ARMSTRONG TO START COMEBACK AT TOUR DOWN UNDER

Lance Armstrong will make his comeback to professional cycle racing at next January's Tour Down Under, the ProTour stage race based in South Australia.

The announcement came from the office of South Australia Premier Mike Rann, and was made ahead of the seven-time Tour de France winner's official announcement in New York this afternoon.

?Lance participating in the Tour Down Under will mean the biggest influx of overseas and interstate visitors to any sporting event in South Australia?s history," said Rann.

?Attracting world cycling icon Lance Armstrong to begin his comeback in South Australia is a major coup for the State and will place the Tour Down Under front and centre of the world professional cycling events."

Armstrong's appearance at the Australia event underlines his intention to take the message of his cancer charity, Livestrong, to a global audience.

The Tour Down Under is the first event on the ProTour world cycling calendar and will be held in South Australia from January 18-25, 2009.

We will be covering Lance Armstrong's public announcement in full on www.cyclingweekly.com at approximately 5pm British time.