tuesday 02 November 2010 at 23h49

Today the UCI - the International Cycling Union - announced the first lists of teams registered as "ProTeam" (formerly ProTour) and Professional Continental teams for the 2011 season. The union also published the ranking of teams which requested a registration based on De bond plaatste daarnaast het klassement van de ploegen die een registratie-aanvraag hebben gedaan op basis van sporting value.

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The ProTeam and Professional Continental teams

In its press release the UCI explicitely mentions the first division for the ProTeams and the second division for the Professional Continental teams before indicating which teams have already been granted a licence in each of the divisions. The UCI furthermore indicates in its press release that so far only first division teams with continuing licences which meet the required sporting, ethical, financial and administrative criteria as well as teams seeking to be registered in the second division which have provided dossiers considered to be in compliance, have been registered by the UCI. For the time being the following teams have thus been registered:
  • UCI ProTeams (first division)
    - Rabobank Cycling Team (The Netherlands)
    - Garmin-Cervélo (United States)
    - Omega Pharma-Lotto (Belgium)
    - Sky ProCycling (Great-Britain)
  • Professional Continental teams (second division)
    - Androni Giocattoli (Italy)
    - Bretagne - Schuller (France)
    - Caja Rural (Spain)
    - Colnago - CSF Inox (Ireland)
    - Europcar (France, the 2011 version of the Bbox Bouygues Telecom team)
    - Farnese Vini - Neri Sottoli (Great-Britain)
    - FDJ (France)
    - Landbouwkrediet (Belgium)
    - Saur - Sojasun (France)
    - Skil - Shimano (The Netherlands)
    - Team Type 1 (United States)
    - Topsport Vlaanderen - Mercator (Belgium)
    - Unitedhealthcare Pro Cycling (United States)
The list of UCI ProTeams will be completed on 20 November, when the UCI Licence Commission will have taken its decision concerning the other teams' registration requests. There'll still be a short period, until 10 December 2010, for the teams which appeal and for those which need to complete their filings, before the list will finally be announced.

The final list and the decision of the Licence Commission will mainly be based on the sporting value of the different teams, as wished for by the organisors of the Grand Tours such as the Tour de France for years. According to the new article 2.15.011b of the UCI rules, the 15 best placed teams will automatically be granted a ProTeam licence (or renewal) (given that they also comply to the ethical, financial and administrative criteria). The teams on the 16th till 20th place will be evaluated by the Licence Commission which will decide which teams can be part of the first division, knowing that only 3 of them will be able to access this division since the maximum number of UCI ProTeams has been decided to be 18. The teams which are under the 20th place are considered not to have fulfilled the sporting criterion for ProTeam status.

The sporting value is determned based on results from 2009 and 2010 by the 15 best riders who will be on the team's roster in 2011, in all events on all the circuits of the UCI International Calendar. It also takes into account the collective value of the team, based on placings in team classifications of stage races on the UCI World Calendar and HC events on UCI Continental Circuits (Europe Tour, Asia Tour, America Tour, ...) during 2010.

Based on this sporting value the following classification has been established and is being used for granting licences based on the above mentioned rules. In this table you'll find, as a comparison, the team's ranking in the UCI world classification at the end of 2010.
team
## 2010
1Luxembourg Pro Cycling Project(-)
2Rabobank Cycling Team4
3Garmin-Cervélo7
4HTC-High Road6
5Omega Pharma-Lotto8
6Lampre-ISD14
7Katusha5
8Sky ProCycling15
9Liquigas-Cannondale2
10Saxo Bank SunGard1
11Team Radioshack11
12Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team24
13Pro Team Astana3
14Movistar Team9
15BMC Racing Team10
16Euskaltel-Euskadi13
17Geox-TMC29
18Quick Step Cycling Team16
19Cofidis Le Crédit en ligne20
20
AG2R
18
21FDJ22
22Saur-Sojasun27
23Pegasus Sports(-)
24Skil-Shimano31
25Acqua e Sapone23
26Colnago-CSF Inox25
27Europcar19
28Androni Giocattoli17
29Topsport Vlaanderen-Mercator28
30Veranda's Willems-Accent(-)
31Team Type 1(-)
32CCC Polsat Polkowice(-)
33Bretagne-Schuller(-)
34Farnese Vini - Neri Sottoli(-)
35Landbouwkrediet30
36UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling(-)
37Team Netapp(-)
38Team SpiderTech powered by C10(-)
39Caja Rural(-)
40Colombia Es Pasion-Café de Colombia(-)
41De Rosa-Ceramica Flamina(-)
42Andalucia Caja Granada32
(for the 2010 ranking of the Garmin-Cervélo team, the Garmin-Transitions team's ranking is shown since this will be the structure which will continue with the two sponsors)

With the magical cut-off being after place 20, we clearly see that the French teams FDJ and Saur-Sojasun are not able to get the ProTeam status in 2011, just like the new Australian team Pegasus Sports. This team, known in 2010 as Fly V and as a Continental team, tried to skip one step up and immediately get the ProTeam status. According to CyclingWeekly the manager of the team, Chris White, commented this as: so, we'll go for Professional Continental status. As a reminder: this team will have riders like Robbie McEwen, Svein Tuft, Robbie Hunter, Daryl Impey, Christian Knees and Sergey Klimov in 2011.

For Astana, Geox-TMC, Liquigas-Cannondale, HTC-High Road, Movistar Team and Euskaltel-Euskadi, together with FDJ applicants for a licence renewal, the sporting value is enough to get this renewal.
Europcar's request to get back at ProTeam level will not be granted (but with Europcar as the new sponsor this request would most probably have been cancelled anyway for financial reasons), in contrast to Cofidis's request which could be granted by the Licence Commission. Vacansoleil and BMC Racing's request to get up one step will normally be granted, just like the request from the new Luxembourg team which will at least be composed of Fränk and Andy Schleck, Daniele Bennati, Jakob Fuglsang, Linus Gerdemann, Dominic Klemme, Maxime Monfort, Jens Voigt, Fabian Wegmann and Wouter Weylandt.
Brian Nygaard, the manager of this new team, commented the first place in the sporting hierarchy on Twitter: I guess we're hitting the ground running.. while Ken Sommer, responsible for communications in the team, twittered Booooom! No further comment! ...

door Thomas Vergouwen
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6 comments | 12158 views

this publication is published in: UCI ProTour

Comments

There are 6 comments!
  1. c\'est peut-etre une bonne nouvelle pour bretagne schuller et saur sojasun d\'acceder en continental pro, ils auront peut etre une chance de participer au tour 2011

    | djo barbaud | Wednesday 03 November 2010 om 08h37

  2. Saur Sojasun était déjà en continental Pro en 2010. Bonne nouvelle pour Bretagne Schuller mais très mauvaise pour 2 autres équipes françaises car l' UCI va les rétrograder en 2ième division: AG2R et FDJ ( déjà effectif pour la FDJ) mal classées, 20 et 21 iemes. Faites le calcul pour le Tour. 18 équipes UCI Pro Teams, 21-18, il reste 3 places pour les 6 équipes françaises.J' espère que l' UCI maintiendra AG2R dans l' élite????? (dopée) et qu' ASO donnera ENFIN sa chance à Coppel, le seul espoir français actuellement. Les dirigeants du cyclisme commence à m' énerver sérieusement.

    | pascal51 | Wednesday 03 November 2010 om 10h29

  3. Les dirigeants du cyclisme commencent ... je corrige une faute.

    | pascal51 | Wednesday 03 November 2010 om 10h45

  4. Coppel, le seul espoir français ??!
    Après, ça dépend ce qu'on appelle "espoir", théoriquement c'est les moins de 23 Ans mais après, il y a beaucoup de mondes qui parlent es espoirs comme des jeunes ...

    Sinon, je ne sais pas d'ou viens l'idée que l'équipe AG2R se dope. Maintenant, tu n'as plus envie de gagner une course où on t'accuse de dopage sans la moindre preuve. Et même regarde Contador. Si il est réellement innocent, il sera quand même considéré comme dopé.On n'a rien à dire même s'il est triple vainqueur du tour. Par contre, Schleck, il ne s'est apparemment pas dopé donc il est le plus fort. Scandaleux ...

    | bap56 | Wednesday 03 November 2010 om 16h12

  5. Je parle de l' élite étrangère dopée, 18 équipes,(VACANSOLEIL par exemple avec Rico et Mosquera) PAS AG2R, 20e donc pas dans l' élite selon l' UCI, ainsi COFIDIS 19E, FDJ 21e, SAUR 22e et EUROPCAR classement inconnu. 22 équipes pour le Tour en 2011 au lieu de 21 en 2010 mais une équipe française peut rester chez elle, par exemple EUROPCAR la moins bien classée.F. GRAPPE s' interroge à propos du calcul opaque utilisé pour le classement des équipes.Naguère l' UCI en manque de sponsors prenaient 5 équipes françaises dans le PRO TOUR. Pourtant celles-ci sont plus compétitives qu' avant. ETRANGE, l' anglo-saxon , nous en veut.

    | pascal51 | Friday 05 November 2010 om 18h31

  6. Finalement AG2R reste en Première Division

    Par contre, ASO va devoir faire un choix pour les invitations, sachant qu'il faut choisir 4 équipes parmi FDJ, Europcar, Saur-Sojasun, Cofidis, Geox (Menchov, Sastre). J'espère juste que Saur y sera pour récompenser le travail de Stéphane Heulot

    | david | tuesday 23 November 2010 om 15h19

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