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My thoughts exactly - teams must be able to retain their points through an ownership change. I just assumed that was the whole point of having the teams retain the points in the first place - to make it more financially compelling to field one.
Chris Kilmurray also talks about Andreas Kolb in this clip. Both are apparently going to Orbea for 2026.
With talk of Kolb also going to Orbea I'm thinking it's probably likely that there'll be a factory team running as well as FMD, much like the Canyon set up when FMD were on their bikes.
I think Chris is trolling us, since he is working for Orbea.
Vali won’t be on Orbea
The age old thing of riders not renewing don’t tag their teams
Let’s start with Charlie Hatton off Atherton
Sounds like Orbea may have taken the opportunity to buy the full program off of YT? They had a brand new team truck and everything. Might have been a good deal if they were under pressure to sell out
That could be feasible... Having a second team that will already have a spot at the races isn't that crazy... Especially when you look at the riders on the current YT team..
Logistically would make sense - one truck in the USA, one in the EU.
Except that both of those teams are currently based in Europe.. I haven't really seen Orbea with much of a presence on the US DH scene.. Maybe that changes as the US DH scene seems to be on the upswing?
dear americans: please stop thinking you are the middle of the world, especially with THAT government.
why in hell do you think it makes sense to own a race truck in america with so little races!?
I'm British 🤣🤣🤣
Here's my logic - USDH is growing, then there's Canada too, plus of course other series seem to be growing (at least from what I can see from media). So if there's a truck going for a song as part of a fire sale, it makes sense - and nothing to prevent them flipping it a year down the line for more than they paid or even the same amount, meaning thry had a year's worth of pit truck & impressiv looking race presence FOC at worst.
I dunno, even if you get a deal you still have to maintain it, keep it roadworthy and store it for the majority of the year. Maybe it'll change, but I don't see enough money flying around in the industry for that to be justifiable right now.
It's look more like they were jocking in front of the camera
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But it confirms that there are rumors rumors about the YT team.
That could maybe work if the company purchasing were to also take over a brick and mortar to store, and then keep the truck rolling throughout the year to ESC, DHSE, USDH, BME, and probably a couple of other race series I am unaware of or are escaping me(live on the east coast).
You just need winning turn key racers on the local level as well to promote your brand.
Financially speaking, if Orbea wanted a truck at North American events, they would buy a truck that is already in North America. Shipping a vehicle like that overseas is not cheap.. Plus, all the other legalities with registration and such.. I can't see that making any sense, even if they did a full blown team here..
I think the only real feasible situation where orbea buys that truck and signs both Vali and Andy is they intend to appeal to the German speaking market in Europe as well as former yt customers. Sounds very expensive though. While I’m sure fmd is bargain for the results/coverage they are getting they can’t be cheap. Perhaps a situation where yt is fulfilling the athlete salary side of things to avoid penalties and orbea is coming in to take on all the other costs associated with operating a team season to season. Just a guess if that rumor is indeed true.
Only teams in America using a truck are North America based and big companies who use that truck for different events already. Pretty much all tents at North American races and a lot of them aren’t even branded unless again the company/team is North American based.
Which is totally fine. Fans come to see the racers and the bikes. The truck thing is really just a tool in Europe where most the races are held. With just a touch of dick swinging.
Europeans like team buses for road & mountain.
US likes NASCAR semi trucks w/ upper decks & 2 race cars.
Lou Ferguson to stay on Intense for 2 more years.
Just listening to the OTB podcast . Rumor from them is that the YT truck got repossessed and the team won't have the funds to make the north American rounds . Pretty rubbish situation all round .
Oisin was joking in Theo’s vid that they need to make prize money to continue racing
No way!
I don't really have the first idea how this stuff works but I'd kind of assumed that YT would restructure their finances and then pretty much carry on as normal .But maybe the race team is having to be sacrificed to save the company, that set up must be a fairly big outlay when cash is at a minimum.
Wyn was also making an interesting point about rock shox and Shimano sponsoring the series next year and how that effectively makes the pot for the teams smaller when their looking for sponsorship.
Seems a pretty fair point to me , you'd imagine that WBD would be in a much better position to get outside industry sponsorship than the teams .
If you buy the YT team assets does it come with the WC points? Maybe BK needs to pony up!
from the ground in champery, "YT is using their sprinter vans" - did they have an actual truck or are sprinter vans normal course of operations for them?
From listening to the Downtime podcast, it sounds like they usually DO have a truck but didn't have one in Les Gets, either. I would imagine that the truck is a significant asset of the company (assuming they owned it, not leased it), and as such, would be subject to freezing/holding while they're under administration in the same way as the frames that they haven't released. No clue if the sprinter vans are owned by them or rentals, though. I would think that if they own them, they would also be under the same restrictions as the truck... so guessing they're rentals or maybe borrowed?
The guys on the OTB podcast put forward the idea that Vali could start up her own team, considering she already has personal deals with Rockshox/SRAM, and other clothing/helmet sponsors because of the uncaged setup that YT ran. I also saw that Nukeproof has come back as a company and said they are trying to get a team going for next year. What if Vali set up a team with her own sponsors, with Nukeproof as a frame sponsor and bought out YT's team points. They'd need a good team manager to pull it together but it would be a decent solution to a bad situation.
It was the same in Les Gets. I was surprised to see the YT Mob Sprinter van/pop up tent combo when everyone else had big truck/trailer set-ups. Especially because they were close to the double decker Orbea truck.
Seems like they definitely had a truck. Screenshots from one of their Val do Sole Reels.
He didn't really seem joking. Wonder if they will have to self fund to make the North American rounds.
joking in the sense of laughing about it.
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