T-Mobile Team

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Presentation of the 2006 team in Mallorca. Photo: T-Mobile Team

T-Mobile Team (UCI Team Code: TMO) is a professional cycling team competing in international road bicycle races. It carries, like many road cycling teams, the name of its owners and chief sponsor - the T-Mobile company. The team participates in many editions of the annual Grand Tours of cycling, such as the Tour de France and the Giro d'Italia. Since 2005, the team has been one of 20 teams that compete in the new UCI ProTour.

The team was founded in 1991 as Team Telekom, sponsored by T-Mobile's corporate parent Deutsche Telekom - but as of 2004 their name changed to the current T-Mobile Team. It contains a total of 29 riders, 9 physiotherapists or nurses, 9 mechanics and service persons, and has 22 partners. The team is under the management of Olaf Ludwig and Eddy Vandenhecke; it has the spokesperson Luuc Eisenga; and is under the sports directors Mario Kummer, Frans van Looy, Brian Holm, and Giovanni Fidanza.

Contents

1 History
2 Film: Hell on Wheels
3 Footnotes
4 External links

History

Founded as Team Telekom in 1991 with Walter Godefroot the team manager, the team soon became an important presence on the international cycling stage. In 1994, the German sprinter Erik Zabel won the first Cycling World Cup victory in the history of the team, the Paris-Tours. A year later, in 1995, Zabel won two stages in the 1995 Tour de France.

The next two years saw the international breakthrough of the team. Godefroot brought in Danish rider Bjarne Riis, the third place finisher of the 1995 Tour, and he went on to win the 1996 Tour de France, with the then 22-year old German support rider Jan Ullrich finishing in second place. The 1997 Tour de France saw the emergence of Ullrich as he won the race with support from Riis, who in turn had won the World Cup race Amstel Gold Race earlier in 1997. Team Telekom also won the team classification, as the overall strongest team of the 1997 Tour.

In both 1997 and 1998, Zabel won the Milan-Sanremo, while Ullrich finished second in the 1998 Tour de France. Finishing second once more in the 1999 Tour de France, Ullrich went on to win the 1999 Vuelta a España. The next year, Zabel won the overall World Cup victory, having won the Milan-Sanremo and Amstel Gold Race. In 2001, Zabel won his fourth Milan-Sanremo win. Ullrich came in second in the 2001 Tour de France, while Zabel won six stages combined in the 2001 Tour and Vuelta. Kazakh rider Alexandre Vinokourov won the Paris-Nice stage race in 2002, a feat he would duplicate in 2003, also winning the Amstel Gold Race and Tour de Suisse that year. As Ullrich left the team to form Team Bianchi in 2003, Vinokourov became team leader for the 2003 Tour de France. He finished in third place, just below the second placed Ullrich. Zabel won the 2003 Paris-Tours, while Italian rider Daniele Nardello took the Championship of Zürich.

From 2004, the team changed its name to T-Mobile. Jan Ullrich returned to the team, and raced the 2004 Tour de France as team leader, while Vinokourov did not ride the Tour de France for the team. Jan Ullrich finished fourth, while Andreas Klöden was the best placed rider of the team in second place. T-Mobile Team won the team classification, as the overall strongest team of the 2004 Tour. In the spring season of 2005, Vinokourov won the Liege-Bastogne-Liege classic race. Ullrich, as the team leader, finished 3rd overall in the 2005 Tour de France. Alexandre Vinokourov rode in support, and finished fifth as he won two stages, including the final stage on the Champs-Elysees. Italian rider Giuseppe Guerini also won a stage and T-Mobile Team matched their 2004 feat by once again winning the team classification in 2005.

In July 2005, during the 2005 Tour, Vinokourov's contract was running out and speculation was abundant if he was to stay with T-Mobile. With four days left of the 2005 Tour, he made an announcement that he would leave the team to pursue his own chances of winning the Tour de France as a team captain[Vinokourov leaves T-Mobile Team], T-Mobile-Team.com, July 20, 2005 and after the Tour he joined the Liberty Seguros team.[Vinokourov to Liberty Seguros], T-Mobile-Team.com, July 26, 2005 After 13 years with Team Telekom and T-Mobile Team, Erik Zabel also left in 2005 to ride for the newly formed Team Milram.[Zabel and Petacchi team up for Milram], T-Mobile-Team.com, September 23, 2005 Before the 2006 season, Walter Godefroot stepped down and Olaf Ludwig became the new T-Mobile team manager.

In the most controversial scandal since the 1998 tour, thirteen riders were expelled from the 2006 Tour de France stemming from a Spanish doping scandal, on the eve of Strasbourg prologue to the 93rd edition. Jan Ullrich, on of the favourites to win the race, was among those excluded from the Tour. Another T-Mobile rider, Oscar Sevilla, was also expelled, leaving the team starting with only seven riders.

On 9 July, the team announced the sacking its sporting director Rudy Pevenage for his implication with former Tour de France winner Jan Ullrich in a Spanish blood-doping scandal. "The contract linking T-Mobile to Pevenage has been retrospectively stopped on 30 June," the team's general manager, Olaf Ludwig, said.["T-Mobile sack team boss Pevenage" BBC Sport 9 July 2006]

Film: Hell on Wheels

In 2005 a film titled Hell on Wheels was released. It is a record of the 100th anniversary (but only the 90th running because of World War I and World War II) of the Tour de France in 2003 from the perspective of the then-Team Telekom.[Blood, sweat and gears], The Sydney Morning Herald, May 27, 2005

Footnotes

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

[Special]

[T-Mobile Team] official website
[T-Mobile Team] at usacycling.org
[Magenta Reign] from Giant Bicycles

Members of T-Mobile Team

Manager

Walter Godefroot

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