Bike World News

Welcome back for the latest in cycling news. Raleigh hopes to re-introduce themselves to a global market, six day season ramps up, 24 hour MTB champs this weekend and more…

• Raleigh will sponsor an eponymous Pro Continental cycling team in 2010. Their aim is to globally re-establish themselves in the performance bike sector. They will announce co-sponsors and a roster in coming weeks.
• Track specialist Teun Mulder has signed a contract with Cofidis that went into effect on October 1. He will ride with them through the end of 2010.
• Steven Caethoven (formerly Agritubel) has signed a contract with Landbouwkrediet – Colnago. This year Caethoven won a stage in the Tour of Normandy and the Wanzele kermis race. Bart Dockx (Silence-Lotto) is also expected to join the team.
• Floyd Landis is planning to ride in New Zealand’s Tour of Southland cycling race next month. Race director Bruce Ross said Thursday that the American would ride for the cycling-nzshop.com-bioSPORT team in the six-day, nine-stage tour which begins Nov. 2 on New Zealand’s South Island.
• Robbie McEwen (Katusha) was involved in a minor car accident. He’s put an end to his season and has headed home to his native Australia.
• Swiss Cyclist Markus Zberg is being dragged down into the morass surrounding Bernhard Kohl’s former manager Stefan Matschiner. Reports say that Zberg allegedly purchased 24000 I.U.s of Dynepo through Matschiner.
• The German Cycling Cup will add two new events next year. The finale of the 2009  series was held on Saturday at the Sparkassen Münsterland Giro.
• Tom Boonen says that the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix are his primary goals next year, but that he will also focus on improving his skills in the time trial. Seems that he might want to go for a Grand Tour win…
• Okay.. try to keep up: The Four Days on Dunkirk, which was a six day race in 2009, will be a five day race in 2010. Everybody got that? As you were.
• Erik Breukink will take over as technical director at Rabobank next year.

Six Day News:

• The Six Days of Flanders-Ghent (November 24 – 29) will feature 3 World Champions. Danes Alex Rasmussen and Michael Morkov are world champions in the Madison and Australian  Leigh Howard is the reigning champion in the omnium. Kenny Ketele, Tim Mertens and Gianni Meersman are also expected to race. Iljo Keisse is still a question mark as his doping case is expected to be decided on October 19th.
• Event directors are pressing for a new roof for the track as well as some improvements to the bleachers, stairs and plumbing before the start of the race. There were problems with water drips during the race last year.

Cyclocross News:

• Cyclocross Magazine will provide live coverage from this weekend’s UCI3 Cincinnati Cyclocross Festival. That’s probably all I’ll get to see of it between funerals and birthday parties.
• Niels Albert and Sven Nys are just two of the riders complaining about the course for this weekend’s GVA Cyclocross event in Namur. From what I can determine, the course is very long and difficult and Alberts says that fans will only see the riders pass seven times. Erwin Vervecken and Zdenek Stybar do not agree with that analysis. “Heavy, but chic,” Vervecken suggests. “A difficult but beautiful pass,” adds Stybar. “This is for men in form, so Niels should not complain.”
• Ex-world champion Bart Wellens (Fidea Telenet), who is currently sitting on the bench with the cytomegalovirus, will make his debut as co-commentator for the VT4 network at this weekend’s Superprestige race in Ruddervoorde.

Mountain Bike News:

• The 2009 USA Cycling 24-Hour Mountain Bike National Championships will go off this weekend, Oct. 10 and 11, in conjunction with the 24 Hours of Moab in Moab, Utah. In all, the event is expected to draw more than 4,000 athletes, support crew and spectators.

Paris-Tours:

• Oscar Freire will lead a Rabobak team of Juan-Antonio Flecha, Maarten Tjallingi, Nick Nuyens, Sebastian Langeveld, Mathew Hayman, Jos van Emden and Tom Stamsnijde at Sunday’s race.
• Tyler Farrar is taking aim at a win in the race, saying that “Two classic wins would be great.”
• Andre Greipel (Columbia-HTC) will also be searching for a win and thinks that the closing kilometers of the race course are ideal for a sprinter.

Results:

• Andre Greipel took his 20th win of the season at Paris-Bourges, taking the final sprint over Juan Jose Haedo (Saxobank) and Alexandre Usov (Cofidis).
• Philippe Gilbert (Silence-Lotto) won Italy’s Coppa Sabatini Thursday, outsprinting ISD’s Giovanni Visconti and Leonardo Bertagnoli (Diquigiovani) after joining a large and successful 24-man break earlier in the 199km race.
• Look for full reports on both races later in the day.

Tags: Agritubel, Alex Rasmussen, andre greipel, Bart Wellens, Bernhard Kohl, colnago, columbia-htc, cyclocross, Erwin Vervecken, floyd landis, Giovanni Visconti, Iljo Keisse, juan jose haedo, Markus Zberg, Mathew Hayman, nick nuyens, Niels Albert, Oscar Freire, Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, Philippe Gilbert, Rabobank, Robbie McEwen, Sebastian Langeveld, Silence-Lotto, Sven Nys, Tom Boonen, Tyler Farrar

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