PCutter said:
Lots of valid points, but I would note some established/long standing ProConti teams wouldn't have the commitment from sponsors needed for the step up to PT (and we've seen from HTC that finding big sponsors in cycling isn't necessarily easy).
Which is why teams are having to retreat back to regional bases. An Australian moneyed backer is a good starting point, but it seems that the big multinationals are the hardest to sway. When Caisse d'Epargne were in trouble, and that's a big, traditional team (of the teams in the current péloton it can trace its direct lineage back the furthest), their identity being primarily Spanish helped them persuade Telefonica to step in. HTC didn't have that benefit because they didn't have a sufficient 'local' interest, so had to look at multinational companies which will not feel the pull of the heartstrings the way, say, Europcar or Telefonica did.
Plus, of course, a lot of ProContinental teams don't actually aspire to be World Tour. Teams like Androni Giocattoli have never had the money, but they get to do all the races they feel they need to because their results justify it (and those results are also better for the roster not being overstretched). When we see the final GreenEdge roster we can debate whether they would be better served as a ProConti team or not. Personally, I see no harm in them being ProConti at all. I like the idea of all teams having to start off that way, because too many teams have come straight in and bought licences in the last few years, and it's casting traditional and long-standing teams to the wayside.
Yes, the sport wants dynamism and to attract new teams and sponsors - but it shouldn't do that at the cost of alienating those long-standing sponsors. Because ultimately, this 'new quasi-national team starts up, buys big names, gets licence' epoch can't last forever. It's like the big manufacturer era in F1, or the Rock/Austin years of the WWF; there's only so much room at the top, and when those sponsors end, those teams cost more to keep going than the smaller, regional concerns, which makes finding sponsors willing to stump up the right amount of money harder. And who will likely be the ones to pick up the pieces? The traditional nations and their teams.
I'm not saying GreenEdge shouldn't come into the sport. We need turnover and dynamism. But the UCI has bent over backwards and admitted a number of new teams to the ProTour in the last couple of years, whilst teams with a lot of history are being cast aside to make room; I feel that considering the money and talent levels mean that these new big money teams will get plenty of organisers falling over themselves to have them around anyway, the UCI is not doing enough to safeguard the teams that have kept the sport afloat through harder times. Again, this isn't GreenEdge's fault. I welcome new teams and new exposures. But I feel like; if their roster is good enough to be ProTour, then they would probably get the invites to the races they wanted to anyway (like Cervélo did in 2009); if their roster is not good enough to be ProTour, then they shouldn't be ProTour.
I favour the promotion/relegation system, but I feel points should stay with the team, not the rider. What if somebody waves a bunch of money under Voeckler and Rolland's noses and they go? Europcar have invested their year in those guys, just had an amazing year, and then the UCI punish them by relegating their status further for it? If you sign for a team with no proven record, you know what you're getting. Does anybody really think that Radioshack needed to be ProTour in 2010? They would have got to do all their season's goals anyway. Does anybody think that Leopard needed to be ProTour in 2011? With the roster they had, they could have gone to any race they wanted.
If a team comes in and acquires enough points to rank up in the top 15 (for I would have just 15 guaranteed invite teams in my top tier), then fine, make them ProTour.
In fact, in my mind, I would have three tiers.
The top 15 ranked teams in the world would be the top tier. These teams are not forced to go to any race, but must be invited to any race of .1 status or above that they ask for an invite to.
The next 25 ranked teams would be second tier. They can be invited to any race, if it be the organiser's will. Any major new teams will be automatically installed at this rank (though all new teams will start with 0 points, the points accumulated by their riders will determine whether they enter at the second tier - if their rider points are greater than those of the 40th-ranked team the previous year - or third - if their rider points are less than those of the 40th-ranked team the previous year).
Any teams below this will be third tier. They can ride .HC races in their own country, .1 and .2 races, as per Continental teams now.
Responding to the 3 quotes above (sorry, Im a muppet so don't know how to split quotes)
It would be my view the borderline national teams are closely aligned to Olympic ambitions of the nation (not just TdF), and with gold medal dreams, the UCI is the link between the national squads and the IOC as the recognised administrator of the sport. The politics of IOC/UCI/National teams may even be more entangled than the UCI/PT!
Yes, perhaps - but what does this have to do with ASO/RCS/Unipublic? Those are the people that it really matters to be in with. And I don't see why pseudo-national teams is a good thing, personally. Especially if a country produces more good riders. Should Spain or France be disadvantaged because they produce too many good riders and have to split them between teams, compared to the powerhouse of resources that Australian/British cycling can offer?
There are lots of Australian pro's in the peloton, but its not always the case that their ambitions are being supported. There's a long history of this, (and its not just Australian's who suffer from it) but an example would be Cadel at Lotto where he noted when VdB was rising up that he felt the team/sponsor would prefer to have a Belgian win a stage than have him finish on the podium. A rider like Wes Sulzberger probably deserves a few more chances then he's currently getting (and this predates his being linked to GE), I'm not suggesting he should have been on the TdF roster, but he deserves a bit more support than some of the riders in his team who seem to proceed him. Ditto Simon Clarke.
Simon Clarke has only really broken through this year though. I'm sure after his year he deserves more chances for sure, but I'm also not sure Astana's the best fit for him. And these riders... if they moved to GreenEdge, would they really get more team support? Or would they, more likely, still be support riders, only support riders for Australian teammates instead of French/Kazakh ones?
I would only expect probably 3 (4 most) riders to come up from the AIS team in the first year (for as you say, too many would weaken the squad), and probably be Durbridge (U23 TT runner up), Hepburn and maybe Dyball or Lang. There's been a number of riders who've stepped straight from AIS to PT (without GE forcing it) including Bobridge and the Meyer brothers (all of who's road results have been held back by track ambitions, but have all claimed road wins since the jump), Matthews (as you pointed out) and goes back as far as Jens Voight and Stuey coming out of the fore-runner of the Jayco squad many many years ago (Jens first team was ZVVZ-AIS after T-Mobile showed no interest).
Ah yes, but people like Bobridge and the Meyers were by no means the finished article. In a squad as big and as strong as Garmin they were able to take time to adjust; again it really depends on the strength of the rest of the squad whether these riders are able to be molly-coddled. Sky are doing the molly-coddling job on Peter Kennaugh, but if they had 3 or 4 riders they had to do that with, it may prove problematic when it comes to spreading the talent across multiple races at hectic times of the year.
Matthews has been a spectacular talent for a long time and has really acquitted himself well at the top level, albeit he has had a quiet few months now, but that's to be expected in your rookie season. Even Peter Sagan disappeared mostly after May. But the thing is, not everybody can be as talented as Michael Matthews, and riders take different time to develop. Some riders have completely different skillsets and would be better off learning their trade elsewhere.
I bet Ian Stannard learned more from a year at Colnago and a year at ISD than he could ever have learned in the UK Academy or domestic scene. Then, when he finally got to Sky, he was a more rounded rider than many of his British peers at the same age.
The other thing, of course, is that Australian cyclists cover the whole gamut of talent. You have great sprinters and time triallists. Fewer GC men and climbers, granted, but you do have the current Tour de France winner. What will the team's aims be? Will they go for sprints? Classics? When it comes to the GTs, will they be a sprint team? A GC team? If you've got lots of competing aims it can hurt the chances of competing because you don't commit wholly to them. See Robbie McEwen wanting more flat power engines in Lotto's team at the same time as Evans wanting more mountain goats, and then the team having to balance that with Hoste's goals in April. In the end Lotto tried not to annoy any of them, and ended up annoying all three by trying to accommodate all three, and ending up with a bit short on all three fronts. This is Sky's problem; sprints are a good way to bolster your win count but it runs counter to their aim of providing a GC challenge. Would it not be better for climbing Aussies to go to climbing teams, sprinting Aussies to go to sprinting teams and time trialling Aussies to go to time trialling teams, perhaps?