Mr Nibali, what was it that first attracted you to the multi-million euro deal with Astana ?
There was a great interview on the cycling podcast earlier in the year (sorry can’t find the link) with Astana’s PR guy – a superb raconteur explaining the basis behind the whole Astana project. Now admittedly he was a real master of spin etc, but the way he put was it was part of a great plan to use Kazakhstan’s immense oil wealth to develop the whole country (Norwegian style). It was always the powerhouse of soviet cycling, but now a lot of ex-cyclists have ending up running businesses and they are using it to promote the Astana Expo in 2017.
Well, they certainly got a lot of people talking about Astana !
He also explained the Kazak attitude to cheating is somewhat different to the Europeans – don’t get caught, but if you do you serve your time and then the slate is clean. None of this hairshirt, forgive me malarkey.
Nibbles win is tarnished, but at the same time he does appear to have a team within a team and kept the kazaks at arms length – apparently he didn’t want Iglinsky in his tour squad. But his choice of doctor seems very odd for someone who professes to be Mr Clean. Unless Astana gets kicked out, it looks like he hasn’t much choice other than to see out his contract. But if he signs the extension he’s been offered, his credibility will be in tatters.