José Maria Jimenez made his first public appearance of any kind for several weeks when he spoke to Spanish radio on Thursday and condemned stories circulating in the Spanish media that he was not training and would never compete again.
The iBanesto.com team leader, who has admitted to suffering from depression, said that ‘everything they are saying about me is lies.’ He added: ‘I’ve still got a couple of years left in which I can excite the fans.’
Jimenez’s statements were primarily in response to an article published in the El Periodico de Catalunya newspaper earlier this week that claimed the iBanesto rider had not spoken to his team-mates for some weeks and was spending most of his time partying rather than training. The article also suggested that Jimenez, the highest paid rider on his team’s roster, is about to be dropped and replaced by world champion Oscar Freire.
Jimenez confessed that the reason for his lack of recent communication was based on advice given to him by his psychiatrist – ‘the best psychiatrist in the world,’ he stated – who had told him to avoid the phone and stick to ‘training and rest’. Jimenez said that he had OK’ed this with iBanesto team boss Jose Miguel Echavarri at a meeting in August, and that Echavarri had said there was a place for Jimenez on the team next year.
Jimenez also received the backing of the new leader of the Vuelta, Oscar Sevilla, who dedicated his ‘maillot oro’ to ‘all of my team-mates, but also to Chava Jimenez. He’s been overly criticised in the past few days and a great champion like him doesn’t deserve this kind of treatment.’
a hetvege elvileg szabad, de van "hazi feladat" :(
most meg eppen zar a konyvtar, szoval ma sem volt sok ertelme beneznem :(( csak arra eleg hogy bizonyitsa, hogy en sem vagyok angyali turelemmel megaldva :)
jo ejt
Csak nekem is elkezdődött a suli, és az első héten elég nehezen akklimatizálódok (akkor kell kelni, amikor nyáron fekszem és hasonló szörnyűségek) :-)
És elkezdődött egy újabb nagy verseny Jose nélkül :-(
