Iris Slappendel, Rabobank videos, and the horrible position the Garmin-Cervélo women are in

So, this starts as a light-hearted story, but it has a serious message. And of course, it's all my opinion, nothing to do with the Podium Café editors or Podium Café as a whole.

Rabobank have been putting out some fun videos of their 2012 women's team on their training camps. The videos are sweet and fun - interviews & footage from some team-building exercises (I grinned when I saw Marianne Vos blindfolded, and thought "bet she could still win races like that!") and checking out the 2012 World Champs course, - but eagle-eyed Bart Hazen, who writes & publishes his pics over at the Daily Peloton, spotted a familiar face we didn't expect to see there - Garmin-Cervélo's Iris Slappendel.

Slappendel is a superb rider, who loves the attacks, cobbles and all things Classics, but has also been part of Cervélo and Garvélo's lead-out train. She had an unfortunate 2011 all round, getting injured early on, and getting caught up in crashes, and of course, now stuck in the unfortunate Garmin-Cervélo situation, where the women riders only found out last week that Garmin-Cervélo is planning to save money by not racing the team in 2012. On the one hand, I'm really happy for Slappendel, if she ends up at Rabo - she's used to riding with Vos and Van Vleuten through her stints on the Dutch National Team - and I'd love to see her take over the Loes Gunnewijk role, of attacking like a loon and stealing the wins in my favourite Classics races. And I know the riders on the team respect her as a formidable rider - one of my favourite things about getting to see an hour of each stage of the Giro Donne was watching how the peloton responds to different riders, and there was one flat stage where Nederland Bloeit were being happy to let HTC-Highroad chase down any attacks..... until Slappendel jumped off the front, and suddenly Marianne Vos popped out of the side of the peloton, and it looked like every member of the Bloesems was on the front, until Slappendel was safely caught. Yeah, that must have been annoying for Iris, but it's one hell of a sign that she's seen as a threat!

Anyway, as I said, I would be happy for Slappendel, but Ben Atkins of Velonation had also spotted it, and did some digging. Here's what he found (head over and read the full article)

"Very clever of you!" Slappendel joked to VeloNation when we told her that we’d seen her in the Rabobank videos. "Unfortunately I can't say anything about it, there is nothing official yet. We are all still waiting on an official something from [Jonathan Vaughters].

"But I can say I am also very disappointed about the way things go," she added. "If Garmin really stops the women's team it's a big loss for womens cycling and a great team gone.

"I let you know more when I know more!"

So it looks like the riders at Garmin are STILL completely in the dark. And it gets worse...

With 2012 fast approaching, most of the team also still seem to be in the dark about their immediate future and that of the team. VeloNation has been in contact with a number of riders, but most are still unwilling, or unable, to comment on the situation.

"We still have not had 100 percent confirmation that the team will be folding," one rider told us, "so really I can't tell you much except that really none of us really have much of a clue as to what is going on."

Some, or all of the team’s nine riders contracted for 2012 – which include former World time trial champion Emma Pooley, and reigning British, Australian and Italian champions Lizzie Armitstead, Alex Rhodes and Noemi Cantele – are actively seeking new teams but, with the new year approaching are finding that most of the best ones are already full.

Read the full article here.
It seems like the riders (and presumably staff) are stuck in a no-win situation. They have heard the same news we have - that Garmin-Cervélo missed the deadline to register for 2012 in the UK (where they have to, given their team make-up), and all signs point to the team being dropped like a hot potato - but they haven't actually been told one way or another what's going on. And as time passes, the situation gets worse and worse for them. And if some riders DO leave, and the team is saved for 2012, it leaves the other riders in a terrible situation, as there won't be enough riders to actually race (well, unless they start adding Pooley to the sprint train/Armitstead to the climbing domestiques...)
It's all a really, really crap situation all round. And the bottom line still stands - while we know women's teams can be precarious, when riders have been signed to a 2-year contract, and the men's team has been signing new riders for 2012, the women had every right to expect to be supported for 2012.