Green City Tour

The 2011 Tour De France winner Cadel Evans had hung his boots in 2014.

He is very happy with is retired life and is seen at many of the popular racing events all over the world. He was doubtful as to how his time away from the racing circuits and the cycle would be. But, to his surprise, he has found the retired life to be interesting and satisfying. He has nothing to complain and he is still enjoying his transition to the new phase of his life.

Evans says that he has more time now to see and feel everything happening around him. He has the time to appreciate a lot of things and also enjoys life more than he used to when he was racing. As a rider, one has to be seriously involved in the training program and recovery and there is no time to see and hear other things happening around.

He says that as a rider, one is always being watched in each and every race and there is constantly judging about the rider every race. In order to be a professional rider, one has to sacrifice a lot of things in life and to turn down a lot of invites.

Evans says that he is now going all out accepting initiations to various events and is happy to see the things happening all around him.

He is very happy to be organizing the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road race. He loves going on his bike and still does a lot of miles on his bike. Evans is fit and very active. What gives him a lot of satisfaction and happiness is being with adopted Ethiopian son Robel. What gives him great pleasure is to boost the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Race worldwide and is taking great care in promoting the women’s cycling event.

Sir Bradley Wiggins will be featuring in the new brand campaign by Skoda UK who has recently come out to announce the details of their new offering – Driven by Something Different.

Skoda UK’s campaign follows key moments in the professional as well as the persona like of Wiggins. It also sees him reflect on his achievements in professional cycling so far as he pushes himself to the limit on northwest Wales’s peaks.

Martin Krejci, the acclaimed Czech film director was responsible for directing the video while Fallon London created it. On the 4th of February, the multi-channel campaign will kick off with a 90-second advert showing on ITV1 during the halftime interval in the RBS Six Nations opening match between England and France.

Sir Bradley Wiggins who spoke about the advert expressed enthusiasm as he hopes to see the advert quite soon.

“I’m looking forward to the advert being released. Škoda has done a great job in capturing my journey through cycling. We are already preparing for the next ad which will take a lot to beat this one.”

Kirsten Stagg, Skoda UK head of marketing expressed their delight with working with a professional like Wiggins, who remains one of Britain’s most decorated Olympian. Stagg also believes Wiggins is more than just a cyclist.

“Wiggins is more than a cyclist – he’s a great communicator and a really normal bloke, which makes him the perfect fit for Škoda,” she said.

Stagg was quite keen to point out the positives despite recent media searchlight on the former employers of Wiggins, British Cycling and Team Sky, as well as on the personal reputation of the professional cyclist.

As a brand ambassador for Skoda UK, he will be expected to work with them on ads, campaigns and experimental work for the next three years.

The female cycling star has expressed her feelings on the direction of women in the sport of cycling.

No doubt, women cycling have garnered quite a lot of attention over the years and it is quite apparent that many people are interested to see the way it grows in upcoming years.

Ashley Moolman-Pasio seems to be at the front line for the struggle for gender equality in the sport as she is very passionate about moving women cycling to the next level. She said that in the past two years, women cycling has witnessed a steady growth and has followed an upward trend.

Ashley has admitted that with the strength and achievement of women in the sport improving with each coming year, the exposure and interest of people seems to have grown in leaps and bounds. This is true seeing as the excitement and standard of women racing has built up and is continuously lifting with every race.

However, Pasio pointed out that though there has been a lot of positive improvement for women in the sport, there is still quite a lot of challenges that are yet to be faced if women cycling are to have any meaningful future. She said that the while everything else seemed to be changing for the better, the attitude of those in influential positions have remained the same, she added that this is not exclusive to the influencers alone as even the attitude of the women who are riding in the peloton has remained unchanged.

Having been brought up in a family where gender equality was the norm and not the exception, Ashley is very passionate about fighting the good fight.

She stated that “for the existing culture of cycling to change in order to embrace women cyclists, the core dynamics that define who we are, as women, and how we relate to each other needs to be evolved.”

She added that while men and women may now be regarded as ‘equals’ in social settings, most women are still conditioned to compete with each other for male protection and attention.

Alberto Contador won his 4th Tour of Basque Country after defeating Sergio Henao’s lead in 6th stage’s decisive time trial on Saturday.

Contador ended rainy 16.5-kilometer time trial around Eibar in twenty minute, thirteen seconds to erase Henao’s 6 second advantage going into the final stage.

The 7 time grand tour champ added this Tour of Basque Country win to titles in the years 2008, 2009 and 2014. Henao ended the time trial eighteen seconds behind Alberto, leaving Colombian runner-up for a 2nd straight year after he lost it to Joaquim Rodriguez in the year 2015.

Contador had not led the 6 day race in the northern Spain till the end but the 2 time Tour de France winner had put himself in a great spot during Friday’s exacting mountain stage. Contador told that he worked quite hard this winter to arrive in good shape for the season but a couple of races eluded him by a few seconds. Therefore, he is very happy that he got the victory this time.

Contador ended both the Paris-Nice as well as Tour of Catalonia runner-up previous month after beginning the season with a 3rd position finish at Tour of Algarve. The thirty-three tear old rider for team Tinkoff told that his positive beginning to the year is making him rethink plans to retire soon. He told that he is rethinking the future and probably he would go on a bit more.

The national cycling squad has been invited to Vuelta a Colombia (also known as Tour of Colombia),this year, slated for 13th to 26th June. Rwanda Cycling Federation president Aimable Bayingana confirmed the news.

Rated among world’s oldest cycling events, Tour of Colombia is in 2.2 UCI category, like Tour du Rwanda. The event is arranged by Colombian Cycling Federation and its very first edition took place in 1951. t times, the contest extends to few parts of Ecuador and Venezuela.

Rwanda would make their debut at the sixty-sixth edition of the annual event, but Team Rwanda has earlier taken part in Tour of Rio in Brazil. On Monday, in a telephone interview, Bayingana told that the invitation is a great scope for Team Rwanda to make some inportant strides.

Before going to Tour of Colombia, Team Rwanda would compete in Tour of Eritrea that is scheduled for 19th to 23rd April, and Tour of Rio in Brazil. Previous year, Janvier Haji was the only rider from Rwanda at Tour of Rio.

Efrain Forero Trivino of Colombia was the winner of the 1st edition in the year 1951; Colombia’s Rafael Antonia Nino has the most victories when Spaniard Oscar Sevilla is the defending champ.

Like Eritrea in Africa and Italy in Europe, Colombia is known for producing world class cycle riders such as Nairo Quintana who is No 9 in UCI World rankings. Team Rwanda, this year, has been to several international events, such as La Tropicale Amissa Bongo in February in Gabon, Tour du Cameroun in March and Grand Cycling Tour of Algeria from March 4 to 28 and African Continental Road Championship in February in Morocco.

The roads and tracks where the cyclists have to make their way is becoming worse day by day.

There have comments such as that people who designed the path where Mile end meets Rosemont did not even know or understand bicycles. They have claimed that it was a bad design and made no sense whatsoever. This path was designed with an intention to be a part of the new network of cycling that would eventually run along tracks in the area and from the middle of the city. The path however has dedicated too much space to cyclists and pedestrians.

There is an underpass in the path for the bikers which they have said are not safe at all. The reason being given is that the cyclists that are heading toward north have to take a forced wide turn around a sidewalk. This turn just you out in the road on the south side and again bound them to take an L-shaped turn to get back on the path to ride. There is not even a straight path after that where the cyclists can continue making the path really short and uncomfortable for the riders.
Zve from Montreal Bike Coalition has stated that the path will soon be a mess once the weather gets better and more and more people start to use it. The design was made with an assumption that the path will be accessed from Clark Ave but actually most of them will be accessing it from St-Lauret.

There have been meeting with cyclists to talk about such problems that have been bothering them and Aref Salem the executive member in charge of transportation of the Montreal city has promised to give better sign boards and marks the lanes once the spring warmth comes in. Zve is disappointed with fact that the city cannot understand cyclists’ needs even though it is mature enough to do the same.

Rafal Majka, the 25 year old polish professional cyclist who rides for the Tinkoff-Saxo team has said that there is a lot that he has to learn from the current leader of his team, 32 year old Spanish professional cyclist, Alberto Contador.

Majka’s name is among the list of the team’s riders who are likely to become team leader after Alberto Contador retires. Contador has already indicated that he is likely to retire in 2016.

The previous year was a successful one for Majka. He became the overall winner in 2014 Tour De Pologne. He also secured six victories. Majka became the winner of two stages in Tour de France and also became the winner of Polka dot Jersey which is given to the rider who becomes the winner of mountain classification in Tour de France.

This will be Rafael Majka’s fifth season as a professional cyclist but still he says that there is still a lot for him to learn. Majka considers Contador to be a good teammate and he further added that he thinks that he needs to learn a lot from Contador about being a successful professional cyclist.

Majka became the winner of the seventh place in the overall winner category in the 2013 edition of Giro d’Italia. He also managed to win the second place in the best young rider category in that race. Last year in the month of May, Majka won the sixth place in the overall winner category in Giro d’Italia. Majka was not completely willing to be in the Tinkoff-Saxo team which would compete in Tour de France last year but in spite of that he became the winner of two stages in that race and even managed to win Polka dot Jersey. In summer last year he became the winner of Tour de Pologne. The last season can be regarded as the most successful one yet for Majka.

Rowsell is a believer of strength in depth. The strength in a great depth has given the Women’s team a huge deal of success and improved the pursuit of the team.

She said that the squad has given them so much competition that they could never feel unsatisfied. She said that it is very tough to get through the selection process and the internal pressure on them is the sole reason behind their win every time and the success they have seen in the recent times.

Roswell also said that she feels very excited to be racing on the London veldrome after the London 2012 race last time. He feels that this time it is going to be a huge thing even if it is not the same as the World Championships. It is going to feel the same to her. The noise that comes from it is just phenomenal and she is very excited to experience it all over again.

Trott went into record saying that she has performed a few times in the veldrome after 2012 but it still feels just the same to be back inside. The feeling of having butterflies in the stomach doesn’t go away once you enter the veldrome.

She is supposed to race the omnium as per the new format in order to follow the commitments towards her team in London. She won the Revolution event on the same tracks beating Marianne Vos, the Dutch champion and the Europeans last October.

Trot said that she likes to think that they have the capability to win the Team pursuit. He hopes that her performance improves and she can get what she deserves.

The 2015 Vuelta Espana track has been announced to include flat time-trial as per the Vuelta director’s earlier promise to 2012 Tour France champion Chris Froome.

“After his defeat this year, Chris said, ‘Thanks Javier, but tell me could the Vuelta time trials be flatter?’,” stated Javier Guillén, the Vuelta Director to the Spanish media.

“And I answered then, ‘In 2015, Vuelta time trial would be organized in some flat region.’ Thus, started our conversation.”
Team Sky’s Brit lead Froome came second to Alberto Contador in the race as the latter swept away the crowning glory of being the 2014 Vuelta Champion, last September. Froome lost out on time in mountains but Javier stressed that the 2012 Tour France hero was maximum frustrated by 36.7 km time-trial towards Borja. The very time-trial involved a three category ascent to 1000 m & saw Chris concede fifty-three seconds to Alberto.
Vuelta also started with 12.6 km team time-trial & a brief 9.7 km individual option on last day.

The very conversation between Guillén and Froome kept going through phone messages& include the topic of Tour France 2015. In October this year, ASO, the Tour organizer, presented a riding route which involves just a 14 km time trial for day 1 & team time-trial for day 9. Giro 2015 will involve 59.2 km time trial in 3rd week, which is going to be the longest ever in 6 years.

“I reminded Froome then”, added on the race director of Vuelta. “that the Vuelta time trial will follow its usual pattern which has been patent in the previous editions, about forty kilometers & on false flats or level ground.

The 2015 Vuelta route presentation pushed Chris to declare that he would possibly race at Giro rather than trying his pulse at Tour France championship next year.

A seasoned cyclist and racer- Guy Nethery (forty-seven year old) died after the Cyclocross race which was held in Texas (Webberville) got over. After the race finished on Saturday (18th of October, 2014), Guy rode away and collapsed without any particular medical cause. A passerby noticed him and contacted the race officials. CPR was given to Guy moments after he collapsed.
Spectators and fellow racers stayed near Guy until the emergency services crew arrived at the scene. He was rushed into a nearby hospital by the EMT crew. Later, on Saturday afternoon it was confirmed that Guy Nethery was dead.
Cycling has obviously suffered the loss of such a remarkable cyclist. But the loss has been felt more dearly by the local cycling community of Texas.
TXCX Coordinator and friend of Guy- Joe Doyle said that that Guy was a racer who used to be friendly to everyone and respected everyone equally. Guy also used to participate in Andrew Willis’ The Driveway Series. According to Doyle, Guy loved riding and racing. But above all he loved his family.
Guy Nethery leaves behind his wife (Denise Nethery) and three daughters namely- Chloe, Phoebe and Dylan Nethery.
Details in relation to the medical cause or illness that led to Guy Nethery’s death will be revealed later.
The Visitation is going to take place on 22nd of October, 2014 (Wednesday) from six o’clock to eight o’clock in the evening at Weed-Corley-Fish Funeral Home. The Celebration of Life Services is also going to take place in the same funeral home on 23rd of October, 2014 (Thursday) at two o’clock in the afternoon.
A fund raiser campaign has been started by Rick Weinberg for the education of the three daughters’ of Guy Nethery. The funds collected will be transmitted to the 529 education accounts of the girls after the campaign is over.