It's about time

I was very excited to read in the newspaper a couple of weeks ago that Robbie McEwen has signed on to the new Pegasus Racing/Fly V team for next year. Of course, one has to take this with a grain of salt as it is likely that he has a clause in his contract the stipulates he can bail if the team isn’t granted a ProTour license. Given the fact that CEO Chris White has yet to announce who the major sponsors of the team are, there is some speculation that the team may fall through. However, with the signing of McEwen virtually guaranteeing them a start in next year’s Tour de France and the fact that White plans to unveil the major sponsors for the team during or shortly after the World Championships later this month, the team is gathering momentum.

It seemed inevitable that Australia would eventually get a ProTour team, it was more of a question of ‘when’ not ‘if’. However, when I learned that Luxembourg, which only has 3 notable professional riders (the Schleck brothers, Andy and Frank, and Kim Kirchen), was forming a team for next year, there was cause for concern. With 11 riders beginning this year’s Tour and up to 30 top shelf cyclists competing in Europe, Australia is becoming somewhat of a cycling powerhouse. Yet our failure to secure a ProTour team until this point seems to point directly at Cycling Australia and the mismanagement of Aussie cycling talent.

There is plenty of drive at the grassroots level, for which Cycling Australia (CA) must be commended. You only have to go down to your local club meet to see the wealth of young and old battling it out in the streets. However, professionally, Aussies, for the most part, still need to head to Europe to go anywhere in the sport. Europe still holds all the powerhouse teams, the prestigious races and the big bucks. There are still only 3 ‘Grand Tours’, all of which are held with a day or two’s drive from each other.

Australia has only one big internationally renowned cycling event, the Tour Down Under, with smaller events, such as the Herald Sun Tour, occasionally attracting some lesser known European names. Whilst I’m not saying that we should try and hold a Grand Tour (although I think it would work better in Australia than any other country in the world save Canada and the USA), CA needs to look into developing the Aussie racing calendar as a viable alternative for young riders to develop into superstars.

The new ProTour team and holding this year's World Road Cycling Championships will go some way to achieving these goals. Hopefully, this will be the necessary stepping stone to help the Australian continental race calendar develop enough to provide a sustainable and encouraging platform for our cycling talent to launch their international careers. Adding cycling legend McEwen to their armoury and one can only feel excited about the future strength of our country in the sport. You can only expect from there, we will get our first Tour de France winner. I say it's about time...