Originally I was going to title this post Riiis is “bringing Saxo Bank” into cycling. Apologies to Justin Timberlake for the bad reference to his song. But I decided to keep it basic.
Bjarne Riis successfully found a new sponsor to replace the outgoing CSC in Saxo Bank. Effective immediately Saxo Bank will cosponsor the team with the highlight being big exposure at the Tour. In 2009 Team CSC will become Team Saxo Bank marking a smooth transition over to the new sponsor. With the advent of sponsorless teams such as High Road and Slipstream and the loss of Gerolsteiner as a main sponsor it looked like cycling would have a tough time getting new sponsors into the sport. With Riis’ success at attracting Saxo Bank hopefully more sponsors will take another look at cycling.
Team CSC News
T-Mobile has dropped their main sponsorship from their Bob Stapleton run cycling team. The news comes after Adidas dropped sponsorship of the team in light of the ongoing-neverending doping stories surrounding the team. The team will not disband as T-Mobile’s contract was set to go until December 2010 and there must be a decent enough exit payment that will allow Stapleton and Co to continue for at least 2008. The team will now be called appropriately enough Team High Road. The good news for George Hincapie is he won’t have to wear Magenta in South Carolina. Riding with feminine like colors in the South is not good. Then he would get into more trouble when the UCI would say he was a “man in black” for training without his team colors. Perhaps that is why George was pissed at Levi for winning the US Pro Championship. Levi and others probably knew that George was going to go to T-Mob next year and the specter of wearing pink in the South must have been a real FU to George when Levi took the win.
With Team High Road and Team Slipstream in the Pro Peloton could this be the dawn of sponsorless team names? I hope so. It would actually be better for a team’s long term survival since they would not necessarily be attached to a specific sponsor. Team could weather the storm of a major sponsor loss since they would not necessarily be associated with a specific product. Products would then be associated with the team making it easier to switch around.
Anyway, thanks for the years of cycling T-Mobile. It is unfortunate that just as the team was clean T-Mobile decided to leave the sport. It is perhaps premature and hasty. T-Mobile could have stayed on with a cleaner image instead of leaving under a cloud of doping related stories.
Go Clipless has a nice writeup on a recent USA Today article that talks about how cycling is growing in the US. The fans lining the roads of the Tour of California definately show that there is a large interest in the sport, but just how large is this interest?
Race organizers are predicting that the eight-day event that ends in Long Beach Sunday will attract more than 1.3 million spectators and break its own record as the biggest sporting event held in California since the 1984 Olympic Summer Games.
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(pic from thepaceline.com)
A change in the top level management at Discovery Channel has resulted in a loss of sponsorship for the cycling team at the end of 2007.
Armstrong’s agent spoke to USA Today to relay the news that was released on the Friday which is when most high profile people like to dump bad news.
Stapleton told USA TODAY Friday that the Discovery’s decision to not renew for a fourth year is connected to Monday’s firing of Discovery Network’s president Billy Campbell by new Discovery Communications president and CEO David Zaslav.
Campbell was the major force behind the company’s decision to sponsor the team in 2004. He also pushed the team to sign Italian star and Tour favorite Ivan Basso this year despite a since-resolved controversy about the rider’s role in a Spanish doping scandal.
“This would not have happened if Billy Campbell was still there,” Stapleton said. “This is about their change in management.”
Stapleton said the company is already evaluating potential replacements for Discovery and could sign another company before the 2007 season is over.
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iShares will co-sponsor the Phonak Cycling team for 2006 with an eye to becoming the main sponsor in 2007 when Phonak will bow out. iShares sponsorship shows an extension of Barclays Global Investors moving from main sponsor of the San Francisco Grand Prix to co-sponsoring a major Pro Tour Cycling Team.
Facts about iShares
iShares is the brand name for one of the world’s largest ranges of exchange traded funds (ETFs), which is marketed and managed by Barclays Global Investors (BGI). iShares manage over 129 funds listed globally, totalling over $150 billion. iShares funds are available to institutional investors and private investors. ETFs are index funds that are bought and sold like ordinary shares on a stock exchange and are a tool to gain diversified exposure to a market.
Tuttobici Web
Phonak Press Release
