Velochimp: Astrochimp on Cycling

The new team Murcia - 3 Molinos is heavily active in the rider market signing up several riders that were surprisingly still available. They are hoping for a wildcard bid to the 2006 Vuelta Espana. Their ultimate goal is to become a larger team with ProTour ambitions (whatever that may mean in the next few [...]

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 [...]

Roberto Heras’ second sample came up positive for EPO. Does this mean that the test is flawed? or that doping controls to catch cheats are working? Either way, we will not be seeing Roberto Heras racing next year as he will soon be fired by his team. Heras will appeal this finding, but as the [...]

Igor Astarloa has more or less returned to a top level team by rejoining Lampre-Fondital for 2006. He is anxious to get back to winning big races after being with the smaller Barloworld Team last year. The best way to get back into racing Igor feels is to get a big win right away, [...]

Igor Astarloa might be on his way back to Lampre after a few years in cycling’s neather region. Astarloa as you may remember was World Champ in 2003 (Velochimp was there in Hamilton to see him win). He quickly succumbed to the curse of the rainbow jersey when his Cofidis team had some serious doping [...]

A new Spanish Team is set to debut next season. The team will be known as la Murcia Resort 3 Molinos. The main objective will be to get a wildcard spot for the Vuelta a Espana. The long term goal will be to get a spot as Pro Tour Team. La Murcia is much [...]

Roberto Heras has apparently tested positive for EPO usage in stage 20 of the Vuelta a Espana from Guadalajara and Alcala de Henares.
Liberty Seguros released the information because of press leaks about the positive test. The Team will not take action against Heras’ contract unless the ‘B’ sample comes back positive. Heras just won [...]