May 4, 2007 — Following Symmetrics announcement that they are officially withdrawing all Symmetrics riders from the Canadian national team heading to Venezuela for the 2007 Pan Am Road Championships (click here for that press released) we contacted Kris Westwood, the Canadian Cycling Association’s director of high performance programs for his comments.

What’s the CCA’s reaction to Symmetrics’ decision to withdraw its riders and did you see it coming?
Kevin had made it pretty clear from the outset that he wanted to have a team that would work well to support Svein Tuft. That’s something the committee and myself agreed with.

I am disappointed that his reaction to withdraw the team is based on the inclusion of a couple of riders that he’s not comfortable having on the team. It’s disappointing because I felt that we had a very competitive team set up and ready to go, and now I don’t feel we’re going to be competitive at that event.

Does this simply boil down to Charles Dionne being named to the team?
Kevin has is own opinion of Charles and my understanding was he was prepared to have his athletes there if Charles was there, but he wasn’t prepared to have his team there with two Quebec athletes in the selection, is my understanding of his position.

What now? Is there an opportunity to work with Symmetrics and get something worked out before the Pan Ams?
The discussions have already happened on whether or not there is movement on this, and unfortunately there doesn’t appear to be.

Are there long-term ramifications from something like this?
I think it may lead to reviewing the way teams are selected, but what it boils down to is our relationship to private teams. Selection is intended to be something that is available to all athletes based on their merits. So whether the CCA and the high performance committee are exercising their right to select the athletes they feel are competitive, or whether they allow the selection to be manipulated based on the considerations of a private individual — regardless of whether that individual is offering financial assistance or not — where do you draw the line on that?

That’s the difficult question to answer because on the one hand we are the national team, but on the other hand we’re not out there earning the points and investing the big dollars in road cycling because we simply don’t have the resources to do so. Symmetrics has earned the vast majority of Canada’s points the last couple of years and they’ve invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in men’s road cycling.

The CCA can’t because our funding from Sport Canada does not support road cycling because of the priorities on Olympic medal chances etcetera. I certainly respect the investment Symmetrics and Kevin have made in the sport and I understand his position, but at the same time, we can’t just go out and hand over selections to a team when there’s a selection process in place. Do we have a partnership or do we just hand things over, or do we try to make independent decisions? These are all things that will be discussed over the next little while.

How was the team, and Charles Dionne for example, selected?
If you look at the selection criteria there’s an automatic spot for the top rider on the America Tour ranking and that was Svein Tuft. Then there was a spot for a committee choice. That’s an athlete the high performance committee can choose based on their evaluation of his performance potential. In the case of Charles, he has come off an injury, but he has been gradually riding back into form.

That seems to be resolved and the confirmation of that was his couple of top 10s in Georgia. Based on the profile of the course and the possibility there may be a sprint finish, it was felt it would be logical to have a sprinter on the team, and Charles is the only real sprint specialist that was available. Dominique Rollin, Mark Walters and Ryder Hesjedal were all contacted before the selection were began, but they weren’t available.

And you felt Dionne could work to compliment Tuft?
We were going in with a core tactic to support Svein and an ace up our sleeve with Charles there for the finish. It’s going to be a very aggressive race and a highly team-oriented race and that’s why a large proportion of the team was selected around supporting Svein. That would give us a two-prong strategy.

Do you feel Dionne still has a chance of being competitive with a smaller team around him?
He still has a shot, as he would any time, but with fewer athletes around him to back him up and play other tactical cards, it’s a lot more of a shot in the dark. It’s one thing to be a great sprinter, but if you’re only sprinting for 15th place, it doesn’t get you any further forward. Having a team of four or five riders based around Charles gives us a much narrower range of strategic possibilities than having a full team of 10 riders.