Nicolas Portal
Nicolas Portal (23 April 1979 – 3 March 2020) was a French directeur sportif and professional road bicycle racer. He was born in Auch, France. He missed much of the 2009 season because of problems with cardiac arrhythmia and retired as a professional cyclist following the 2010 season. He stayed with his final professional team, Team Sky, as a manager from the 2011 season. Following the retirement of Sean Yates, Portal was appointed lead ''directeur sportif'' of Team Sky for 2013. He died of a heart attack on 3 March 2020, aged 40. Professional career Portal was born on 23 April 1979 in Auch, France. His father was a quarry manager and his mother worked as a medical secretary. He started cycling as a mountain biker and was successful at youth and under-23 levels in the late 1990s, before switching to road cycling. He rode as a ''stagiaire'' with at the end of 2001, having been recommended to team manager Vincent Lavenu by a mutual friend. Portal then turned professional with ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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2011 Giro D'Italia
The 2011 Giro d'Italia was the 94th Giro d'Italia, one of cycling's Grand Tours. The race started on 7 May with a team time trial in Turin to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Italian unification, when the city served as the first capital of the single state. The route was one of the most difficult in the modern history of the race, with substantial criticism that it was simply too hard for a three-week-long race. Of the seven stages categorized as 'high mountain', six had summit arrivals, highlighted by the three stages before the second rest day ending at Grossglockner in Austria, the exceptionally steep Monte Zoncolan, and a tall and steep peak near the Fascia Valley in Gardeccia. There was also, for the fifth consecutive Giro, a climbing time trial, this one to the Nevegal. Of the race's 18 mass-start stages, only three ended with the majority of the field together at the front of the race. In the third stage, rider Wouter Weylandt crashed coming down the Passo del Bocc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Vincent Lavenu
Vincent Lavenu (born 12 January 1956) is a French former professional road bicycle racer and is currently the general manager of UCI WorldTeam . Professional career Born in Briançon, Hautes-Alpes, Lavenu had been competing as an amateur in France for the Parisian amateur team La-Motte-Servolex and had been in contact with Jean-Pierre Danguillaume of the COOP-Mercier team and Jean de Gribaldy of Skil Sem about becoming a professional, but it was not until the autumn of 1982 when Pierre Rivory and Michel Nédélec turned the elite amateur team Pélussin into a professional team that they contacted Lavenu with the offer of becoming professional. Lavenu was 27 years of age when he became professional with the Union cycliste Saint Étienne Pélussin team in 1983. As a first year professional, he crashed in the Dauphiné Liberé and spent 8 days in hospital after which he could only compete in several races at the end of the season. The Saint Etienne Pelussin team did not obtain the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cyrille Guimard
Cyrille Guimard (born 20 January 1947) is a French former professional road racing cyclist who became a directeur sportif and television commentator. Three of his riders, Bernard Hinault, Laurent Fignon, and Lucien Van Impe, won the Tour de France. Another of his protégés, Greg LeMond, described him as "the best (coach) in the world" and "the best coach I ever had". He has been described by cycling journalist William Fotheringham as the greatest directeur sportif in the history of the Tour. Riding career Born in Bouguenais, Loire-Atlantique, Guimard rode as a junior, an amateur and a professional, on the road, track and in cyclo-cross. He was national champion in all three forms: road in 1967 as an amateur, track sprint in 1970 and cyclo-cross in 1976. The riders ahead of him in the 1970 and 1971 professional road championships were disqualified and the titles not given. He said: "After those in front of me were disqualified for failing the drugs test, the federation never ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Egan Bernal
Egan Arley Bernal Gómez (born 13 January 1997) is a Colombian cyclist who rides for UCI WorldTeam . In 2019 he won the Tour de France, becoming the first Latin American rider to do so, and the youngest winner since 1909. At the 2021 Giro d'Italia, Bernal took his second Grand Tour win. Early life Bernal was born in Bogotá, Colombia, and raised in Zipaquirá. He is the oldest child of Germán, an employee at the Salt Cathedral, and Flor, a flower factory worker. His father had been a keen amateur cyclist, and he started riding on a second hand bicycle at age five. At nine, against his father's wishes, he entered and easily won a race in his home town, the prize for which included a training scholarship. He studied one semester at Universidad de la Sabana in Chia, Colombia. He initially focused on and excelled at mountain biking, winning races in Brazil, Costa Rica, and the United States, and getting both silver (2014) and bronze (2015) in the UCI Mountain Bike World Champion ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Vuelta A España
The Vuelta a España (; en, Tour of Spain) is an annual multi-stage bicycle race primarily held in Spain, while also occasionally making passes through nearby countries. Inspired by the success of the Tour de France and the Giro d'Italia, the race was first organised in 1935. The race was prevented from being run by the Spanish Civil War and World War II in the early years of its existence; however, the race has been held annually since 1955. As the Vuelta gained prestige and popularity the race was lengthened and its reach began to extend all around the globe. Since 1979, the event has been staged and managed by Unipublic, until in 2014, when the Amaury Sport Organisation acquired control. Since then, they have been working together. The peloton expanded from a primarily Spanish participation to include riders from all over the world. The Vuelta is a UCI World Tour event, which means that the teams that compete in the race are mostly UCI WorldTeams, with the exception of the w ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dave Brailsford
Sir David John Brailsford (born 29 February 1964) is a British cycling coach. He was formerly performance director of British Cycling and is currently general manager of UCI WorldTeam . Early life Brailsford was born in Shardlow, Derbyshire, and moved as a toddler with his parents and siblings to Deiniolen, near Caernarfon in Wales: He attended Ysgol Deiniolen and Ysgol Brynrefail, and learned Welsh. In 1984 he gave up his job as an apprentice draughtsman with the local highways department to travel to France, where he raced for four years as a sponsored amateur for a team based in Saint-Étienne. He has described his years in France as a time of autodidacticism: He returned in 1988 to study for a degree in Sport and Exercise Sciences and Psychology at Chester College of Higher Education (then an affiliated college of the University of Liverpool, now the University of Chester) and then an MBA at Sheffield Hallam University. Career Early career Brailsford spent some of h ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sébastien Portal
Sébastien Portal (born June 4, 1982 in Auch) is a French professional road bicycle racer. He is the brother of the late racing cyclist and ''directeur sportif A ''directeur sportif'' (French for sporting director, although the original French term is often used in English-language media; plural ''directeurs sportifs'') is a person directing a cycling team during a road bicycle racing event. It is se ...'' Nicolas Portal. References External links * French male cyclists 1982 births Living people People from Auch Sportspeople from Gers Cyclists from Occitania (administrative region) {{France-cycling-bio-1980s-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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2006 Tour De France
The 2006 Tour de France was the 93rd edition of the Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tours. It took place between the 1st and the 23rd of July. It was won by Óscar Pereiro following the disqualification of Floyd Landis. Due to the United States Anti-Doping Agency announcing on August 24, 2012, that they had disqualified Lance Armstrong, a former teammate of Landis, from all of his results since August 1, 1998, including his seven Tour de France titles from 1999 to 2005, this is also the first Tour to have an overall winner since 1998. By terms of margin of victory the 2006 Tour was the 3rd closest of all time. The Tour began with a prologue in Strasbourg, on the French-German border, and ended on Sunday 23 July in Paris. The distance of the course (run counterclockwise around France) was . The race was the third fastest in average speed. Along the way, the cyclists passed through six different countries including France, The Netherlands (a stop at Valkenburg in Stage ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Óscar Pereiro
Óscar Pereiro SÃo (; born 3 August 1977) is a Spanish former professional road bicycle racer. Pereiro was declared the winner of the 2006 Tour de France, after the original winner Floyd Landis was disqualified for failing a doping test after his stage 17 victory. Pereiro is a former member of Porta da Ravessa (2000 to 2001), Phonak Hearing Systems (2002 to 2005), (2006 to 2009), and the cycling team (2010). After retiring from cycling in 2010, Pereiro joined his local part-time football club Coruxo FC of the Segunda División B. Early career Pereiro placed tenth in the 2004 Tour de France, 22 minutes 54 seconds behind original winner Lance Armstrong, who was subsequently disqualified. He was awarded the Most Aggressive Rider Award in the 2005 Tour de France after powering the winning breakaways in Stages 15, 16 and 19. He was the Stage 16 winner - just edging out Spain's Xabier Zandio, Italy's Eddy Mazzoleni and Australia's Cadel Evans. His efforts on Stage 15, the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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2003 Tour De France
The 2003 Tour de France was a multiple stage bicycle race held from 5 to 27 July, and the 90th edition of the Tour de France. It has no overall winner—although American cyclist Lance Armstrong originally won the event, the United States Anti-Doping Agency announced in August 2012 that they had disqualified Armstrong from all his results since 1998, including his seven Tour de France wins from 1999 to 2005; the Union Cycliste Internationale has confirmed this verdict. The event started and ended in Paris, covering proceeding clockwise in twenty stages around France, including six major mountain stages. Due to the centennial celebration, this edition of the tour was raced entirely in France and did not enter neighboring countries. In the centenary year of the race the route recreated, in part, that of 1903. There was a special ''Centenaire Classement'' prize for the best-placed in each of the six stage finishes which match the 1903 tour - Lyon, Marseille, Toulouse, Bordeaux, N ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tour De France
The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage bicycle race primarily held in France, while also occasionally passing through nearby countries. Like the other Grand Tours (the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a España), it consists of 21 stages, each a day long, over the course of 23 days, coinciding with the Bastille Day holiday. It is the oldest of the Grand Tours and generally considered the most prestigious. The race was first organized in 1903 to increase sales for the newspaper '' L'Auto'' and is currently run by the Amaury Sport Organisation. The race has been held annually since its first edition in 1903 except when it was stopped for the two World Wars. As the Tour gained prominence and popularity, the race was lengthened and its reach began to extend around the globe. Participation expanded from a primarily French field as more riders from all over the world began to participate in the race each year. The Tour is a UCI World Tour event, which means that th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |