RadioShack miss out on Vuelta a Espana invite

[Bro Deal]

Your reasons were refuted, even though they were so stupid that they didn't need to be. We can't help it if your half brain cell can't recognize that.

You have not refuted anything. The only thing we have seen from you is ranting that is so filled with anger that you can barely string words into a sentence, let alone an intelligible argument.

Lovin' it.

 

[swampy1970]

The best thing about this is watching the doping apologists like Swampy and Tam get so hopping mad. They cannot even refute the reasons why Retirement Shack was not included. Heck, Tam has been reduced to making stuff up. All they can do is vent their rage. I, for one, am loving it.

Who said I was mad?

Not a doping apologist. If someone comes back with a non-negative A and B sample within specific ranges - nail 'em to the cross and leave them their until you need the space of the next sucker. But until a test comes back with both A and B samples non-negative, or equipment and/or irrifutable proof that doping of any kind was used then it's all rumour and conjecture and should be treated as such. Basing team selection on rumours from someone who lied under oath (ie not selecting RadioShack due to Landis accusations) is just plain dumb.

Then again, in Europe nothing surprises me anymore.

No, I'm just calling you out for loving everyone, including people who you've spent lots of time slagging off, who just happens to try and call out Lance. Nothing more, nothing less.

In this instance its someone who's consistently lied, perjured himself, is wanted on arrest warrants, computer hacking/data theft charges, just the very upstanding model citizen that we should all believe - someone that you were dragging through the dirt a couple of years ago. Now you're pulling his pubes out of the gaps in your teeth.

... and the Vuelta. The organizers are obviously free to invite who they like - but dropping a ProTour team that's have multiple top 10 Vuelta finishers and instead we'll see the likes of the Andalucia - Cajasur team bring in the results and stage wins.

 

[Bro Deal]

Uh-oh, looks like fat Swampy is angry about being called what we all know he is, a contemptible doping apologist who dreams about tossing Armtrong's salad every night and becomes enraged whenever people tell the truth about Armstrong's doping. He can barely even address the subject at hand. Instead he veers off into some made up stuff about Landis.

Don't worry. The Giro got along just fine without Retirement Shack. I am sure they won't be missed at the Vuelta either. The rest of us will enjoy following the race. You can spend the time sulking in your basement while tossing off to your Armstrong posters.

Lovin' it.

 

[genedan]

I'm sure if there weren't conflict between the UCI and race organizers this wouldn't be so much of a deal...

The organizers sort of had some credibility in their reasoning due to the fact that RadioShack is in their first season and like all the other teams, must prove themselves with victories and such.

However, RadioShack is clearly better than a lot of the teams invited so something's messed up. The 16-team agreement was pretty messed up too. They should have said that the 18 ProTour teams should have automatic invites with 4 invites at the discretion of the organizers. That way, RadioShack would have been in and subpar teams like Cofidis, BBox, out...problem solved.

There needs to also be "quality control" of the ProTour that allows teams that do not meet a high standard of sport to be ejected, i.e., Footon-Serveto is an empty shell of Saunier Duval and should not even have been considered as being in the ProTour in 2009 and 2010, but somehow bureaucratic technicalities have allowed them to remain in the organization...

 

[slovakguy]

so, if, as swampy and others are pointing out, the vuelta attracts such a b-list of talent and that no one of any worth since the badger has contested the vuelta, why are the hog and others so intent on radioshack gaining an invitation? to save the hog's face? to prevent others from pointing out that a pro-tour team couldn't get into two grand tours?

 

[Eldrack]

Radioshack is far stronger than some of the teams that have been given automatic invites. All of the wild card teams deserve to be there, but some of the other pro-tour teams most certainly do not. But I guess RCS don't want to risk a war with the UCI over not inviting some of the weaker pro-tour teams.

This perhaps indicates why the automatic invite system needs to be ditched. If you know you're getting an invite you can send a **** squad and you don't care. If you're fighting for places then you'll send the best squad possible because that's how you get a place. Then you get the strongest riders racing against each other.

 

[swampy1970]

Uh-oh, looks like fat Swampy is angry about being called what we all know he is, a contemptible doping apologist who dreams about tossing Armtrong's salad every night and becomes enraged whenever people tell the truth about Armstrong's doping. He can barely even address the subject at hand. Instead he veers off into some made up stuff about Landis.

Don't worry. The Giro got along just fine without Retirement Shack. I am sure they won't be missed at the Vuelta either. The rest of us will enjoy following the race. You can spend the time sulking in your basement while tossing off to your Armstrong posters.

Lovin' it.

I don't think that I've read much, let alone watched anything about the Vuelta since the days of Romminger - apart from the odd video of contador going up the Angrilu...

You're so funny... "posters" what do you think I am, 14?

 

[mattp1975]

That first sentence may have carried some weight until about 1995 when the Vuelta was moved to the end of the season and apart from Contador, has been won by people who couldn't win either the Giro or the Tour... Not even the great Spaniard Miguel Indurain could be ar$ed to ride the event for the better part on his Tour winning career.

Ullrich 1999, Menchov 2005 & 2007.

 

[swampy1970]

Ullrich 1999, Menchov 2005 & 2007.

Three years out of 15... Wow. I'm crushed! What about the other ~80% of the time?

Try harder.

Of course I'm implying that apart from the winners, the second and third guys in that particular years race were top 20 Tour quality.

 

[mattp1975]

Three years out of 15... Wow. I'm crushed! What about the other ~80% of the time?

Try harder.

Of course I'm implying that apart from the winners, the second and third guys in that particular years race were top 20 Tour quality.

Including Contador that's 4 years out of 15.