Lance Armstrong: ’09 Tour de France route is “interesting”

Lance Armstrong says the 2009 Tour de France route, unveiled Wednesday, is “innovative and very interesting” and he said he looks forward to negotiating with Tour officials about “a mutually beneficial future together.”

In the statement released Wednesday afternoon, Armstrong appeared to be a bit ambivalent about whether he would ride the Tour next year.

“I am well aware that there is new leadership at ASO and I look forward to upcoming conversations and to a mutually beneficial future together. Whether it’s promoting the Livestrong global cancer campaign or making the biggest bike race in the world the gem that it deserves to be, I look forward to next year,” he said.

“The route of the 2009 Tour de France strikes me as innovative and very interesting. From its start in Monte Carlo with a 15k time trial, to the reinstatement of the team time trial, to stages in my old hometown of Girona all the way to another visit to my old friend the Ventoux, I could not have hoped for a different Tour.”

Armstrong also said it us much too early to talk about who will lead the Astana team next year.

“We are blessed at Astana to have the strongest team in the world and I look forward to riding with all of these great riders. I have been around long enough to know that cycling is a team sport and I am fully committed to supporting the strongest rider in any race, whether that’s me, Alberto Contador, Levi Leipheimer, or Andreas Kloden.”