Huub-Wattbike and Beat teams hit back at radical UCI track reforms
The British-based squad Huub-Wattbike and the Dutch Beat Cycling Team have hit back at the UCI's decision to shake-up track racing and only allow national teams to compete in the prestigious World Cup events, claiming they will be cut out of major racing.
In an open letter, published on Monday and addressed to the UCI president David Lappartient, the Huub-Wattbike team said the changes "have severe implications for us and will ultimately kill off the existence of trade teams completely," describing the reforms as "brutally destructive for the sport we know and love."
The Beat Cycling Team launched a petition against the changes and warned they "investigate the legal base for these measures and are of the opinion that effectively canceling our team can under no circumstances be done without proper compensation for our damages."
They explained they don't specifically seek compensation but simply want "to be able to continue to operate our UCI track team as we do today."
Former Olympian and five-time world champion Theo Bos is part of the Beat team, and his teammate Matthijs Buchli won the Keirin event at the World Cup event in London in December.
The Huub-Wattbike team has embarrassed some leading nations in pursuit events in recent years, using technology and aerodynamics to eke out every hundredth of a second. The team won a silver medal in the Milton round of the World Cup in Canada, with the USA's Ashton Lambie joining the team for the Berlin event.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com