Velochimp: Astrochimp on Cycling

Igor Astarloa is one man who can attest to the legendary curse of the Rainbow Jersey. The Spanish Classics expert who would rather ride on Italian teams (sounds like Oscar Friere) has been in the doldrums since his 2003 World Championship victory in Hamilton Ontario. After winning with Saeco Astarloa switched over to French [...]

The feast of San Giuseppe is traditional day that San Remo used to be raced on. That day to Americans is known as the day after St. Patrick’s Day. Usually San Remo was raced on the Saturday around St. Giuseppe. This year, San Remo is raced on that day, which would probably mean an Italian [...]

Oscar Friere came out of the woodwork today to tell the world that his butt sore did not totally derail his career. The Spanish rider who has dealt with the curse of the World Champion more than anyone else riding today claimed a win in the Italian race of the two seas just ahead of [...]

Since NBC and most other Olympics reporters were saying Torino instead of Turin, I will hereby keep referring to Turin as Torino and Milan as Milano. Now that we have that clear, Igor Astarloa is coming back from the doldrums with a sprint win in Milano Torino today.

The Spanish wannabe Italian beat out Oscar [...]

Claudio Corti and Igor Astarloa had a great year in 2003. They won Fleche Wallone together, had a powerhouse Italian team and Igor won the World Title. Their team had red kits and Cannondale bikes. Nothing could be better. In 2004, Astarloa suffered the “Curse of the World Champion” and eventually tumbled down to [...]

The mini-saga of where will Igor Astarloa ride next season has been solved. As predicted in the virtual pages of Velochimp.com (which is a new way for you readers to get to this site), the Spanish classics specialist will stay with the South African/ British/Italian Barloworld team. The former World Champion must have [...]

Claudio Corti who was behind the Saeco success as well teams such as Chateau D’Ax with Gianni Bugno joined the struggling Barloworld team. With the signing, he may bring in co-sponsor Caffitta and possibly Cannondale bikes. Former Fassa assitant DS Alberto Volpi who was headed to Aqua e Sapone is instead joining Corti at Barloworld. [...]

Not a huge story, but more news wires are picking up that Igor Astarloa signed for Liquigas for 2006. This is false as the Yahoo! News story below has a profile of Liquigas for 2006 and the roster does not include the former World Champ. I emailed Liquigas to see what the bottom line is, [...]

This came off of the news at TuttoBici this morning saying that reports saying that Igor Astarloa has signed for Liquigas are not true. Last heard around Velochimp offices was that Astarloa was mulling over a contract offer from Lampre, but that wasn’t sweet enough. Todociclismo has the story about Astarloa and buddy Peio Arreitunandia [...]