February 15/05 1:17 am - CCA Selection Criteria for 2005 Pan-Am Championships

Posted by Editoress on 02/15/05
 

Canadian Team Selection Criteria for 2005 Pan-am Road and Track Championships

Mar del Plata, Argentina
Track events: April 25-29
Road time trial: April 30
Road race: May 1

With the growing emphasis on continental calendars the Pan American road and track championships have become very important to Canada’s international standing. For road, there are significant continental ranking points available, which affect everything from the number of points available at our national championships to the size of our team at worlds. For track, the new worlds qualification system based on UCI ranking rather than World Cup ranking means Pan Ams are a key opportunity to secure spots for the 2006 worlds.

With all that in mind, the Canadian Cycling Association is investing significant resources into this year’s Pan Ams, to be held in Mar del Plata, Argentina, from April 25 to May 1.

Selection Process

Road
The road team will be by invitation only based on the availability of National Team carded athletes and National Team athletes, with the target team size of road specialists set at two elite men, two elite women and two espoir men. The teams will be completed with endurance track riders.

Track
The track team will be made up of automatically selected athletes (carded track athletes, athletes selected to the 2005 Track World Championships) and athletes selected at a training camp to be held at the Brian Piccolo Velodrome in Cooper City, Florida.

The selection will be a two-stage process:

April 8-10: Time trials to qualify for the selection pool – open to all interested athletes. Athletes who met selection criteria at the Burnaby track trials in November qualify automatically for the pool and do not need to qualify through the time trials. These athletes are, however, encouraged to participate in the time trials.

April 10-22: Preparation and final selection camp: Final selection will be done at the end of the camp and will be based on time trials and subjective evaluation of the athletes by the National Track Coach, Eric Van Den Eynde.

Maximum team size:

Sprint Men - 4
Sprint Women - 1-2

Endurance Men - 5-6
Endurance Women - 2-3

Preselected to final team (before final track worlds selection announced):

Sprint Men: Travis Smith
Sprint Women: Lori-Ann Muenzer,

Endurance Women: Mandy Poitras, Gina Grain
Endurance Men: none

Preselected to pool (based on Burnaby results) :

Sprint Women: Lori-Ann Muenzer
Sprint Men: Matt Chater, Cam MacKinnon, Yannick Morin

Endurance Men: Zach Bell, Martin Gilbert, Marsh Cooper, Bob Veroba, Phil Abbott, Mark MacDonald, Andrew Pinfold,

Funding :
• The Pan Am project is fully funded by the CCA
• Attendance at the camp for preselected athletes is fully funded by the CCA
• Athletes prequalified to the pool will have their accommodation in Florida paid by the CCA, but must travel to Florida at their own cost
• Other athletes must cover their own travel and accommodation
• All athletes selected to Pan Ams will have their travel to the camp and accommodation in Florida reimbursed, according to fixed rates