Bike World News

In today’s cycling news, more on World Champ Cadel Evans’ move to BMC; “If the cathine doesn’t fit, you must acquit” ; Valverde would welcome Contador with open arms and more….

Evans:

• As I’m sure you all know by now, Cadel Evans has made the jump from Omega Pharma-Lotto to BMC for 2010. Evans has solidly set his sights on the 2010 Tour de France, but with all of the teams (Cervelo, Vacansoleil and Skil-Shimano) hoping for wildcard spots, will he get the chance?
• Evans says that he is delighted with the BMC team and their recent reinforcements (Ballan, Burghardy, Hincapie, Kroon) and is confident that they will be able to swing an invitation to the Giro. For the Tour de France, they will have to prove their mettle.
• BMC had to buy out Evans’ contract to acquire him. They are hoping to reestablish themselves on the world stage. Floyd Landis took his ill-fated Tour de France on a BMC, but they have not sponsored a Pro Tour team since.

Keisse:

• Christophe Sercu, manager of Iljo Keisse’s former Topsport Vlaanderen team, is happy that he has been acquitted. He says that the team did what it had to do when the doping positive came to light. As to Keisse re-joining the team, he says that is a matter for the team sponsors to decide.
• Upon hearing of the decision, Keisse said that he was “extremely happy”. He thanked his lawayers, but was less grateful for his sponsors for not believing in him.

The rest of the news:

• Lies, lies, lies, yeah! Who would want to work with this guy? After seemingly committing to the CDC-Knight team, Michael Rasmussen has denied signing with them and says that he is still negotiating with other teams.
• Enrico Gasparotto, Italian national champ in 2005, will move from Lampre to Astana for 2010 and is expected to play a leadership role at Tirreno-Adriatico, Milan-San Remo and the Tour of Flanders.
• Alejandro Valverde says that he has great respect for Alberto Contador and that the Tour de France champion would definitely take over the leadership role at Caisse d’Epargne if he wants it.
• Philip Deignan, winner of the stage of the Avila stage of the Vuelta a Espana, has re-signed with the Cervelo Test Team for two more years.
• Defending champion Hayden Roulston was forced to drop out of New Zealand’s Tour of the Southland after banging up his knee in a group crash caused by strong winds. Roulston will transfer from Cervelo to Columbia-HTC for the next two seasons.

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