Fireworks to come from Lizzie Armitstead?

Breaking news: ARMITSTEAD SIGNS TO AA-DRINK Pooley, Laws, Ryan, Martin and Daams also going to the Dutch team

The shocking demise of the Garmin-Cervélo Women's Team - one of the most progressive and admired in the sport - was always going to cause ruptions.

Armitstead is angry
(image credit: otbphoto CC BY-NC 2.0) 

Comments made on Twitter seem to suggest that just as soon as she can, multiple British, European and World Champion Lizzie Armitstead is going to join the row over what could have been done, what should have been done and what other teams need to do in the future with arguments as explosive as her famously devastating sprint.

At around midday on Wednesday (07.12.11):

L_ArmiTstead Lizzie Armitstead 
Hopefully not long left biting my tongue, I am so angry!

Then, just under two hours later:

L_ArmiTstead Lizzie Armitstead 
Very tempting to let it all out but I have got to play the game...

We await more with baited breath. Whatever Armitstead has to say is going to be worth hearing.

Garmin-Cervélo Pro Women budget slashed

Emma Pooley is rated among the top
cyclists in the world

Garmin-Cervélo's women's team, one of the best-known and most successful in the sport, is facing financial difficulties with the departure of sponsor BigMat. Rumours suggest that it's just had its budget cut by as much as 50%, causing some members to start looking elsewhere.

This is dire news for women's cycling which has seen several teams and races vanish due to lack of funding over the last few years. The team - home to some of the best riders in the world such as Emma Pooley, Lizzie Armitstead, Sharon Laws and Lucy Martin - is one of the few that has always placed its female members on an equal footing with its male members, guaranteeing them a minimum wage when some teams don't pay any salary at all to female riders; though in the opinion of many, team manager Jonathan Vaughters has not shown anything like the enthusiasm for the women's team that Cervélo founder Gerard Vroomen demonstrated with the women's TestTeam.

Vaughters, meanwhile, stated his case on Twitter, pointing out that he can't take money from the men's team to finance the women (which is fair enough, just as it would be were he to refuse to take money from the women to bolster up the men's team should they lose a sponsor) and suggests that if fan are angry they should take it up with the company and ask why they'll be continuing to sponsor FDJ - who don't have a women's team - in 2012. He also insists that he is "trying to get the best solution possible for the women." That BigMat is still sponsoring FDJ seems to suggest that Garmin-Cervélo is another victim of women's cycling's biggest problem - it doesn't get the exposure it deserves and, as a result, sponsors decide they're not getting value for money and withdraw support. Cycling News reported in October that the team would be able to take BigMat to court to seek compensation, saying that its lawyers would decide on whether or not this course of action would be taken "in the near future."

Cyclopunk asked Vaughters if he'd be willing to confirm the cut is 50% as rumoured, but received no reply. However, when we expressed hope that he'd find a new backer, he replied "Me too."

As such, it has led the way towards the ultimate goal of increasing the profile of women's cycling to a state at which it is taken as seriously and receives the same exposure as men's cycling; enjoying a great deal of success along the way and  picking up a string of race victories. To lose a team such Garmin-Cervélo, perhaps the organisation best placed to lead women's cycling forward, would thus be a disaster, in addition to being evidence that the sport is in a worse state than previously though.

More: Sarah Connolly "suggestions that Garmin spend more on the hospitality budget for their men’s team than their entire women’s team budget added together…."

Giro Donne: Stage 1

In a career spanning nine years, Vos
has excelled in road, track, MTB and
cyclocross.

There were no huge surprises in today's Stage 1 of the Giro Donne with the Dutch and World champion Marianne Vos showing the skill and supremacy that have made her name, pacing herself with extreme precision and eventually crossing the line just a second before Ina Teutenberg and the group. The course itself threw up nothing unexpected either with riders taking it relatively easy for the earlier parts of the stage, no doubt sizing one another up and seeing who looks like they're on form and who isn't looking so good and concentrating on pacing themselves up the large climb to Castel Gandolfino, where Valentina Scandolara dominated and became the first to wear the green jersey.

Once up the climb - the altitude remained fairly constant thereafter - a few spats broke out with various teams and individuals making half-hearted attacks here and there. Scarlett Callovi made the best go, but the peloton hadn't yet got themselves in the mood for that sort of thing at this early point and refused to give her the space she needed. However, it would be completely wrong were we to give the impression that it was boring - when you have the likes of Nicole Cooke, Emma Pooley, Lizzie Armitstead and Marianne Vos all in the same race, the one it's never going to be is boring and the excellent form required of anyone who races at their level ensured that there was plenty of high-speed action through the beautiful countryside lying between Rome and Velletri. The area around Lago Albano being a particular highlight and not to be missed for anyone fortunate enough to visit the region.

Nicole Cooke, who has been having a difficult season since returning to the sport after illness, must have been having a bad day today as she finished in an uncharacteristic 50th place. Cooke has been striving to prove to the cycling press, much of which seems to have written her off forever, that she can return to the form that saw her win two Tours de France Féminin as well as the 2004 Giro Donne. Many fans will be hoping the Welsh star can do so, because at just 28 it would be a great pity were her career to come to an end now.

Things came to ahead in the final kilometres, which featured a small but definitely noticeable incline and where a sprint broke out with what looked to be most of the field involved. Armitstead, who powered past her team leader Pooley ( who came in 11th today) in a similar sprint to take the honours in the British Nationals last weekend, looked hopeful but in the end even she didn't have the strength required to best Vos and achieved fourth. With six major victories in the bag already this year, the 24-year-old Dutchwoman was always going to be a favourite in this race. Nothing is a foregone conclusion in a sport as dangerous and subject to unforeseen circumstances as cycling, however, and the close race today shows what an interesting race this is going to be.

Stage 1 results:



1. Marianne Vos (Netherlands) Nederland Bloeit, 02:11:56
2. Ina Teutenberg (Germany) HTC-Highroad, + 00:01
3. Emma Johansson (Sweden) Hitec Products (2-10 received same time)
4. Lizzie Armitstead (UK), Garmin-Cervélo
5. Judith Arndt (Germany) HTC-Highroad
6. Rossella Callovi (Italy) MCipollini-Giambenini
7. Elena Berlato (Italy) Top Girls Fassa Bortolo
8. Tatiana Guederzo (Italy) MCipollini-Giambenini
9. Rasa Leleivyte (Lithuania) Vaiano Solaristech
10. Martine Bras (Netherlands) Netherlands National Team


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Giro Donne set to be as good as le Tour

Can't wait for the action to get under way at the Tour de France? So excited you feel like you've just eaten a box of pills you found in Willy Voet's car glovebox? Friends and family already annoyed by your obsession?

Well, you can satisfy the craving simply enough, because there are actually two Grand Tour cycle races starting this week, and one of them starts this morning. It's the Giro Donne, also known as the Giro d'Italia Femminile, and today's stage features 86km of high-speed action from the stunning Italian countryside between Rome and Velletri where vineyards cover the rolling hills and castles are plentiful. Along the way, riders will pass through Castel Gandolfo which has been voted one of Italy's most beautiful towns and is the location of the pope's summer residence. Catholic riders may be hoping his presence will attract some divine assistance, because to get there they need to complete a steep climb to 425m.

Emma Pooley, one of the fastest women in cycling

There are a number of British entries in the race, some of them among the favourites to stand on the top step of the podium in San Francesco del Campo on the 10th of July. Among them are Emma Pooley who won the women's Flèche Wallonne last year and who will be accompanied by a crack Garmin-Cervelo team assembled from the best female cyclists in British racing, put together purely to help her win this race. Team members include Sharon Laws, Lucy Martin and Lizzie Armitstead who, so far this year, has been crowned British Road Race champion and won the Tour of Chongming Island. Pooley has stated that she considers this race to be the most prestigious in women's cycling and will be giving it everything she's got - and as anyone who has seen her race knows, she has a lot packed into her petite frame.

...and she'll need to be too, since Marianne Vos and Nicole Cooke are also after the top spot on the podium .

US National champion Shelley Olds is also taking part, as are ex-UCI World Champion Marianne Vos who will be many people's favourite for the general classification win and Nicole Cooke, the Welsh nine-time British champion and twice Tour de France Feminin winner who has been battling to regain the form that saw her take first place here in 2004. With a field made up of these seven, along with 119 women at the very pinnacle of modern competitive cycling and some challenging stages - 2,3 and 8 (with a summit finish at around 1,750m) all look like killers - the Giro Donne is set to be every bit as interesting as the Tour.

In fact, while it's often said that the race is overshadowed by the Tour and largely forgotten as a result, the sheer quality of women's racing at the moment may well see the Giro taking attention from her French brother for the next ten days.