As predicted Alberto Contador’s win at the Vuelta on Sunday is already proving complicated for his team Astana. Speaking to the Spanish newspaper AS Contador dropped a strong hint that he would quit the Astana team if it hires Lance Armstrong, who has announced he is coming out of retirement to seek a record eighth Tour de France title. Armstrong has strong links with the current Astana management. Contador was asked by the sports newspaper AS how he would feel if the Armstrong joins Astana. "It would be quite complicated. I think I’ve earned the right to be the leader of a team without having to fight for it," he said in the interview published on Tuesday. "And with Armstrong, there could be difficult situations in which the team would put him first and that would harm me." Armstrong, now 37, shocked the world of cycling earlier this month by confirming that he was planning an audacious comeback with a view to winning a record eighth Tour de France next summer. Astana boss Joahn Bruyneel, who managed Armstrong as director of the US Postal and Discovery Channel teams, said recently he would "not allow" the American to join another team. Contador who has now won three grand tours in 14 months – a feat which guarantees him legend status now says he may quit the Kazakh-backed, Luxembourg-based team if Armstrong signs on, the American will announce his plans at a press conference on Thursday. "I will base my decision on what he says," the Spaniard told AS. "I intend to stay because I am under contract until 2010, but I have received a good many offers from other teams. "Bruyneel believes I can deliver results, but it can’t be denied that he made his name because of his ties to Armstrong." Contador won the Tour of Spain on Sunday to add his victories in the 2007 Tour de France winner and this year’s Giro d’Italia. He is now only the fifth rider in history, and the first ever Spaniard, to win all three of cycling’s three-week Tours. A feat that in most situations would guarantee him an unassailable position in most teams, but Armstrong is different. Contador’s comments to AS are very different from those he made immediately after Armstrong’s announcement and suggest his Vuelta win has emboldened him into letting his true feelings on the Armstrong situation be known. Back on 10 September when asked about Armstrong’s return he said: "I would welcome (Armstrong) into the team with open arms because a cyclist like him would fit in anywhere," "I have always had the highest regard for him and would be delighted to be in the same team as him."
- News
Update: Contador may quit if Armstrong joins Astana- Armstrong to join Astana
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@mdavidford I can see how it confused you when I pointed to the reviewer at the bottom. but hey if you cant read an entire comment before getting all keyboard warrior blah, kind of like you usually do that not my fault. I should have guessed the first person to reply to a comment would be you, you cant help yourself.
@chrisonabike It never ceases to amaze me how drivers consider public land to be their private parking spaces.
Erm - it has - as per the item above: (Technically, a 'budget cap' and a 'team salary cap' aren't quite the same thing, but given how much of the costs are paying riders, it would have a similar effect.)
A lot of pro sports leagues have team salary caps. Curious that hasn't been mooted. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salary_cap
Well your original comment did rather suggest that was your understanding. The bit 'critiquing' the pros and cons was sandwiched in the middle of railing against the makers. And the amount of ill-thought-out tripe that gets posted under some of these reviews, it wouldn't surprise me at all if someone thought the manufacturer provided the pros and cons.
JB may not bé Mr Nice but in this case he's 100% right. I thought when Lappartient was elected he knew sod all about pro cycling and his real ambitions were related to running thé Olympics.
@mdavidford Well duh, is a manufacturer going to put negative comments on their own products? did you really just try to explain that?
Surely Fred Wright's going to win a race in his career that isn't the national champs. He's been close so many times now.
Awful human slags off Machiavellian politician -shock horror.
The pros and cons come from the reviewer, not the manufacturer. And they do explain in the review why they think the lack of MIPS could be viewed as either/both a positive or a negative. Less so with the shape, but it's easy to see how that could be considered a good or a bad thing, depending on whether it suits your head shape. If anything, it's a deficiency of the review template - that it doesn't have a section for something like 'other considerations' that aren't pros or cons.