Israel-Premier Tech Owner Says of Chris Froome: “I Couldn’t Say He’s Value for Money.”
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Team owners aren’t known for their mid-season brutal commentary when it comes to calling out their riders. Normally, the most you’d get is an admission of mild disappointment or an ‘onward and upward’ type of comment.
Not the case with Israel-Premier Tech owner Sylvan Adams, who made headlines this week when he gave an interview slamming Chris Froome’s ‘value’ to the team.
In an interview with Cycling Weekly, Adams noted that, “We signed Chris to be the leader of our Tour de France team and he’s not even here, so that cannot be considered value for money… This [hiring Froome] is not a PR exercise. Chris isn’t a symbol, he isn’t a PR tool, he’s supposed to be our leader at the Tour de France and he’s not even here, so no I couldn’t say he’s value for money.”
Continuing along that train of thought, Adams noted that Froome was ‘not ready to compete for a GC podium, forget about winning’ in this year’s Tour. And you thought your annual performance review from your boss was harsh!
“We had a double risk: the risk from the severity of his injuries and of course his advancing age,” Adams added about his decision to sign Froome in 2021, despite his career and life-threatening injuries sustained from a crash in 2019.
Adams also said that he and Froome agreed that Froome would be retiring as an Israel Premier Tech rider—at a maximum age of 40, which is not too far off for the 38-year-old—but he doesn’t know if Froome has any plans to exit the sport before then.
In a passive-aggressive line that followed Adams’ commitment to have Froome retire as an Israel Premier Tech rider, he rhetorically asked, ‘Would he really want to continue to be a pedestrian domestique on this team?’
And in fact, the same day Adams released his volatile interview, Froome posted a video to YouTube expressing his disappointment to not have made the Israel Premier Tech Tour de France team, citing frustrating equipment issues that have plagued his season. It was titled "I was ready for the Tour,"so you can guess what his overall vibe was. He also expressed intentions to continue racing this year at the Czech Tour and Deutschland Tour, prepping for the Tour de France in 2024. So he’s not quite ready to retire just yet.
Arguably, whatever Adams believes, the four-time Tour de France winner is an important fixture in cycling (as is his ridiculously cute cat). Even without any major wins this season, he does still have a place in the cycling world—whether he's at the front of the peloton or not.
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