A friend* of mine tipped me of on a quite interesting study conducted by a Belgian economist. Daam Van Reeth studied how a number of different variables - like the parcourse, doping news, uncertainty about the outcome, and patriotism - influence the TV audience during Tour de France. He only use data from Flemish television, but since Podium Cafe is the site where people dream of Belgium, we might learn something from the study anyway.

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August 1st is on Monday, and that means teams and riders can be more outspoken (take note, Leopards) when it comes to new contracts. There are of course rumours, like BMC signing the entire peloton except, apparently, for Egor Silin, Jacopo Guarneri and Dimitri Muravyev.

Now, I'm not really interested in listing who goes where, because I'm sure other sites will provide such lists. I'm more interested in talking about the moves. Like, is Gilbert trying to drive tgsgirl mad by going to BMC? (Not saying that he is joining them, but still.) Isn't Ben Hermans to Leopard - Trek a very nice deal, perhaps even for both Hermans and the team? Stuff like that.

Fire away.

When the UCI aren't busy telling the audience that there isn't an elephant in the room, they sometimes spend their time deciding new rules. Like today, when they banned convicted dopers from getting a staff licence:

After ratifying the measures proposed on Thursday by the Professional Cycling Council (PCC) on the subject of riders returning to competition after a period of suspension for violation of the Anti-Doping Regulation (see press release dated 15th June), the UCI Management Committee approved the introduction of a new article in the regulations (1.1.006.2) aiming to prevent anyone found guilty of infringing the Anti-Doping Regulation during his cycling career from obtaining a licence authorising him to take on a role in cycling as a member of a team’s staff.

Here's the article, which of course also contains an exemption to the rule.

Another rule decided on today that is pretty interesting (especially in the light of a post from FMK earlier this year: AIGCP/UCI Biohazard Warning).

The UCI Management Committee, which is moreover very happy with the positive outcomes of the appeals lodged with the CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sport) concerning cases linked to the biological passport, also ratified the introduction of article 364bis to the Anti-Doping Regulation, which from now on makes the teams responsible for the total costs generated by each doping affair. These costs are currently born by the UCI.

Really bad news from the Spanish site Biciciclismo. Google translation:

The Team Movistar rider Xavier Tondo has died in an accident as he was leaving to train together with Alejandro Valverde. Apparently, the Catalan rider dropped his garage door when he went out of their homes. Tondo was concentrated in the Sierra Nevada with several teammates.

Biciciclismo says that Eusebio Unzué, team manager of Movistar, has confirmed.

Edit (Jens here) : Benat Intxausti was the training-partner, not Valverde apparently. 

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