Without a doubt this last week has provided some of the biggest team news coming out of Europe in quite awhile. Although we first reported on the CSC/Specialized connection weeks ago, it is only now starting to creep its way towards officialdom. Beyond that pairing of course comes news that Giant and Rabobank have teamed...which is big news as much for them getting together as it is for who Giant left behind. Since July, Team Columbia has become one of the most talked about & celebrated teams on the planet and the news that Scott Bicycles is the new bike sponsor came as a major surprise. We snuck in a quick call to Scott's U.S. honcho, Scott Montgomery to find out how it all happened.  




RBA: First of all, congratulations on the new team.
Scott:  Yeah, thanks. We are totally fired up and excited to have one of the world's top elite teams riding Scott bikes.

RBA: How did the deal come about?
Scott: It reallly all started after Ricco's positive test in the Tour. That really put us on notice about Sanier and the make-up of that team. We realized that the value of our sponsorship deal would start to diminish as the team was disallowed from competing in certain events. Internally, the prospect of that happening was a major concern. Once they stop getting invited to the big races the sponsorship money often decreases which affects running the team and holding on to good riders. We made the decision to follow through with our contract  through the 2008 season, but also started exploring other options and as we looked at the 18 teams of any note, we knew that two were up for contract renewals; CSC and Columbia.

RBA: How was the decision made between those two teams?
Scott: We had been bidding on the CSC team, but eventually lost out on that to Specialized. The thing that made us withdraw from CSC however was finding out that Giant was not going to re-new with Columbia. I think that was the bigger impact on our decision making process and that was not only because of their recent results, but because of Bob Stapleton's presence there. I think everyone would agree that what Bob has done in the last year with his team, and especially in taking the lead on running a clean team, has been impressive. I've known Bob for awhile because he and I worked together when he was running the T-Mobile women's squad and I worked at Cannondale who supplied the bikes. And now, with Columbia on board as the title sponsor through 2010 the team has the support and structure it needs to acheive even greater success.

RBA: So what's your sense of what the immediate future will bring?
Scott: Work, lots of work! But, just as I had known from our previous realtionship, Bob is exceptionally organized and we've already got a handle on team camps, equipment needs and marketing opportunities. Bob is the sort of team owner that provides an immediate sense of value for a financial commitment of this size.
 

RBA: Speaking of the financial commitment, what's in store on the bike side of things?
Scott: Lot's of bikes. It's huge. It's ginormous. Not only are we supplying bikes for the European team, but also for his women's team. Between the two squads we need to supply bikes for a total of 41 riders and trust me, the riders get more than one bike! It's crazy and ridiculous, but it's what we need to do to guarantee that the riders have the best support posible to compete at that level. Scott is dedicated to being  a top brand worldwide and it goes hand in hand to be associated with a top team. I have to say that our sales success in America is key in giving us the confidence necessary to make this investment. You can expect to see them riding some version of our Addict and of course the Plasma II TT bike.