Where will they end up?

Hi All,

I have lots (LOTS!) to get to over the next few days, with lots of triathlon news, running news, etc, so feel free to come back in the next couple, but wanted to try and sort out the biggest story in Pro Cycling (and remarkably, has been since September) and that is the whole Who-will-Alberto-be-riding-with-in-2010?

If you don't know the whole story - here goes. Alberto Contador signed a 3-year contract with Team Astana for the 2008 thru 2010 seasons. Then Astana got blackballed (thank you Alex Vinokourov) for the 2008 Tour, so he just won the Giro and the Vuelta that year. Then Lance comes back in 2009, Alberto and Lance try to play nice, end up sniping thru the summer, Alberto wins the Tour as Lance tries to upstage him, then Lance leaves Astana to start his own team and takes most of the key Astana riders with him. Then Vinokourov comes back from his suspension to rejoin Team Astana (which was essentially created to support him) and Contador wants out. Problem is that he still has a contract and Astana really doesn't want to let him leave. So he's stuck...


The last few months have been full of rumours. At least 5 big ProTour teams have been rumored to be interested in signing Contador if they could work out a deal with him and Team Astana. Once it became apparent that Team Astana was not going to just release him from his contract to save his reported €2 million per year. But Astana insisted he would ride with them for 2010. However, Astana still haven't secured their ProTour license for 2010, which needs to be completed or Contador could walk away and become a very big free agent cyclist.


That is not nearly the end of the story. In the past week, all of these stories have been posted.

1. Last week, it was reported that Contador was re-negotiating a new contract with Astana for upwards of €4 million per year. However, his new contract would contain a provision that if anyone on Astana tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug, he would be free to leave the team.

2. Then came news that Astana has offered Contador a new contract for 4 more years, at a reported €8 million per season. Wow. It appears that Astana wants to simply offer Contador more money than anyone else to keep him. This is twice as much money as they offered him in late July on a similar 4-year deal.

3. Contador's brother and manager is now trying to clear up some of the confusion, saying that Alberto would only remain at Astana for one more year at most. Is this a strategy to maximize the amount of money he can get out of Team Astana? Or are they seriously looking at leaving €32 million on the table?

With all these stories, it might be evident that Contador will be riding in the teal of Astana in 2010. Well, maybe not...

A story today suggested that Team Quick Step has offered Contador a €20 million contract over 4 years. So maybe that explains why Astana upped their offer so much. So they are betting that Contador doesn't re-sign with Astana and that they lose their ProTour status in 2010. Very interesting...

Contador is not only the big name still out there...Bradley Wiggins also has a contract for 2010 (with Garmin) but continues to be rumored to be moving to Team Sky (the new British ProTour team). Team Sky was supposed to announce their entire 2010 team at a media event last month, but delayed the event for unknown reasons. Similar to Quick Step, Team Sky is very vocal in their pursuit of Wiggins. Plus the Contador-to-Garmin-if-Wiggins-leaves-Garmin-for-Sky circle has been rumored for months as well.


So while we are about 2 months from the beginning of 2010, we are still waiting for the last few cycling dominoes to fall? It should be all done by the end of November, but we were assuming that it would all be done by the end of September. Once these two cyclists find homes, then we will sort of the rest of the questions for 2010...but let's deal with those later...

More to come this week - including a preview of Ironman 70.3 Worlds...see you soon!

Cadel on the move...

Hi All,

Some late-breaking pro cycling news this weekend concerning our current World Champion Cadel Evans. Normally late-breaking news about a pro cyclist would involve a positive doping violation but not this time...


Cadel Evans surprised a lot of people in the cycling world on Saturday by exercising an out in his contract with Silence-Lotto and deciding to leave the team with whom he has twice finished second and once third in the Tour de France in the past 4 seasons. There had been speculation that Evans was dissatisfied with his team over they years for not surrounding him with strong enough helpers to help his ascent of the TDF podium. Evans had been with Silence-Lotto since 2005, and finally broke thru with the biggest win of his career when he solo'ed away to win the World Championship Road Race in September.

Of course, with a GC rider of Evans stature on the free agent market, the rumor mills were very busy yesterday. Would Evans go to Team Sky to be their leader in 2010? Would he join Vinokourov on Astana? Perhaps Garmin would grab another GC contender? However, the discussion were short-lived when it was announced on Sunday that Evans would be joining BMC Racing Team for 2010 and beyond. This gives BMC - who are making the jump from a continental team to a pro-continental team, a giant extra reason for race directors to invite them to prestigious races in 2010, including Grand Tours like the Tour de France. Evans joins 2008 World Champion Alessandro Ballan and American George Hincapie on BMC in 2010, which has gone from a "Who?" team to a solid race contender with the addition of those 3 racers, plus a couple of other veteran riders.


So in 2010, we will perhaps have 3 more brand new teams in the Tour. We have the Lance-lead Team RadioShack, the mostly British Team Sky, and now Team BMC. It is already shaping up to be a very good 2010.

Of course, Evans' defection does mean that Silence-Lotto will lost out on the chance of having the rainbow jersey on one of their riders in 2010. But perhaps the extra money this frees up could help them attract a certain Spanish rider who still might need a new team in 2010...as always, stay tuned...

100% Non BikeY...

Hi All,

Bikey is taking a day off, as we are two days away from the end of the 2009 Elite Marathon season, with Sunday's New York City Marathon on the agenda. So no bike or triathlon news right now, it's all running this week...


The New York City Marathon doesn't have the history of Boston (117 years vs 40 for NYC) or the uber-fast times of Chicago (where 4 marathon world records have been set, including Paula Radcliffe's 2:17 in 2002) but it seems to have an aura about it. It helps that it can afford to attract a great elite field year after year. Paula Radcliffe has won this race 3 times, and is going for number 4 in her return to the marathon. She hasn't run one since NYC a year ago, but has always performed great at this race. She runs from the front, dares the other women to hold on, and outkicks any one who remains near the end. This year she doesn't have too many rivals to worry about, because there have been 5 major female pro withdrawals, so Radcliffe goes into Sunday's race as an overwhelming favorite. Radcliffe has only 2 main competitors including 2009 Boston winner Salina Kosgei. However, Radcliffe has stated that her 2009 win includes breaking the women's race record of 2:22:31. We shall see...


The men's race is noteworthy as well since Ryan Hall is making his NYC marathon debut. He did run 2:09 two years ago in New York City while at the US Olympic Trials but that was a modified Central Park course. So he will be the people's favorite but will be challenged by a very strong mens field. Ryan Hall has a PB and US record of 2:06:17, but that is only the 4th fastest PB in the field, and those other guys have all run faster than that in 2009. Check out this list:
* Jaouad Gharib (Morocco) - ran 2:05 in London this year, silver in Beijing Olympics, 2-time World Marathon Champion
* James Kwambai (Kenya) - ran 2:04:27 in Rotterdam (and finished second!) which makes him the 3rd fastest man all-time, has ran a 59:08 half-marathon less than 2 months ago
* Patrick Makau (Kenya) - ran 2:06 in his marathon debut in April in Rotterdam, is the second fastest half-marathoner of all time (58:52)


There are many other elite men in the race - you can check out the list here. Who will win? Since Ryan Hall has often run well in his major marathons but ultimately has a bad mile or two and falls off the pace, I can't pick him to win. Let's go with Kwambai, who'll use his experience to outlast Makau and Hall. Of course, that means Gharib will win going away...

I didn't talk at all about this month's very frigid Chicago Marathon, which was run about three weeks ago. It included a new course record (and a North American marathon record) of 2:05:41 by Sammy Wanjiru, which is a whole 1 second faster than the previous record. That 1 second was worth an extra $100,000 to Wanjiru, who is widely regarded as the best marathoner in the world today. He won Beijing last year, London this spring, now Chicago in the fall. He also owns the half-marathon world record and has run 2:05 twice this year. Wanjiru also moves to the top of the World Marathon Majors for 2008-09, which will be worth another cool $500,000 for him. It's so sad that he won't run against Gebrselassie (or vice versa) one time so we can see what they could do running against each other. The next step for Wanjiru appears to be a shot at the world record...stay tuned!


The women's winner in Chicago was not pre-race favorite Irina Mikitenko, but a Russian track star, Liliya Shobukhova, hammered the last 2.2 km (apparently running that split in 6:36, faster than Wanjiru did!) to beat Mikitenko by 35 seconds. Apparently, the combination of her track speed (she had world indoor record in the 3000m) and her huge training (regularly runs 250 km a week!) has honed Shobukhova into a future marathon star. Mikitenko can be consoled by her second place finish with the knowledge that she has already won the half-million for the World Marathon Majors for 2008-09 (she also won the 2007-08 segment and leads the 2009-10 segment as well).

I could depress you with some stories about the recent "rash" of marathon deaths that the media likes to discuss, but instead will leave you with a couple of stories to think about. One is a Globe and Mail story about the combination of drinking and running (includes the BeerMile) and the others are from the NY Times (caution: you may need to create a free account to read them). One is about the rash of "slow" runners who are now participating in the marathon. They make a case that 44% of runners in last year's Honolulu Marathon took longer than 6 hours to finish the race, and that keeping roads closed and volunteers out on the course creates headaches and extra costs for race directors. An interesting read. The other one is a fascinating look back at the NYC Marathon in the 1970's where 8- and 9-year-old children ran the marathon in 3-and-a-half hours or less! One of them later ran a 2:38 when he was 15! Ahhh - the days before Nintendo and Xbox, when all kids could do is go outside and run...

That's it for now...

The Brits are Coming...

Hi All,

2008 was known as the "Year of the Spaniards" with dominant years by Alberto Contador (Giro and Vuelta champion), Carlos Sastre (Tour de France champ), Samuel Sanchez (Olympic champion), a second place finish at Ironman by Eneko Llanos and a dominant year by Javier Gomez in ITU triathlon (who won everything but the Olympics). Add in Rafel Nadal's amazing summer of 2008, and it seemed that Spain owned everything sporting in 2008.

2009 can now definitely be called the "Year of the Brits". As if great seasons by Mark Cavendish (did he ever lose a sprint?), Alistair Brownlee (perfect in ITU championship races), and Chrissie Wellington (she never loses either) are not enough, this weekend included more of the same.


Two follow-up races to Kona are the Xterra Worlds, held every year a week after Kona in Maui. A few Ironman pros attempt the Kona-Xterra double, but mainly this is the weekend for those offroad triathletes to get their time in the spotlight. For multiple time world champions like Conrad Stoltz, Jamie Whitmore, and Canadian Melanie McQuaid, this is the one race that can define a career. With a unique 1500m swim, 30 km mountain bike, and 11 km trail run distance, this event has even been won by short-course specialists like Michellie Jones and Hamish Carter.

As you might have guessed from the introduction, the Brits did come to play in Xterra today. Julie Dibens, the 2007 and 2008 Xterra champion, quickly broke away on the bike to open up a huge lead over the rest of the women's field. She had over a 4 minute lead off the bike over Melanie McQuaid (a 3 time winner herself) and would not be challenged as she won by almost 8 minutes over Lesley Peterson, who is, yup, from Great Britain. McQuaid did finish third for her 7th career podium finish at Xterra Worlds. She's the Peter Reid of Xterra! So congrats to Dibens and to Melanie McQuaid for representing Canada so well again.


A quick note on the men's race. Before he was known as an Ironman threat, Eneko Llanos of Spain had won Xterra worlds twice (2003 and 2004). However, today, just 15 days after Kona where he had finished 14th overall, he outran fulltime Xterra pros Nicolas Lebrun, Olivier Marceau, and Conrad Stoltz to win his third Xterra world title. He joins McQuaid, Stoltz, and Dibens as a three time champ.


Quick Canadian content update - McQuaid was joined by two other Canadian women in the top 10 - Danelle Kabush was 7th and Christine Jeffrey was 8th. Our men weren't quite as fortunate as we were last year, when Brent McMahon and Mike Vine finished 3-4. This year, Vine was 12th and Kelly Guest was 16th. Also congrats to Calgary athletes Cal Zaryski and Sheri Foster for becoming world champs in their respective age groups.

One more for your Great Britain fans. As if having world champs in ITU racing, Ironman racing, and Xterra racing was not enough, you can add one more. The ITU Long Course world championships were also held this weekend in Perth, Australia. the 3k-8-k-20k format means that both short-course and long-course athletes can try for an ITU world title. This race actually used to be a 4k-120k-30k format until 2007, and Ironman athletes like Greg Welch, Simon Lessing, Luc Van Lierde, Torbjorn Sindballe, Eneko Llanos and Chrissie Wellington have all previously won this event. Now, with it's close-to-70.3 distance, but without the Ironman brand, and with a spot on the calendar between Kona and Clearwater, it sort of loses a bit of prestige since many pros regularly skip it. The 2009 event was supposed to be a nice post-Kona showdown between the dominant 70.3 champion Tim O'Donnell and Kona champion Craig Alexander, but Alexander decided to skip the race at the last minute. This left O'Donnell as the clear fave, and he won by a minute to show the rest of the world that he might be the best middle-distance racer in the world.


On the women's side, it was yet another dominant win by Great Britain. Jodie Swallow, who races ITU short-course mainly, absolutely dominated and won by over 10 minutes over hometown fave Rebekah Keat, who was hoping for some vindication after getting disqualified at Kona. But Swallow was first out of the water, lead by 8 minutes off the bike, and cruised to an 11 minute win. What can't the Great Britain athletes win? I guess Joel Filliol is doing an okay job over there...



More coming real soon...lots of racing news still to cover!