After claiming victory on stage 2 of the Tour of Qatar on Tuesday afternoon and accepting the congratulations of UCI president Brian Cookson at the podium, Alexander Kristoff received further good tidings from the UCI that evening, when its disciplinary commission confirmed that Katusha would not be sanctioned as a team for recording two positive anti-doping tests within the past twelve months.
Kristoff had arrived in Qatar concerned that his Katusha squad would be barred from taking the start in the wake of Eduard Vorganov’s recent positive test for meldonium, and up until the UCI communique landed on Tuesday evening, a possible suspension of up to 45 days lingered over the team.
“Sure, it was relief. It was the decision I was hoping for, for the team, and of course we are happy with the decision, but if they had made another decision, we would also have accepted that,” Kristoff said after completing the stage 3 time trial on Wednesday. “It was all up to the UCI commission to decide this.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Although Kristoff and Katusha had contingency plans for a training camp in mind in the event that the team was prevented from racing in the coming weeks, the Norwegian was adamant that speculation over the UCI disciplinary commission’s eventual decision had not been a distraction, as testified by Tuesday’s sprint victory at Qatar University ahead of Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data).
“I was ready to focus just on my race. I was prepared for that,” Kristoff said. “Ok, if we were told we could not do that, then we would do something else. But now we are here and I didn’t really think too much about it.”
Kristoff lived up to his billing as the pre-race favourite for the Tour of Qatar with a strong showing in the crosswinds on day one and his stage win the following day, but after losing almost a minute to fellow countryman Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data) in Wednesday’s stage 3 time trial, he acknowledged that his hopes of final overall victory have all but disappeared.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest News http://ift.tt/1QtkOHm
No comments:
Post a Comment