Aussie Allan Davis is unhappy with team support at Astana. So, what’s the surprise here?
Davis acts like he is somehow shocked, like he woke up one morning and the sky was red instead of blue, that 2 plus 2 didn’t equal 4. He’s actually stunned and bitter and frustrated.
Think Allen, think. This was a classic bonehead, desperately horrible decision going to Astana despite all the bad news coming out of that team when Johan Bruyneel packed up every decent rider but Alberto Contador and headed to Radio Shack. His quotes about Astana’s management style were instant classics. We believe ungrateful and meddling and cheap were the operative key words.
Still one year later, Allan Davis chose to stay against all logic and the return of Alexander Vinokourov and the final, definitive departure of Contador. On simple math alone, Davis had an obvious problem. This is one of those fundamental misjudgments you can’t miss even with a dead seeing-eye dog.
If you’re in a Kazakh team and every rider is a Kazakh but you, hmmm … problems arise, you’re odd man out, you’re totally beyond UCI help, you’re royally screwed. The only mystery here is why Davis stayed and that money rational is looking rather foolish right now.
What, exactly, was he expecting? Eight Frenchmen, Italians, Belgians, Martians and a foreign sprinter. That train is not happening and nobody is breaking wind for you all day. Wake up, Mr. Davis.
A few back-up questions for Davis that maybe should have been posed before the contract signature. Did you grow up in the Kazakh capital city of Almaty, Petropavl or Shymkent? Do you like to eat beshbarmak and are you partial to the national beverage, which consists of fermented mare’s milk? Are you, like 70% of the Kazahk population, a practicing muslim? Do you spend your evenings, post-race, post-massage, listening to the plaintiff sounds of the two stringed Kobyzz?
What? No, seriously?
Well, then cash the Kazahk checks and keep your mouth shut and find a new team for next season. Astana is not riding for anyone in Turkey who isn’t a Kazakh. Any expectations to the contrary were insane from the git-go.
AD tell those goat hearding Kazahk mutha fuggers to go play their kobyzzes . . . and while you're at it, bitch-slap that annoying little wanna-be GC rider blonde tuurd and tell him to go home to his mummy.
You got it, man. Consider it done. Matt
True story- ADs brother (when contracted to Astana before Allan joined) only knew about the team training camp when he read it on cycling news. Needless to say didn't race much that year!
That's not surprising given everything I've read about the way they run the operation. Matt
Its like complaining you can never be a race leader on US Postal during the Armstrong days, its rigged and they fell for the it. Time to bail was when everyone else did and the Kazaks were retuning to re-take the team.
Exactly right. But I think Davis figured he'd profit from the vacuum left by the exodus. Wrong, terribly wrong. Matt