All of your cycling news: April 20, 2010

In today’s cycling news: Pre race notes from Fleche Wallone; plains, trains and automobiles for Andre Greipel; Cavendish finding life in the spotlight undesireable; Tour of Britain route announcement and more.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Fleche Wallone:

• HTC-Columbia for Fleche Wallone: Michael Albasini (Swi), Rasmus Guldhammer (Den); Craig Lewis (USA); Maxime Monfort (Bel); Marco Pinotti (Ita); Martin Velits (Svk), Peter Velits (Svk).
• Ben Hermans (Radio Shack) was the highest placing Belgian in last year’s Fleche Wallone, but the Limburger will sit out this year’s race because of a sinus infection.
• Milram will have to do without Linus Gerdemann for the race. He is suffering from bronchitis, but hopes to be recovered in time for Sunday’s running of Liege-Bastogne-Liege.
• Saxo Bank will once again look the Schleck brothers for success in the second Ardennes Classic. The squad for the race is: Andy Schleck, Fränk Schleck, Jens Voigt, Jakob Fuglsang, Nicki Sorensen, André Steensen, Laurent Didier and Jonas Aaen Jørgensen.
• Kim Kirchen (Astana) will make his return at the race. In recent weeks, the Luxembourger was treated for a cyst in his perineum and also suffered respiratory problems.
• Lampre’s Damiano Cunego finished 6th in AGR and is looking for even better performance at the Fleche Wallone. “I am satisfied with my performance Amstel Gold Race,” he said. “I knew (I was) not in top form, but (had the) determination that was needed to battle to the head of the race. Now I’m two days past the race and feeling better. The mood is growing, thanks to the confidence of all my teammates.”
• Cadel Evans will lead BMC Racing on Wednesday after working for teammate Karsten Kroon at AGR. Evans came in 12th and is looking to do better.

Other Cycling News:

• Mark Cavendish says that life in the spotlight has been difficult. He says that he is sometimes not himself and that he would not have made the comments about teammate Andre Greipel had he not been in a down mood. He says that 2010 may not be his year and that he wants to be able to spend more time with family.
• Dries Devenyns (Quick Step) took his first ride after crashing in the Amstel Gold Race and says that each bump in the road was “torture”. He’s given up any illusions of riding in Wednesday’s Fleche Wallone.
• The Austrian anti-doping agency is set to open proceedings against many of the athletes involved in the investigation of blood transfusion company Humanplasma for unlawful practices that occurred between 2003 and 2006. The athletes involved were from seven nations and six different sports and among them seem to be ten cyclists.
• Once cyclist known to be prosecuted is Christian Pfannenberger. In 2009, just before the Tour of Italy, the Austrian cyclist was suspended for life by NADA because of doping. It meant the end of his career.
• The Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld the two-year ban imposed on Portuguese cyclist Joao Cabreira, who was accused of attempting to alter the outcome of a doping test by taking protease, a substance that covers all the proteins, especially EPO. The rider was initially suspended for one month as decided by the Consejo de la Federación Portuguesa de Jurisdicional Cycling because the product was not among the banned substances, but WADA appealed and the runner was permanently banned for two years.
• Milram announced their squad for the Giro. Linus Gerdemann is expected to captain the squad and he will be supported by German Markus Fothen, Robert Forster, Dominik Roels, Matthias Russ, Paul Voss and Fabian Wegmann and Luke Roberts of Australia and the Austrian Thomas Rohregger. This will be Gerdemann’s first start at the race.
• Andre Greipel arrived home in Cologne after a 36 hour travel adventure involving planes, trains and automobiles. After a short break, the winner of five stages at the Tour of Turkey will return for the Round the Eschborn-Frankfurt Financial Center race on May 1st.
• The route has been unveiled for the 2010 Tour of Britain which will give Britain’s cycling fans a chance to see Team Sky take on the world’s best on British roads. This year’s race will take place across eight days from September 11-18, starting in the North West of England and finishing in London. The 2010 event returns to several established venues for the Tour of Britain, but also takes in a number of regions for the first time, visiting Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex in the East of England, and revisiting Wales for the first time since the revival of the event in 2004. (Sky Sports)

Tags: amstel gold race, andre greipel, astana, BMC Racing, cadel evans, Court of Arbitration for Sport, Damiano Cunego, doping, EPO, Fabian Wegmann, Fleche Wallone, liege-bastogne-liege, linus gerdemann, Mark Cavendish, radio shack, Robert Forster, Team Sky, Tour of Turkey