Archive for the 'Tour of California' Category

Tour of California Partners With Tour de France

Published by
Brent
June 15, 2008 in Tour de France and Tour of California. 0 Comments

According to USA Today and VeloNews, the Amgen Tour of California will join forces with the organizers of the Tour de France.

According to a draft press release obtained by USA TODAY, the agreement begins with the upcoming 2008 Tour de France and 2009 Amgen Tour of California and calls for “the organizations to develop and initiate comprehensive cross promotional platforms for the world’s most prestigious cycling event and America’s most successful cycling race as well as provide assistance with media and sponsorship sales for the races in their respective regions.

This comes on the heels of news that ASO (the organizers of the Tour de France) was set to purchase 49 percent of the Vuelta.

The deal with the Tour of California looks to be mainly a TV distribution deal as the Tour de France has experience producing broadcasts for many countries and the Tour of California would like to grow their world wide audience.

As long as the deal is about TV distribution it is probably a good thing, but I don’t know if it is such a good idea to be taking public relations tips from the Tour de France. The Tour has been getting a lot of headlines, but it isn’t alway the good kind.

Should the Tour of California join the ProTour?

Published by
Brent
February 28, 2007 in Pro Cycling and Tour of California. 0 Comments

There has been a lot of talk this week about the Tour of California becoming a ProTour event. I’m not so sure that will be the best thing for American cycling.

The event as it stands now attracted 8 ProTour teams with some of the biggest stars in the sport. American fans got to see Discovery and CSC go head to head with Leipheimer, Voigt, Hincapie, O’Grady, Julich, and Ivan Basso.

Basso and BettiniAmerican fans got to see the World Time Trial Champion and Paris-Roubaix winner Fabian Cancelara. The got to see Olympic and World Champion Paulo Bettini, and 3 time world TT champ Michael Rogers. They got to see super sprinters Thor Hushovd, Graeme Brown, and JJ Haedo.

Bringing in all 20 Pro Tour teams will not guarantee the star riders from those teams will come. Bringing Milram will not guarantee Pettachi. I for one really don’t care if half of the the six French pro teams come to the race. O.K., maybe let Cofidis in if they bring American Tyler Farrar.

Allowing some of the top American based teams is of greater value to American cycling. It give teams like Slipstream, Healthnet, Priority Health, Toyoto United and others some great exposure for their sponsors, and it gives up and coming American riders the chance to go head to head with the big boys.

What value is there to these sponsors of the American based teams if they can’t do the biggest U.S. race? Also I think American fans like the underdog story and want to see the stories like a Jason Donald almost winning the prologue.

I guess if the organizers of Paris-Nice and the Tour de France want to continue to go against the Pro Tour, maybe they can turn the Tour de France into a French amateur event like they are doing with Paris-Nice, and I’m sure the Tour of California would be happy to take the month of July to bring a Grand Tour to the U.S., but until that happens, I think an 8 or 10 stage race in the early season with a combination of some of the big stars, and U.S. teams is just fine.

What do you thinks? Go to the Pro Tour or stay as is? Leave your comments

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