Adiós Periero?
by Jen See on Dec 6, 2009 1:41 PM EST
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Oscar Pereiro confided to the press this week that his contract dispute with Astana may mean the end of his cycling career. The dispute arose when the team tried to change the terms of his contract, a change which meant lowering the Spanish Tour winner's salary by a third. Pereiro said he had signed a contract, and at the time, he believed he would take Haimar Zubeldia's roster spot and ride in support of Alberto Contador's Tour ambitions. The team's efforts to change the terms of his contract came as a surprise to Pereiro, and he has said that he will not ride for the lower salary. he has set his lawyers to work on the case.
If he can end his contract with Astana, Pereiro said he would try to sign with a new team. But the Astana contract goes into force on 1 January, which does not leave much time for the lawyering required to end it. Pereiro noted in his press statement that he could not sign for another team while he still had a contract with Astana. He said that the situation likely meant his "adiós" from cycling, but that he was not "overly sad." I "must be realistic," he concluded.
Pereiro is best known for his 2006 Tour de France victory in which a lucky escape into a long breakaway set up his general classification campaign. Though he stood on the second step in Paris, Pereiro received credit for the victory after Floyd Landis lost the title to a failed doping control. The following year, Pereiro finished tenth in the Tour after riding in support of Caisse d'Epargne team-mate Alejandro Valverde.
Pereiro never really returned to his best form after he crashed badly during stage 15 of the 2008 Tour de France. Pereiro went over the guardrail on the wet descent off the Col Agnel, falling to the switchbacked road below. The crash required a lenghty recovery period and resulted in a slow return to racing this season. His contract with Caisse d'Epargne ended this season, and rumor connected Pereiro with several teams this Fall, before he signed with Astana. In particular, he had an agreement to sign with Quick Step, if Astana did not receive its Pro Tour license. He may now be wishing he had signed on with Lefevre, rather than dealing with the Kazakhs, who seem to have a knack for complicating the most basic team management tasks. Perhaps the Spanish rider's lawyers will yet find a way to win his freedom. But for now, it looks as though his career may come to an end.
Adiós y buena suerta, Oscar.
Source, AS.
Photo Credit: Ezra Shaw, Getty Images Sport.
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He really was great in the '06 Tour
Really tentative in interviews after he was gifted the yellow jersey, but constantly speaking with his legs. His final time-trial was actually pretty good, and he gutted it out on the climbs. He certainly couldn’t have won without the half-hour time bonus Floyd gave him, but he made the most of it.
I’ll miss Oscar if he has to go.
I don't understand why anyone would sign
any sort of deal with Astana without locking it up five ways to Sunday, BEFORE you commit yourself. There’s a pattern of serious failure of representation amongst the folks dealing with them. I don’t understand it, at all.
Seriously
So he signed a contract. Then, they come back and say, well, no, we’re not honoring the contract you signed, you are actually getting this contract worth much less. Say what? I’m thinking they thought they could get away with it because it’s so late in the transfer season.
Well, if they are refusing to honour his contract
by saying, ‘We won’t pay you what we’d promised’, then surely they’ve breached the contract and he can say, ‘See you later’. How is he bound to a team that has declared it won’t abide by such an important aspect of the contract as how much he’s going to be paid?
Or is the problem not that they’ve said they won’t pay him, but that they’d ‘like to re-negotiate’ (ie. falling short of outright refusal)?
so much for
a meeting of the minds. What planet is this?
"Harder! Better! Faster! Stronger!" Philippe Gilbert
by Chris Fontecchio on Dec 7, 2009 2:03 AM EST up reply actions
I'm really glad you started this.
I don’t understand why the UCI hasn’t stepped in. Where are Oscar’s rights here? I’m so angry about this. He should have signed with QS to begin with. Why anyone would sign with Astans!
Sad indeed.
The Kazachs are not looking like cycling friendly folks to deal with. I would think that after this year and after AC’s departure, this team will have further difficulties signing riders.
No horn, watch for finger.
No word from Almaty yet, as best I can tell
Mind you, my cyrillic search skills are extremely basic, unfortunately. Do we not have any Russian speakers in the crowd? (No, I am not volunteering to learn…)
He earned my respect
in 06 and after. He definitely rose to the occasion. Buena suerta, Oscar.
"…I saw bloody Cavendish coming, really fast…"
HH
How ironic
that the flashing ad above this thread when I read it was “We are hiring, Anyone can apply”
So if Oscar stops riding, it appears he can make money at home.
Sayonara sir,
As much as he may be lambasted sometimes for the way he won the TDF, he did win the Tour and how many people can say that. Keep your head up high Oscar, you had a good career!
or
that he got some roos loose in the back paddock.
"Harder! Better! Faster! Stronger!" Philippe Gilbert
by Chris Fontecchio on Dec 7, 2009 2:05 AM EST up reply actions
Strange end
to a strange career?? I wasn’t a fan after he barked at Hincapie for beating him, and I loved watching Jens! yelling at him while sprinting it out on that fateful stage. Bah, the politics of drafting! Nevertheless, I do wish him well. He was a humble Tour champ, relatively classy guy the last few years.
"Harder! Better! Faster! Stronger!" Philippe Gilbert
by Chris Fontecchio on Dec 7, 2009 2:08 AM EST reply actions
Hey
I have too long a track record of dissing the guy to say “I always loved him!!!”
"The only pain I got time for is the pain I put on fools who don't know what time it is." Edvald Boasson Hagen
by Chris Fontecchio on Dec 7, 2009 6:53 PM EST up reply actions
Astana, bah...
Sad to see a good rider retire when he may still have some good miles in his legs, but after that crash perhaps his heart is not in it. I like that he is somewhat philosophical about things and has some pride in what he’s accomplished.
Not so fast with the adios
Some us will continue to hope that this will work out during the five-day period that Pereiro has given the team.
As for lucky escapes in the 2006 Tour, whatever may be accurate in technical terms, in our family we thank Pereiro, together with Carlos Sastre, for saving that dark Tour by being proactive and doing something when it looked like the peloton and and the fans were going to succumb to the horrible funk in the atmosphere that year.
Pereiro is worth fighting for. I hope the team will come to realize that. As a fan, it’s hard to sit by and watch this happen.
Well said.
"How strange it was to see men doing something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant." Tim Winton, 'Breath'
Right
Which is why there is a question mark in the headline ;-)
I tend to think he went public with the story in the effort to apply pressure to Astana. But it remains to be seen if the pressure actually accomplishes anything.
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