Italian ex-pro rider Andrea Tafi is hoping to make a comeback in the sport, not as a cyclist but as a manager.
Tafi who quit cycling after Paris-Roubaix in 2005 wants to create a Tuscan cycling team along the lines of the Euskaltel-Euskadi outfit which is co-sponsored by and promotes the Spanish Basque region. “Tuscany is the beating heart of Italian cycling so wouldn’t it be great if there was a professional cycling team of Tuscan riders?” he said. “It’s one of the ideas I’ve been working on for several years now.”
During his career Tafi won the Paris-Roubaix, Tour of Lombardy and Tour of Flanders classics and now runs his own cycling hotel, Il Borghetto in Lamporecchio, a town close to Florence. In addition to being a hotelier, Tafi helps manage a local U23 cycling team, which next year will be known a Grassi-Sansi-Mapegrete-Scott-Mastromarco.
“In the past, this was the team of Bettini, Bennati and Riccò,” explains Tafi. “The core of this youth team will be the 20 U23 riders, but we also have younger cyclists. The team could become the basis of the professional team that I hope to create within a few years, but there’s still a lot of work to do.”
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