plans because the Giro was too hard for him," Riis said.

Sörensen fought his way through the bad weather and fog to win the eighth stage of the Giro d'Italia at Monte Terminillo.

"It was crazy cool to win the stage,” he said. “It was huge. "