Carlos Sastre will miss the Amstel Gold tomorrow, the Cervélo Test Team has said, due to the fallout from the Icelandic volcano eruption on Wednesday. It leaves the Spaniard’s already light race programme looking positively anorexic. He joins Bradley Wiggins, who also announced today he couldn’t make the journey from Spain, as the latest high-profile casualty of Eyjafjallajökull’s wrath.
With volcanic dust still drifting south-east from Iceland in the high atmosphere, most northern European airports are completely closed until further checks tonight and Sastre was unable, despite his best efforts, to work out alternative means of travel.
Team-mate, Volodymir Gustov has also pulled out, but Xavier Tondò will make it to Holland in time. “We had most of our riders already in The Netherlands as they arrived before the Brabantse Pijl that took place last Wednesday” said Joop Alberda, Cervélo’s general manager. “The flights yesterday for Sastre, Gustov and Xavier Tondò were cancelled; for Tondò we found a solution to come by car and for Sastre and Gustov, we where depending on the airports opening today but we just received word that all the major airports around Maastricht will be closed until 20.00h tonight.”
Sastre will ride the Flèche Wallonne in mid-week, which he hadn’t originally intended to race, and Cervélo will announce their modified Amstel squad later today.
