Shoestring budget runs dry for USA Cycling

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Aug 27, 2000 | by Paula Parrish

Buddy, can you spare $200,000?

That's how large USA Cycling's budget shortfall is this year, which just happens to be an Olympic year, which is part of the problem.

Because sponsorship funding fell off, USA Cycling only had about $1.9 million to fund its programs, which range from hosting training camps to picking up the tab for all the travel and competition expenses for dozens of junior- and senior-level elite cyclists.

Compare that to the approximately $6-$9 million spent by the U.S. Postal Service team, which has only 16 members, the most famous of which is two-time Tour De France champion Lance Armstrong.

"It goes pretty quick," said Sean Petty, USA Cycling's director of athlete performance.

Not everyone agrees it's going in the right direction.

Cyclist Marcelo Arrue, a member of the 2000 U.S. Olympic cycling team, is angry because USA Cycling had to eliminate athletes' stipends this year as part of its budget crunch. Arrue, who won gold medals in the match sprint at the Pan American Games and the national championships last year, was receiving a $1,250-a-month stipend in 1999. This year, he's gotten no stipend from USA Cycling, only a one- time $2,500 grant out of the "Venture" funds allotted to USA Cycling by the U.S. Olympic Committee.

The Venture program was initiated two years ago to provide athletes with medal potential more money for training and other pre- Olympic preparations. Many cyclists survive on funding from their own sponsors.

"You'd think we'd get more from USA Cycling, not less, during an Olympic year," Arrue said.

Petty doesn't like the situation any more than Arrue.

"It seems contrary and contradictive, and it hurts," Petty said. "The only consolation is that we pay for a lot of training and camps and travel to (international) races. But it's hard for them between the camps and the races."

Petty said this year's funding shortfall was caused by changing sponsorships and that USA Cycling had no choice but to eliminate the stipends, as opposed to making cutbacks in the number of junior and senior cyclists it sends to national and international races. Also, the budget took a $100,000 hit just to pay for the trip to Sydney.

Petty said eliminating the stipends was preferable to cutting back the number of junior and senior cyclists USA Cycling sends to national and international races. The budget took a $100,000 hit in travel costs for Sydney.

Petty believes that the formation this year of the U.S. Cycling Foundation will create a perpetually self-renewing source of funding for USA Cycling and its programs.

Petty also hopes for more dollars from the USOC, once representatives from both organizations map out a strategy for increasing cycling's medals count, as per the overall "money-for- medals" plan being instituted by USOC chief Norm Blake.