As the deadline approaches for his team to secure Continental status for 2011, Michael Rasmussen and the management behind the Christina Racing team have signed former Saxo Bank team-mate Michael Blaudzun to act as a directeur sportif with the squad.
Blaudzun competed as a professional between 1995 and 2008, lining out with Rabobank and Telecom in the early part of his career and then spending the final ten seasons with Bjarne Riis’s squad. Rasmussen was a Team Saxo Bank rider for one season, 2002, and worked alongside his compatriot then.
Blaudzun brings experience of his racing days to the team, having been twice Danish road race champion and thrice winner of the time trial title. He also finished second overall in the 2005 Tour of Britain, losing out to Nick Nuyens by just two seconds.
More recently, he has been acting as a directeur sportif for the Team Designa Kitchen team, which stopped at the end of this season. The same sponsor will be one of the backers of Rasmussen’s team. The Danish climber’s own salary is being paid by the watch designer Christina Hembo (pictured), after whom the team is named.
Rasmussen had been hoping to return to the ProTeam ranks in 2011, but months of discussions with Riis failed to translate into a deal.
Unlike Ivan Basso, Alexandre Vinokourov and others, the double Tour de France King of the Mountains winner has experienced difficulties in getting his career fully back on track after a doping suspension. He accepts that he is extremely unlikely to be able to ride the Tour de France again, but aims to return to the race after the end of his career as the manager of his own team.