Igor Astarloa Askasibar (born March 29, 1976, in Ermua, Basque Country) is a retired cyclist from Spain.
![]() Astarloa at the 2006 Rund um den Henninger Turm | |||||||||||||||
Personal information | |||||||||||||||
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Full name | Igor Astarloa Askasibar | ||||||||||||||
Born | Ermua, Spain | March 29, 1976||||||||||||||
Height | 1.70 m (5 ft 7 in) [1] | ||||||||||||||
Weight | 67 kg (148 lb) [2] | ||||||||||||||
Team information | |||||||||||||||
Discipline | Road | ||||||||||||||
Role | Rider (retired) | ||||||||||||||
Rider type | Classics specialist | ||||||||||||||
Professional teams | |||||||||||||||
2000–2001 | Mercatone Uno–Albacom | ||||||||||||||
2002–2003 | Saeco–Longoni Sport | ||||||||||||||
2004 | Cofidis (until April) | ||||||||||||||
2004 | Lampre (from May) | ||||||||||||||
2005–2006 | Barloworld | ||||||||||||||
2007–2008 | Team Milram | ||||||||||||||
2009 | Amica Chips-Knauf | ||||||||||||||
Major wins | |||||||||||||||
One-day races and Classics | |||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Career
editAstarloa turned professional with the Italian cycling team Mercatone Uno and enjoyed his best season in 2003 with team Saeco when he won the Flèche Wallonne and the road race title at the World Cycling Championships at Hamilton, Canada. The following year, he joined Cofidis, but when the team temporarily stopped racing due to a doping scandal, he was released to join Lampre.[3] During the 2006 transfer season it was announced that he was to leave Team Barloworld, the Continental Circuit team for which Astarloa had ridden for the last several years, and join Team Milram, a member of the UCI ProTour.
Team Milram terminated its contract with Astarloa in May 2008 following disclosures that he had shown "irregular blood values", as reported by Focus magazine.[4] He joined the Amica Chips-Knauf team, which folded in May 2009. Soon after, in June 2009, Astarloa was one of the first five riders to fall foul of the Union Cycliste International's new biological passport system, introduced to combat doping by competitive cyclists. Astarloa was unable to secure another contract that season, and retired in January 2010.[5]
Doping conviction
editOn 1 December 2010, the Union Cycliste International announced that the Spanish Cycling Federation’s Disciplinary Commission had handed down a two-year suspension and a €35,000 fine to Igor Astarloa. According to Cyclingnews.com, Astarloa's blood samples had come under considerable scrutiny prior to the events of 2008-09 and in the wake of his 2003 world championships victory, although he was never punished for any infraction.[6]
Major results
edit- 1999
- 4th Gran Premio della Liberazione
- 2000
- 9th Road race, National Road Championships
- 9th Gran Premio della Costa Etruschi
- 2001
- 1st GP Primavera
- 5th GP Miguel Induráin
- 6th Clásica de Almería
- 7th HEW Cyclassics
- 2002
- 1st Overall Brixia Tour
- 1st Stage 2a
- 2nd Clásica de San Sebastián
- 2nd HEW Cyclassics
- 2nd Japan Cup
- 7th Paris–Tours
- 2003
- 1st Road race, UCI Road World Championships
- 1st La Flèche Wallonne
- 1st Stage 3 Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana
- 3rd Rund um den Henninger Turm
- 4th HEW Cyclassics
- 10th Amstel Gold Race
- 2004
- 2nd GP Industria & Artigianato di Larciano
- 3rd HEW Cyclassics
- 4th Overall Tirreno–Adriatico
- 6th Milan–San Remo
- 9th Overall Brixia Tour
- 2005
- Vuelta a Burgos
- 4th Overall Brixia Tour
- 5th Paris–Brussels
- 6th Coppa Placci
- 7th Gran Premio de Llodio
- 10th Clásica de San Sebastián
- 2006
- 1st Milano–Torino
- 6th Overall Critérium International
- 8th Gran Premio di Chiasso
Grand Tour general classification results timeline
editGrand Tour | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Giro d'Italia | — | 53 | — | 55 | — | — | — | DNF |
Tour de France | Has not contested during his career | |||||||
Vuelta a España | DNF | 63 | DNF | DNF | — | — | — | — |
— | Did not compete |
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DNF | Did not finish |
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ "Team Milram". Archived from the original on 2007-11-06.
- ^ "Team Milram". Archived from the original on 2007-11-06.
- ^ "Weltmeister Astarloa wechselt zu Lampre". Rheinische Post (in German). 24 April 2004. Retrieved 1 October 2019.
- ^ Milram terminates Astarloa's contract
- ^ Astarloa retires with good and bad memories
- ^ "Astarloa suspended and fined for UCI biological passport infraction". December 2010.
External links
edit- Igor Astarloa at Cycling Archives