Cancellara rejoins Schlecks, Voigt, etc

After much speculation, a little strategic maneuvering, and then a final parting of ways Swiss time trial champion Fabian Cancellara has found a new home.   And the new home looks a lot like the old home.  Fabian has followed the Schlecks, Voigt, O’Grady and others to the new Luxembourg Team.  By my count, this makes him the 25th (and final) member of the team.    The timing leads to questions about whether or not Cancellara was waiting to be sure the team received their ProTour license – which in fact they did.

A news item posted to Cancellara’s website (www.fabiancancellara.com) stated:

Fabian Cancellara signs with Luxembourg Pro Cycling Project, which also includes the Schleck brothers belong to a three-year contract. (sic – Google translation for the original German post)

The Director Sportif of the new Luxembourg team, Kim Anderson, has stated that the signing of Fabian is a recent development.  According to a story in the Danish news publication Ekstra Bladet (English translation):

“No, it’s only just recently that everything fell into place. It was not something we had anticipated from the start. He had a contract,” said Kim Andersen

The statement possibly adds credence to the idea that Cancellara was waiting on ProTour status confirmation for the team before signing.

Exstra Bladet is the same publication that claimed to have “exclusive information” (English translation) about Fabian signing as far back as September 20th.