Millar takes Thomas's place at road Worlds
- Friday, 3 September 2010
- 2 Comments
David Millar and Geraint Thomas, Criterium du Dauphine 2010, stage two
British Cycling has announced that David Millar will replace Geraint Thomas in the British squad at the UCI road race World Championships in Melbourne, Australia, on October 3.
Welshman Thomas announced that he was withdrawing from the event on Thursday, citing poor post-Tour de France form. He will now concentrate on his participation for Wales in the individual pursuit (track), road race and road time trial at the Commonwealth Games in India, starting October 5.
Millar was already named in Britain's Worlds squad, riding in the road time trial. He now joins Jeremy Hunt in supporting Mark Cavendish's bid to become world champion in the men's road race.
Millar is currently riding in the Vuelta a Espana for the Garmin-Transitions team. The Scot is one of the few riders to have taken part in all three grand tours this year. He has won a stage of Criterium International, and a stage and the overall in Three Days of De Panne this season.
Millar took first place in the 2003 World Championships time trial, but was subsequently stripped of the result when he admitted to taking banned blood-boosting drug EPO. He was banned for two years from competition, returning to professional competition in 2006. Millar is now a staunch advocate of anti-doping in cycling.
Related links
Thomas withdraws from Britain's Worlds team
David Millar: Rider Profile
Reader comments
Add your commentsSeptember 03 16:54
Mike
Its good to have Dave backing his home nation. I dont hear him complaining of tiredness due to a hard season.
It begs the question where has Bradley Wiggins and the other "stars" of super team Sky gone?
Brad has become the invisible man this season.
After his high profile, big bucks, move from Garmin last year he has done nothing.
Nowhere in the Tour prologue. Bad for a 4k persuit champion.
Nowhere in the Tour mountain stages, and poor in the final TT.
I have seen nothing of him since the Tour. Has he ended his season early?
Just shows what a huge risk it was puting all his eggs in the Tour basket.
Surely he is fit enough for more than one race a year?
I was complaining that we only have three places at the worlds. The way things are going with drop outs we may not be able to fill them.
September 06 13:25
Jon
Mike - I don't think they are doing it because they are lazy and unpatriotic; I'm sure Thomas and Wiggins both have Britain's best interests at heart.
They have both already done a lot to make their country proud. Wiggins is still a GC contender in the Tour if he can get his training right and have bit of luck on his side - it just wasn't his year. He's just shown he's still the best time triallist in Britain anyway.
I know what you mean about Sky though - there was a lot of hype at the start of the season and they didn't have the strength in breadth to back it all up. Rome wasn't built in a day though.