An open letter to Rabobank

Lense Koopmans is the supervisory director of Rabobank's Supervisory Board, a body that "supervises the policy of the Executive Board of Rabobank Nederland and the general conduct affairs at Rabobank Group and its affiliated entities. In addition, the Supervisory Board advises the Executive Board and is responsible for the appointment and remuneration of the members of the Executive Board." 

I have emailed a copy to Rabobank - if you agree that the Rabobank women's team should not suffer from the possible withdrawal of Rabobank's sponsorship due to doping in men's cycling, please feel free to copy the letter and send it under your own name. One email won't make much of a difference, but if enough women's cycling fans ask Rabobank to make the right decision we might be able to help ensure their future support.


Dear Mr. Koopmans,

First off, please allow me to apologise for contacting you in this manner - I have no doubt that, as the supervisory director of Rabobank, you are a very busy man. However, I am writing to you in order to share some thoughts on a matter involving your company and which is of very great importance to myself and to an ever-increasing number of people around the world, and reading this letter will take only a few moments of your time. I hope you will spare me those few moments.

You've probably already guessed that I'm talking about Rabobank's recent decision to withdraw from professional cycling sponsorship. I fully understand the reasons for this decision: like all cycling fans, I had hoped that doping was finally coming to an end in the sport and I am deeply upset at the recent USADA revelations that show it has remained a far greater problem than we thought. If I was the director of a company such as yours, I too would feel reluctant to continue associating my company with cycling now that doping is in the spotlight once again. I'd like to add at this point that the decision to honour contracts, now that it would be too late for the riders to find new teams, is admirable proof that Rabobank has a heart, rather than being simply another inhuman, uncaring giant corporation. Proficiat for that!

One of the reasons I admire Rabobank (the company and the cycling team) is your fantastic support of women's cycling. While I'm sure that part of the company's decision to become involved in women's cycling is that there were and still are very few "big name" sponsors, allowing Rabobank to gain greater public awareness from it than would be possible in men's cycling which benefits from numerous very famous sponsors, I've always believed there was something more to it, something related to the altruistic ideals upon which Rabobank was first established: a desire to help female cyclists get the recognition and equality that they deserve. The salaries you pay to those riders and the money you've put into promoting them is a shining example of fairness in a sport where many receive no salary at all and compete for prizes that are a tiny fraction of those on offer to the men. I like to think also that Rabobank was the first company to realise that the women's sport is not a less exciting version of cycle racing and that the riders are not weaker and less interesting than their male counterparts; that in actual fact women's racing is always every bit as interesting and competitive as men's and, sometimes, more so.

Women's cycling has never suffered from the same image problems caused by doping that men's cycling has experienced; yet the riders are subject to the same tests with the same regularity. The only conclusion, therefore, is that doping is far less prevalent in women's cycling. Imagine how women's cycling would benefit if Rabobank were to decide that the support it had given in the past would continue and that the reason was because so few female riders resort to cheating. Men's cycling will take a knock from the current scandal, then continue just as it did after Tom Simpson died and in the wake of the Festina Affair and Operacion Puerto - it might even benefit from the scar left by the withdrawal of Rabobank, which would serve as a reminder that when riders dope everybody loses. But if Rabobank stayed with women's cycling, the benefits would be enormous - it would be seen by the media to be the far cleaner, fairer form of cycling that evidence suggests it really is. With women's cycling currently more popular than ever before in the wake of the Olympics and Marianne Vos' superb victory at the World Championships, the news that Rabobank had decided to remain a part of it could do more good than all the money you've provided and then some.

I also understand that a final decision has not yet been made on the future of the Rabobank women's team (and I'm pleased to hear that you will continue sponsoring Vos, who is a hero to so many of us). I hope, therefore, that the points above will be considered - Rabobank has an opportunity to do women's cycling an enormous favour, and the increased exposure for the sport and the riders would surely make financial sense.

Many thanks for your time.

New backer for Holland Ladies' Tour

Organisers of the Holland Ladies' Tour - among the most prestigious European women's cycling events now that the Giro Donne is the sole surviving women's Grand Tour - have revealed that they're successfully recruited a new main sponsor.

Chairman Marten de Lange announced at the end of January this year that the race had been temporarily suspended due to financial difficulties. However, around four weeks later he was able to confirm that the race would go ahead after other sponsors agreed to provide more backing, but that it would have to be a more "economical" event. "It would be a shame if this race was to disappear, especially now that it offers such a perfect prelude towards the world championship in Limburg one a week later," he said. "We are still negotiating with a potential sponsor. If that happens, we can make the race as good as previous years - which is what the successful women of Dutch cycling deserve."

The new backer, Brainwash, is a chain of hairdressers that will already be familiar to many fans, having maintained links to women's cycling for some years - it previously sponsored its own Brainwash team before becoming co-sponsor of the Rabobank Women's team. However, company managers had let it be known when the team closed that they remained keen to continue their support and presence in the sport: that they have now extended it is a promising sign that they've found the returns satisfactory. In difficult economic times that have seen numerous races and teams vanish due to financial problems, this goes a long way to encouraging other firms to become involved.

The race, which has been won in the past by such illustrious names as Leontien van Moorsel, Petra Rossner, Kristin Armstrong and new Olympic champion Marianne Vos, is due to take part between the 4th and 9th of September and will now become known as the Brainwash Women's Tour.

Another Cyclopunk Exclusive: Schlecks' new sponsors!

Hot on the heels of news that Johan Bruyneel is in a spot of bother and today's revelation that Jakob Fuglsang has been made to go to his bedroom without any tea and has to stay there for the rest of the season, Cyclopunk's Copenhagen-based sister newspaper Overskud Lort has come up with the strongest evidence yet that the Brothers Schleck will be racing for a new team backed by a German sponsor in 2013.

Overskud Lort undercover journalist Spionclopunk has obtained apparently genuine documents showing that well-known candy manufacturer Haarigen Jungen - which amusingly produced black licorice coins named negertaler as late as 1993 - has signed an agreement to supply the new and as-yet un-named team (instructions on how to write and pronounce the new team's name are expected to be published a few months after it's revealed) with one bag of fizzy jelly rainbow-coloured frogs per day. It's understood that the sweets will be used to bribe Jens Voigt, whom the Schlecks recruited some years ago to prevent bigger boys from stealing their lunch money when UCI officials are looking the other way.

It's still not entirely clear how the team is to be financed, though Andy Schleck has been overheard saying that he knows a magical pixie who has promised him a pot of gold.

More Spyclopunk exclusives

Maxifuel partners Tour of Britain

Maxifuel - "the UK’s preferred endurance brand from sport nutrition experts Maxinutrition," according to the official press release (I rely on tea and cakes personally, but there you have it*) - has announced that it will be the new sports nutrition partner to the Tour of Britain and the Halfords Tour Series. Financial details have not been revealed, but the manufacturer "will provide amateur riders with individually-tailored nutritional support to complement their lifestyle, training and racing schedules as well as support professional participants and race enthusiasts through sampling opportunities at the various events."

"I’d like to welcome Maxifuel to The Tour family of events, and we look forward to working together in what is a very important year for British sport," says Tour director Mick Bennet. "I am sure spectators and our Tour Ride participants will be looking forward to exploring Maxifuel’s range of products with the aim of helping them to improve their performance."

*I also don't win very many races.

IG Markets to sponsor domestic team in 2012

(image credit: Sigma Sport)

IG Markets has confirmed that it will sponsor Team Sigma Sport starting in 2012, with the team changing its name to IG-Sigma Sport. The deal will last for an initial period of two years.

IG, a British company in the financial services sector, is listed on the London Stock Exchange and FTSE-250 indices. The organisation began sponsoring Team Sky at the start of 2011 and has increased its support for cycling over the course of the year, expressing a wish to become "much more than just a logo on the Team Sky kit." To date, they have sponsored the leader's jersey at the Tour of Britain, the Rapha Cycle Club (a mobile cafe, display area and retail space that has proved very successful in bringing people with little previous interest in cycling to races) and three stages at the Tour Down Under. In addition, they worked with Opta to create the IG Markets Pro-Cycling Index, an online service considered by many to be a more accurate representation of rider ability than the UCO rankings system and provided assistance to the Smithfield Nocturne, an event that brings competitive cycling to inner city communities and is highly likely to produce the British champions of the future.

This is undoubtedly fantastic news after a year that has seen so many teams either folding completely or battling against crippling financial difficulties as sponsors have left the sport. Sigma Sport has not yet announced whether it plans to expand its programme with help from its new partner, but failing to move into women's racing after securing backing from an organisation that so obviously wishes to help develop British cycling would seem a missed opportunity - and with women's cycling suffering even more than men's in the current climate, the news will be even more welcome if they choose to go in that direction.

SunGard to leave cycling

As we approach the end of a year in which numerous companies have withdrawn their support from cycling, in some cases forcing the closure of successful teams, US-based software and IT firm SunGard is the latest to announce that it will be ending its support for the sport.

Bjarne Riis
(image credit: VeloSteve CC BY-SA 2.0)

SunGard became co-sponsor of Bjarne Riis' Danish team Saxo Bank-SunGard at the beginning of 2011. While spokesperson George Thomas refers to the deal as a "successful partnership" and says that it is a business decision, insiders and fans will naturally wonder if the company may be concerned about bad publicity stemming from team member and three-time Tour winner Alberto Contador's ongoing doping investigation - the Spanish rider, who says that his positive test result for Clenbuterol is due to having consumed tainted meat (the drug is commonly used - illegally, in Europe - to promote muscle growth in cattle), but the case has now been dragging on for many months with no court decision expected until early next year.

If Contador is the reason SunGard are withdrawing, even though he has not been proved guilty of anything and even though cycling has done more than any other sport to prevent doping over the last decade, it seems that it's still saddled with a druggy image, leaving sponsors likely to abandon ship as soon as there's a whiff of trouble rather than risk being linked to cheats.

Meanwhile, Danish investment bank Saxo Bank will remain and become sole sponsor of the squad, which will be renamed Team Saxo Bank.

The end of the Euskies?

The orange jerseys may be no more in 2012.
(image credit: Fanny Schertzer CC BY-SA 3.0)

The orange jerseys have been a feature of top races for years and the riders who wear them are among the most popular in cycling with a loyal following in both their Basque homeland and abroad - but there's a possibility that Euskaltel-Euskadi might not be with us in 2012.

Speaking to the Spanish newspaper Marca, team captain Samuel Sanchez said that the squad has been experiencing difficulties in securing a replacement backer: "If things continue this way, Euskaltel will vanish in 2012," he explained, adding that his squad's current sponsorship runs out at the end of this year before expressing his hopes that the current sponsor would extend the contract or a new one would be found.

HTC and Highroad still an item?

The Financial Times has printed a correction to its story yesterday on Highroad's reported problems in securing sponsorship for next year, stating that the team is still in discussion with the Taiwanese giant HTC and other potential backers.

Highroad - not the end of the road

Precisely how the newspapers got from Bob Stapleton blaming the reticence of some companies to become involved in professional cycling to a doom and gloom story spelling out the end of one of the sport's most popular and successful teams and the probable apocalypse bringing an end to cycling as we know it remains a mystery, but that's the newspapers for you.

Anyway, since we're not part of the professional scene we rely on the news and published a story on it yesterday. Much of it can be ignored - chances are Highroad's cyclists will be hanging around and the team will continue nurturing new stars under Stapleton's patronage for many years. However, we'll keep the story up because the problem of doping discouraging companies from sponsoring teams for fear of tarnishing their public images remains a very real one.