As far as i Know he is not associated with the project in the current form. He did however want to start a team like that, so he may have sparked the idea that the danes picked up.nevada said:"former Astana manager Marc Biver is in charge of the project"
I dont know if I'm more dissapointed with the UCI allowing him back into the sport or for the huge shadow it casts over those riders joining him.
This, as far as we know.Ney the Viking said:As far as i Know he is not associated with the project in the current form.
You dont think he knew what was going on ?on3m@n@rmy said:When Biver was with Astana, I'm not sure it was Biver or the sponsors that were the real problem. Maybe he deserves a second shot.
For all we know he was never involved in the first place. He just likes to tell people that he knows Fabian Cancellara and has talked to him personnally.Race Radio said:Biver is no longer involved.
Regardless of whether or not some of the riders lied to Riis, I wouldn't say anyone "stole" anything from Riis. There was a new project being set up, and many of Riis' riders decided, for whatever reason, that they would be better off than with him. It might be friendship, money, personal goals, but you can't say Andersen and Nygaard stole from Riis. They had a better offer, fair and square. I agree that it is a sad way for such a great team to end (I strongly assume Saxo Bank SunGard next year will be a lot different from the team of previous years), but after all I think the fact that so many riders chose to join the DS instead of the manager must also tell something about Riis. He is, in some way, the victim in this story, but is it really through no fault of his own?ergmonkey said:The dropping of Biver's name somewhere in the life of the team doesn't bother me nearly as much as the under-handed way they've gone about essentially stealing the project Riis Cycling built.
Christian said:Regardless of whether or not some of the riders lied to Riis, I wouldn't say anyone "stole" anything from Riis. There was a new project being set up, and many of Riis' riders decided, for whatever reason, that they would be better off than with him. It might be friendship, money, personal goals, but you can't say Andersen and Nygaard stole from Riis. They had a better offer, fair and square. I agree that it is a sad way for such a great team to end (I strongly assume Saxo Bank SunGard next year will be a lot different from the team of previous years), but after all I think the fact that so many riders chose to join the DS instead of the manager must also tell something about Riis. He is, in some way, the victim in this story, but is it really through no fault of his own?
Cancellara left Riis because the team was going to be (or will be) built around Contador. I'm sure that even if he hadn't had an offer from Andersen, he would have found another team that would gladly pay the 1.83 Mio.
So I wouldn't say they stole any riders, and I think it's also too early to say whether or not they stole Riis' "project", whatever that may be. For all we know Team Luxembourg may have a completely new philosophy. And in the end, every team has the same "project" or philosophy: they want to win as much as possible (except for Cervélo maybe, but that didn't last too long).
nevada said:You dont think he knew what was going on ?
Good point Nevada. But it looks like it doesn't matter, according to Race Radio's account.Race Radio said:Biver is no longer involved.