Professional Cycling For the Fans - newbie's questions

i've just seen some photos of the stage 6 and i noticed that Alexander Vinokourov of T-mobile team is wearing a different color jersey from his teammates. why is that?
http://www.cyclingnews.com/photos/2005/tour05/tour056/JD05tdfstg605.jpg
the guy after lance is Alexander Vinokourov

and also in this picture
http://www.cyclingnews.com/photos/2005/tour05/tour056/JD05tdfstg601.jpg

why lance is receiving champagne of his weight? does it happen to every yellow jersey holder before every stage?

thank you all!

1. National Road Race Champion of Kazakhstan

2. Special prize for the yellow jersey wearer in Champagne country. Doesn't happen every day....just a bit of extra publicity.

thank you so much for your quick reply, ed073!

for the first question, is it a privilege to wear a different color jersey or is it a requirement to do so if you are your country's national champion? in other words, do other riders who are national champions have to wear their own color jerseys?

are you from melbourne? it is a nice city to ride bicycle in!

i visited my friend in melbroune this february. he is from mount eliza in mornington peninsula. there are many friendly bikers there:)

Yes...a privelige to wear it, although sometimes riders don't. Indurain was Spanish champ in 1992 (IIRC) but to avoid political drama, only wore Spanish coloured armbands.


Melbourne born and bred baby!!!

you don't have to wear your national colors, but a lot of riders and officials seem to consider it bad taste not to. Example - Dave Z. won the first tt in the giro in his CSC skinsuit when he was the US TT champ. The UCI officials got mad at him and the team and his sponsor made him a stars and stripes skinsuit for the next TT.

thank you! you know so much about bicycle!

here are a few photos i took while i rode in melbourne

http://www.0575bike.com/bbs/attachments/forumid_4/DSC01780_YYeqoJ8Egaki.jpg

http://www.0575bike.com/bbs/attachments/forumid_4/DSC01809-s_N3oPZshi6ZMw.jpg

here are the photos from my friend's cousin in melbourne, who is a recumbent bike fan

http://www.0575bike.com/bbs/attachments/forumid_1/DSCN2984-s1_hDTWCEvlGME4.jpg

http://www.0575bike.com/bbs/attachments/forumid_1/DSCN2992-s1_65FuyO9pHoKs.jpg

you don't have to wear your national colors, but a lot of riders and officials seem to consider it bad taste not to. Example - Dave Z. won the first tt in the giro in his CSC skinsuit when he was the US TT champ. The UCI officials got mad at him and the team and his sponsor made him a stars and stripes skinsuit for the next TT.

There even have been times recently where riders were not sure what they should wear because the rules were unclear. I think it was TT champions or road champions during the TT in the Tour.

And what about Team Time Trials, does an individual TT champion wear the champions jersey for that?

There also have problems recently getting a Tour leader a skinsuit in Yellow or Green as good as his team suit, at least when someone unexpected is leading the race.

Phil said tonight that riders have to wear their national champions jersey.

Keith99 - I'm sure I saw Rogers wearing his world champion TT jersey during the TTT. Not sure if it works the same for national jerseys.

Yes, most(if not all) wore their national jerseys. Reich in the German champions jersey(Gerolsteiner), CA had one guy in a red jersey and another guy in a blue jersey., Quickstep looked really funny with Boonen in the Green jersey and Rodgers in the World Championship jersey, with the other guys in Blue. Cofidis had a guy with a Blue jersey

National champs by country....

http://www.cyclingnews.com/road/2005/natchamps05/?id=summary

This was a big hubub in the MTB Racing world last year. Apparently a lot of the normal winners stopped before the end of their national championship races due to sponsor pressure. Their sponsors told them on no uncertain terms that they were to wear the sponsor's jersey, and not the national jersey, at the world championships. Kind of lessens the integrity of the races, when sponsors force that, in my opinion.

This was a big hubub in the MTB Racing world last year. Apparently a lot of the normal winners stopped before the end of their national championship races due to sponsor pressure. Their sponsors told them on no uncertain terms that they were to wear the sponsor's jersey, and not the national jersey, at the world championships. Kind of lessens the integrity of the races, when sponsors force that, in my opinion.


Same thing happened to Neil Stephen in 1997 or 1998 Aussie road champ, Festina told him it meant bugger all and he had to wear the sponsors kit.