gitaneusa.com :: View topic - Tour de France Teams to be Announced in Late March

sandranian · Site Admin

From Cyclingnews.com:

Tour de France teams to be announced late March
By: Cycling NewsPublished: March 6, 11:56, Updated: March 6, 13:21Race:Tour de France

As teams gather for the first major French race of the season, Paris-Nice starting on Sunday, race organisers Amaury Sport Organization (ASO) held a key technical meeting and revealed that the team for this year's Tour de France will be announced at the end of March.

“We have a total of 25 nominated teams,” said Jean-François Pescheux, the technical director of the Tour, according to the AFP news agency.

Just who from those 25 teams will secure one of the expected 22 places at the Tour is still unclear.

16 teams are assured a place under an agreement from 2008. However it remains to be seen if ASO will respect that agreement following sponsor and ProTour status changes. The 16 teams are: AG2R La Mondiale, Astana, Bbox Bouygues Telecom, Caisse d'Epargne, Cofidis, HTC-Columbia, Euskaltel, Francaise des Jeux, Footon-Servetto, Lampre, Liquigas-Doimo, Milram, Quick Step, Rabobank, Saxo Bank, Omega Pharm-Lotto.

Garmin-Transitions, Katusha and Cervelo Test Team are not covered by the agreement but all three teams will surely be invited back to the Tour in 2010. However the creation of Lance Armstrong's RadioShack team and Team Sky has made competition for places in the Tour de France very intense.

If all these teams were invited, as is widely expected, that would leave only one other wild card place. That could go to new French team Saur-Sojasun but with the Tour de France starting in Rotterdam in the Netherlands, the Vacansoleil team must also have a great chance, as does Skil-Shimano, who took part in the 2009 Tour de France.

sandranian · Site Admin

That article didn't didn't discuss Team BMC, which has Hincapie and Cadel Evans on it. I don't think le Tour will leave out the World Champion, who is consistently considered one of the likely winners of the race. And Hincapie is usually good for a stage win (or close to it)...definitely one of the "old men" of the peleton. I am afraid that chances are, Saur will not get the invitation this year.

Hopefully they are planning for next year, when the rules change and the Tour is no longer obligated to invite the ProTour teams. Some of our young riders will be a bit more able, and who knows...there may be ProTour riders who want to join a French team to increase their chances of selection.

There is also the very slim chance that the Tour doesn't honor its contract with UCI to guarantee admission for the ProTour teams. If there is any sort of scandal leading up to the race in one of the ProTour teams, I bet the Tour jettisons the scheme one year early, and Saur is in (maybe). That is NOT to say that I am hoping for a positive, so please don't read that into this....