Clerc calls for allies in "project which would work"

Tour de France organiser ASO has reacted to the latest statements made by UCI president Pat McQuaid. An independent panel of experts will carry out an "audit into cycling" for the World's governing body, and the Irishman didn't rule out that the length of the three Grand Tours may be one of the reasons the sport was so heavily implicated in doping affairs. Therefore, the need to shorten the biggest cycling events may come up.

"The UCI has announced an audit into cycling," ASO president Patrice Clerc told L'Equipe on Wednesday. "But even before it has been carried out, the UCI assures that the problem certainly resides in the length of the Grand Tours. How can you give any credit to the conclusions of an audit if they are already established upon command?"

Clerc continued by heavily criticising the way in which the UCI promotes its top end calendar, the ProTour. "The UCI doesn't listen to anyone anymore: the voices of the race organisers, be they big or small, the voices of the national federations who have expressed doubts on the validity and the basics of the ProTour," he said. "The UCI doesn't listend to the groupes sportifs (teams) either, who have said that some things are wrong, or certain cyclists. Jens Voigt has expressed himself against the obligation of the teams to participate in all the ProTour events. Did they listen to him?"

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Confronted with the fact that a number of talks had been carried out last week at the World Championships in Salzburg, where none of the participants had contested the validity of the ProTour, Clerc commented, "We assisted another World Championship there - one of self-satisfaction and disinformation. How can you believe a communiqué that says that everything is fine, that professional cycling has never been better, that the ProTour has the unconditional support of everyone, that TV audiences are increasing? Today, the UCI wants to brainwash everyone, saying that only the villain ASO is against it. This irresponsible autism prevents the collective awareness necessary to come out of the crisis."

Even if the boss of the Tour de France organisation gave the UCI credit for recently announced anti-doping measures ("Everything that goes into the direction of the fight against doping is fine by me"), the Frenchman is not afraid to continue his stance against the UCI ProTour series, which is planned to bundle up the TV rights of all ProTour races as of 2009. "The UCI defends a economic and marketing project," Clerc continued. "It wants to install a commercial trademark which belongs to (the UCI), which would feed off other, already existing trademarks - ours. If the ProTour calendar was only a sporting calendar, I'd have no problem with it. But in this case, we will be careful over the defense and protection of our trademarks. If we have to go to court, we'll go."

Clerc added that it wasn't the role of the Court of Arbitration for Sport to rule on the case, as had been suggested by the UCI recently. On the creation of a separate calendar, which would include the three Grand Tours as well as numerous classics owned by ASO, RCS and Unipublic, Clerc stated, "Today, I ask all the players in this sport: Do you want to build up a true project, which would work, even if it is a compromise at first? We will take up the dialogue again with the people who have been soliciting us, and those who haven't dared to do it yet. I appeal to all good faith, to all who want to work with us. We, our means, our brains and our organisation are ready to be at the disposal of all those who are not heard by the UCI, to come out of the crisis."