Cyclopunk's News Digest 28.03.12

Castilla y Leon revealed
Details of the teams, stages and parcours for this year's Vuelta a Castilla y Leon have been made public. The race, due to take place between the 13th and 15th of April, is now in its 27th edition and since 2005 has formed part of the UCI World Tour series. The race manual can be downloaded here.


Kolobnev resigns to Katusha
The cycling world probably won't be especially surprised to hear that Katusha has resigned Alexandr Kolobnev after sacking him in the wake of a positive dope test at the Tour de France. The 30-year-old Russian tested positive for hydrochlorothiazide, a diuretic masking agent, sometimes used to cover up the presence or flush out traces of a performance-enhancing drug, but was later cleared of intentional doping after the UCI appealed the Russian Federation's decision to fine him. He will begin racing with the team as soon as he has recovered from a training accident.


Kroon: Contador case "almost criminal"

The entire case stinks, but the UCI had
to appeal
(image credit: Félix Arellano CC BY-SA 3.0)

Karsten Kroon has attacked the UCI over their handling of the Contador doping case, terming it "almost criminal." Speaking to Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf, the 36-year-old SaxoBank rider says: "A month after his positive control in the 2010 Tour, Alberto was personally called by UCI President Pat McQuaid who told him he wanted to keep the case secret. It was then leaked to a German TV channel, so it came out anyway. Alberto was then cleared by the Spanish Federation, at which point the UCI - having said they wanted to keep it quiet - appealed the judgement." (Is Kroon right?)

Other News
Spidertech C10 have received an invite to the Tour de Suisse. "We made very public our vision to crack the WorldTour, and this is another step in the right direction," says manager Steve Bauer, who took second place in the Tour 24 years ago. (More from Velonation)


Tweets

David Millar ‏ @millarmind
I want to do Flanders so much and it's making me very sad that I can't. Even sadder when I turn up to doctors appointments a day too early.

Rochelle Gilmore ‏ @RochelleGilmore
In my opinion it's the hardest women's Tour of Flanders course yet, perfect race for @marianne_vos I rode the last 10km with @Mattibreschel

Prize disparity at the Dwars door Vlaanderen

Here's an interesting little factoid for you all. The winner of the men's race at the Dwars door Vlaanderen will receive €5785. The winner of the women's race will receive €1000.

The women's race is, of course, much shorter than the men's - 81.5km compared to either 199.5 or 201km (the former is the distance stated on the route details, the latter is stated elsewhere). So if we divide the prize by the distance, we find that the winning woman is going to receive €12.67 for each kilometre; around 44% of the  €29 (199.5km) or €28.78 (201km) that the winning man will receive.

Margriet Kloppenburg
(image credit: Margriet Kloppenberg)

Or at least, that's what Cyclopunk thought. Since then, Danish road and cyclo cross rider Margriet Kloppenburg (see the comments after this article), who says she's happy just to be able to race, has informed me that the top prize is not in fact €1000 at all - that's the entire prize fund for the women's race, to be shared among the winning riders. I'd wondered about that when I read the event rules, but the idea that €1000 could be the whole pot was so ridiculous I dismissed it.

Any one of them could earn more than  €1000 each week working in a full-time job. Split between them, it's peanuts. In fact, with the way food prices have increased in the last couple of years, their prizes would only just about allow them to afford a packet of peanuts.

That, of course, is why there are so few women's races mid-week: the riders are working in full time jobs, because the prize money and team salaries don't give them enough money to live on. It's also why women's cycling isn't as "developed" (as Pat McQuaid likes to say) as men's cycling - it's not that female riders are any less competitive, it's because they simply don't have the time to devote to their sport like the men do.

Come on, Pat. Sort it out.
(image credit: Oblongo CC BY-SA 2.0) 

The Dwars door Vlaanderen is showing the way ahead by including a women's race and it's not the organiser's fault that so little money is available - the problem is that the sport simply doesn't have the sponsorship. The way to get more sponsors is to have more exposure, because commercial companies other than those directly involved with bicycle or athletic equipment manufacture (with the possible exception of Rabobank and one or two others) don't hand over the cash for the good of cycling. They do it because they want to advertise stuff to the fans. The way to get more exposure? More races. The UCI can help with that one by encouraging more existing men's events to run corresponding women's races, like the Dwars does. It wouldn't hurt if some of that vast pile of cash they've been bragging about recently could be used to help support women's cycling, too.


Kloppenberg also says that the women's prize fund at this Sunday's Gent-Wevelgem is, incredibly, only €500;which may be why at the time of writing the information isn't available on the Flanders Classics website - the poor organisers are probably embarrassed.



Come on, Pat. Sort it out.

Daily News Roundup

Nick Nuyens has abandoned Paris-Nice. The 31-year-old Belgian rider turned up at the start of the second stage this morning, but decided not to go on as he is presumably suffering in the wake of a hard crash yesterday.

Pat McQuaid
(image credit: Oblongo CC BY-SA 2.0)

McQuaid harbours Contador doubts?
UCI boss Pat McQuaid has revealed that he's not convinced Spanish rider intentionally doped at the 2010 Tour de France - and even hints that he's not happy with the Spanish rider's punishment, telling the Spanish AS sports newspaper that "The Court of Arbitration for Sport in its ruling does not say that Contador is guilty or has doped, and states that a contaminated nutritional supplement is to blame." When asked if it would have been worse for Contador to be escape prosecution and continue riding, even with suspicions hanging over him, he says: "I do not know, honestly."

McQuaid also says that he believes the war against doping is being won. "Doping has not been what it was  for some years now. Fortunately, the situation has changed for the better, and there are less positive results." Asked if doping is cycling's worst enemy, he says "One of the worst, no doubt because it is a deeply rooted culture - as it is in other sports." However, he feels that the problem is now sufficiently under control for the UCI to start looking at combating other issues: "...another very serious problem that affects other disciplines to ours is that of illegal gambling. That sporting fraud is on the agenda."

Vos: "I have so much more power available"
You might think Marianne Vos would be content with where she is now, winning just abut everything she enters. You might even think she couldn't get any better. Marianne, who will be 25 this May, loves her sport so much that she believes she can get even better: she explained in Rabo Wielermagazine that one of the best things about riding with the new Rabobank Women's Team is the improved training program which gives her opportunity to improve specific areas. At present, she's working on her time trial performance in preparation for the Olympics. "It is, of course, a test on a stationary bike in an enclosed space and you can't compare it to a real race," says the Dutch rider. "However, it gives me confidence that I have so much more power available."

Other news
Cofidis rider Florent Barle broke his collar bone at the Three Days of West Flanders - a new misfortune for the 26-year-old Frenchmanwho won the 2010 Tour of the Pyrenees but went without victory in 2011.

Canadian Heather Moyse - who has already had successful careers as a rugby player and in bobsleigh - proved her recent decision to begin a third career as a cyclist was a wise one yesterday when she was the fourth fastest rider in the 500m TT at the PanAmerican Championships in Argentina, recording a time of 36.207".

Bernard Hinault is tipping Tom Boonen for success in today's second stage at Paris-Nice. "Boonen has made an impression," says the five-time Tour de France winner. "He was very fast, even on the climbs. He is aiming, of course, for the Spring Classics, but with the form he has he can make use of any opportunity. If an opportunity arises he won't miss it, because he is a winner." Boonen is paying respects to LeopardTrek's Wouter Weylandt with a "108 per sempre" badge on his bike. 108 was Weylandt's race number when he died at the Giro d'Italia last year.

Three-time track cycling World Champion Gary Neiwand appeared before Melbourne Magistrates today, where the 45-year-old Australian faces two counts of deliberately exposing his genitals to women whilst masturbating in his car. Magistrates received a medical report stating that Neiwand is responding well to treatment for psychological problems caused by heavy drinking and now has his drinking under control, but said that they believe the rider needs the threat of imprisonment hanging over him to encourage him to continue treatment. According to the Herald Sun newspaper, "In an extraordinary outburst outside court, Neiwand’s lawyer threatened to knock a TV camerman’s “head off” as the former cycling great was bundled into an awaiting car."

He's OK, folks -
Alex Dowsett
(image credit: Adambro CC BY-SA 3.0)

British Time Trial Champion Alex Dowsett broke his elbow in a crash during the final stage at the Three Days of West Flanders on Sunday. Team management had initially believed the rider had not broken any bones after another rider crashed in front of him, but subsequent medical checks confirmed otherwise. The 23-year-old Team Sky rider preferred to be treated back home, as he revealed when he passed on the news via his Twitter account...

@alexdowsett
Broke my elbow yesterday. Drove myself back from Belgium & checked into A&E. Operation today at Royal London Hospital. pic.twitter.com/5OHChAbO