Teams bolt the ProTour, UCI tries vinegar to catch them
I guess this is it. The lied-about “private league” of pro cycling is finally going to happen and I think it will be a good thing.
We learned today that the teams formerly known as “ProTour teams” will not renew their contracts with the UCI. Instead, they’ll seek to work out a deal directly with ASO (Tour de France), RCS Sport (Giro d’Italia), and Unipublic (Vuelta a España), of which ASO owns 49%. Here’s the UCI’s response to the teams:
The International Cycling Union has noted the teams’ intention not to renew their UCI ProTour licences for 2009.
This decision was entirely foreseeable in view of the meetings held recently between the teams and the management of ASO.
The UCI notes that the teams have once again succumbed to pressure from the management of ASO, whose aim for the last four years has been to destroy the UCI ProTour.
By signing the agreement that ASO’s management has imposed on them, the teams appear to want to join the parallel system that ASO is seeking to put in place.
The UCI is looking into the situation and will take the necessary decisions in due course.
ASO’s aim is not to destory the ProTour. Their aim is to make money and if the ProTour helped them do it, they’d be all for it. If ASO has in fact forced the teams to sign a one-sided deal, their best option is collective bargaining. Succumbing to the UCI’s threats would be a dead end, since the ex-governing body no longer has any clout with ASO.
The question now is what will happen to amateur cycling. There still needs to be a pipeline to develop the athletes who will eventually be on these teams and race in the Tour de France, but I doubt that the ASO-led alliance will have much interest in managing this sprawling and presumably unprofitable system. I’ll be thinking about this for an upcoming post or column.