Disco dead?
Posted August 10th, 2007 in Race
Tailwind Sports was unable to find a new sponsor to replace Discovery Channel and looks to be pulling the pin completely.
Despite its sterling record, Tailwind has been unable to sign a title sponsor for the 2008 season. Discovery Channel’s three-year contract expires this year and new corporate management decided against extending the deal. Team officials declined to comment on the decision, but USA TODAY was able to independently confirm the plan.
Update: Via Cyclingnews this has been confirmed.
I don’t think they’ve tried hard enough. I’ve heard that there’s a group of Kazakh corporations who may be in need of a new branding vehicle.
Obviously this may leave a formerly cheap Tour winner (Alberto Contador) out in the cold, and on the open market. Now usually this means a price that will confirm his talent and status, unfortunately there are still those pesky rumours floating around to properly deal with, something not helped by his refusal to answer questions from cycling journalists in todays fizzer of a press conference.
What were they thinking? Probably money. If you knew you didn’t have a ride for the following year and you had just won the tour, though with more than a few doping questions hanging over your head, what would you do? Yep, you’d try to drive down the negatives and allay fears about your personal future in order to drive up your price.
But right now it looks like winning the Yellow Jersey is a poisoned chalice as far as career advancement goes and is a race better off lost, and what’s worse is that it looks like there is no neat PR workaround for any current or past winner. Strange days indeed when the Lantern Rouge has more credibility that the Yellow Jersey.
ASO has a long way to go in rebuilding the credibility of it’s winner and the winners have a long way to go in rebuilding the credibility of the race.
I suggest an average winning speed of 25kp/h next year with only 50 finishers……all French.
technorati tags: cycling, protour, discoverychannel, tailwind
What others have to say…
Cripes that post was only up for a tick! Feedreaders!
Yeah, too bad about Disco, it’s a much needed end to an era.
Sponsors want guarantees of no doping. Although teams can do blood tests, watch riders, give better coaching and advise, there is no way you can stop a rider doing a “Sinkewitz” and rubbing on some testosterone cream. I expect more than a few riders to be out of a job by the end of the year (as i have said before). Unfortunately it will be the workers that were probably clean in the first place and there is the irony
Yep, the dopers are killing the sport, but I’m probably not alone in thinking that the best for a reconciliation of sorts in the sport is to see the demise of Discovery, I believe that they have been a corrosive element in the fight against doping.
Sure, they passed all tests, but they sure beat a lot of teams who happened to be powered by dopers in the process……I’m thinking something just does not follow and so do a lot of folks.
The secret history of Discovery has yet to be fully written.
The secret history of Discovery has yet to be fully written.
I think David Walsh has done a pretty good job. I’m bringing back a copy from the US, you’re welcome to a read 
[…] Onward to Spinopsys and we are reminded that “that there’s a group of Kazakh corporations who may be in need of a new branding vehicle” in the Disco dead? article. Philip has provided ASO with a few choice suggestions as well as a possible outcome in next year’s Tour de France. […]
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Too bad about Team Disco.
What happened to your post about Beijing banning cars?