KZBlog

It’s official Lance Armstrong did announce that he will be joining Team Astana. He will not be taking a salary or any bonuses so Team Astana got a good deal. Most people agree that Armstrong chose the Kazakhstan team because of his former coach, Johan Bruyneel. And the presence of Alberto Contador, the 2007 Tour de France champion and last week’s Spanish Vuelta winner.

There are already tensions: Contador is leader of the team and according to the Kazakh Cycling Federation, Armstrong and Contador will share leadership next year and Contador is suggesting he might leave if that happens:

“I think I’ve earned the right to be the leader of a team without having to fight for my place,” the Spanish rider said Tuesday in AS newspaper. “And with Armstrong some difficult situations could arise in which the team would put him first and that would hurt me…My intention is to stay (at Astana) because I have a contract until 2010, but I have already received a good number of offers from other teams,” he said.

From AP News

I wonder if Armstrong is upset that he ended up getting scooped by the Deputy President of the Kazakh Cycling Federation, Nikolai Proskurin, who made the announcement earlier? Probably not. That likely had more to do with timezones.

The question now is, why did Team Astana deny that Armstrong was coming? Did they not know? Did they not want to jinx the deal? Did they think someone would try to steal him away if they announced the deal?

I also don’t need to tell you that last night Khabar News ran a story, “Team Astana Gets Glory on the World Stage” about Contador’s win in the Spanish Vuelta and Armstrong’s announcement. While I always find it a bit pathetic that Kazakhstan seems to try to get an ego boost wherever it can, I would much rather hear about the glory of its cycling team than GDP growth. And let’s face it, you’re going to attract more tourists and more fans in the world with Lance Armstrong than with Grigory Marchenko. I would be willing to take on any bets that Google searches for Kazakhstan and Astana have been skyrocketing over the past few weeks.

So overall I think this is an awesome move. What do you think of all this?