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Team Update
Dateline: 28-Apr-2008
According to a report in CyclingNews, Team High Road will not be going for the Vuelta a Espana this year but will instead “support the Tour of Britain, the Tour of Ireland and the Tour of Missouri”. This is good news for the ToB - and for the Tour of Ireland (27.08 - 31.08) - but it does raise the issue of High Road’s ProTour participation. The Vuelta is obviously not in the ProTour calendar - but the Deutschland Tour (29.08 - 06.09) and the Tour of Poland (see below) are and so need strong selections despite the overlapping dates. Also my comment about the Tour of Missouri having little impact seems a bit optimistic. The ToB teams known so far are - Great Britain, Plowman Craven, Rapha-Condor-Recycling and Team High Road.
 Placement in the 2008 Calendar
Dateline: 23-Apr-2008
Getting a good slot for the ToB in the international calendar has always been a problem. For 2008 the issue is probably worse than before - and not helped by Pro Tour politics that are beyond the control of the UK organisers.
Looking just at the European entries in the UCI road calendar we have these overlapping dates -
30.08.2008 21.09.2008 Vuelta a Espana
03.09.2008 07.09.2008 Tour de Slovaquie 2.2
05.09.2008 14.09.2008 Tour de l'Avenir 2.Ncup
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Vattenfall Cyclassics ProT
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Giro della Romagna 1.1
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Grote Prijs Jef Scherens 1.1
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Memorial Davide Fardelli 1.2
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Trofeo Salvatore Morucci 1.2
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 Polymultipliee Lyonnaise 1.2
07.09.2008 07.09.2008 GP Ljubljana- Zagreb 1.2
07.09.2008 14.09.2008 Tour of Britain GBR 2.1
07.09.2008 14.09.2008 Tour of Bulgaria BUL 2.2
09.09.2008 14.09.2008 Tour of Croatia 2.2
10.09.2008 14.09.2008 Tour of Sochi 2.2
11.09.2008 14.09.2008 Giro della Toscana 2.2U
13.09.2008 13.09.2008 Praha - Karlovy Vary - Praha 1.2
13.09.2008 13.09.2008 Paris-Brusssel 1.HC
14.09.2008 20.09.2008 Tour of Poland ProT
14.09.2008 14.09.2008 Rund um die Nurnberger Altstadt 1.1
14.09.2008 14.09.2008 Chrono Champenois Masculin 1.2
14.09.2008 14.09.2008 GP de Fourmies 1.HC
Even if you exclude the lower ranking 1.2 and 2.2 events this part of the calendar still seems pretty crowded. Outside of Europe the Tour of Missouri (8 to 14 Sep) should have limited influence on the ToB field - but in 2009 the Tour of America could attract most of the ranked pro-elite riders not contracted elsewhere.
For purely domestic reasons this could be good news. Why? Because I think that there always needs to be some national interest to attract the mass-market media. Without the Milk Race it falls to the ToB to be the national tour and the only international showcase for local talent. The long term benefits gained through promoting national riders outweighs the short term kudos of having international stars. [For those who don’t go back that far; the Milk Race provided a boost to the public awareness of British riders including Joey McLoughlin, Malcolm Elliott, Chris Walker, Chris Lillywhite - and further back in time Les West, Arthur Metcalfe, etc.]
Tour of Britain Launch
Dateline: 3-Apr-2008
Today saw the announcement of the outline route for the 2008 edition of the Tour of Britain. Stage 1 will be a circuit race around central London (7-Sep) and the final stage (Stage 8 - 14-Sep) will be from Blackpool to Liverpool with a 1 hour circuit in the city centre. Other stages are - Milton Keynes to Newbury, Chard to Burnham-on-Sea, Worcester to Stoke-on-Trent, Hull to Dalby Forest, Darlington to Gateshead and Glasgow to Dumfries. More ...
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