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Three major tours leave Pro-Tour
PARIS, France -- Professional cycling is set for a power struggle after the organizers of the Tour de France, the Giro d'Italia and the Tour of Spain announced on Friday that they had broken away from the UCI Pro-Tour for next season. The three major tours will instead offer teams a bonus incentive of 100,000 euros each ($117,850) for competing in all three of their races. World governing body, the UCI, were planning to run a 25-race Pro-Tour format in 2006. But the organizers of the three major tours told a joint news conference in Paris they had taken the decision to separate from the Pro-Tour because the UCI had failed to propose a global agreement. The Pro-Tour, which only started last season and was the brainchild of former UCI president Hein Verbruggen, has been dogged by controversy from its inception. It was designed to bring order to the packed cycling calendar and encourage top riders to compete all year rather than select just a few races. But it was seen as a challenge to the established three-week tours in France, Spain and Italy, who openly dissented in many aspects of the organization and delivery. Patrice Clerc, president of Tour de France organisers ASO, said the three tours would still be on the world calendar next year, although not with the Pro-Tour label. But in a clear challenge to the UCI, he added that a separate calendar with the three tours and maybe one new event could see the light in 2007. "We are thinking about re-launching the Trophee des Grands Tours set up during the 1980s. The prize money would be two million euros," he said. 
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