Vuelta director vows to finish race in Madrid, labels protests illegal
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Stage 16 ended 8km before the finish after a large protest blocked the road 3km from the scheduled stage end.
PHOTO: EPA
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MADRID – After pro-Palestinian protesters forced a premature end to yet another stage of the Vuelta a Espana on Sept 9, race director Javier Guillen said the intention is to finish the race in Madrid on Sept 14 as planned and called the disruptions illegal.
Stage 16 ended 8km before the finish after a large protest blocked the road 3km from the scheduled stage end, similar to Stage 11 when riders had to finish 3km from the line due to protesters causing disruption at the finish in Bilbao.
“I’m here before you because, from La Vuelta, we want to clearly express our strongest rejection of what we experienced today,” Guillen said.
“Fortunately, the stage was completed in terms of timing and the stage winner but, obviously, the stage did not end where we had planned.
“The main message I want to share with you today is that we are going to continue with La Vuelta, and tomorrow we will start the next stage.”
The focus of the protests has been the presence of the Israel-Premier Tech team at the Vuelta.
The first disruption came during Stage 5’s team time trial when the Israel-Premier Tech team were stopped on the road by protesters holding Palestinian flags.
Since then, riders have crashed because of protesters’ actions and, while Israel-Premier Tech removed their name from the riders’ jerseys, the latest events show that this has had no effect on the protesters.
“You cannot cut stages short, you cannot block the cyclists’ path,” Guillen added.
“It’s illegal because it’s defined as such both in the Penal Code and in the Sports Law. We are a sport and sport is meant to unite, anything that doesn’t serve that purpose isn’t linked to sport.
“We want to defend our sport, we want to defend our race, and that’s why we want to keep working.”
There have been calls to suspend the Israel-Premier Tech team from the race, but Guillen reiterated the Vuelta’s stance that this is a decision which is out of the organisers’ hands. “Yesterday, there was a match between Italy and Israel. A football match was played, and a World Cup European qualifier in which Israel participated has taken place,” he said.
“The participation of these teams is not prohibited because no international federation has done so, none. And there hasn’t been any international body that has imposed sanctions requiring us, the world of sport, to act accordingly.
"From now on, what we want is for the race to continue because all the teams participating in La Vuelta have legitimacy."
Guillen also said the Vuelta is deploying every possible resource when it comes to security, but it is impossible to cover every area in a race of this size. The director was asked if a Plan B was in place for the final stage.
“No Plan B for reaching Madrid, no replacing the Madrid stage, absolutely not,” Guillen replied.
REUTERS
