Without any great victory during the spring, Oleg Tinkov said many times he was disappointed about his leader Peter Sagan. The Tinkoff-Saxo team owner, according to La Gazzetta dello Sport, wishes to cut Sagan's salary, one of the most expensive in cycling, even if he won a dew days ago the Amgen Tour of California.
"In the Classics we only had plan A, but no plan B, so when Peter didn't perform, there were no other guys to cover for him", Tinkov told Gazzetta dello Sport. "There was not much we could do because we put all of the chips on one guy and it didn't work. Peter's still a great rider but he cannot win everything."
The Russian millionaire wants to change the business model in cycling. He would like to know if cycling wages is structured correctly because riders who under achieve are paid the same basic salary regardless of performance.
"The problem in cycling is that it's not easy to cut salary because we have a contract. I believe that cycling needs a different model. The problem with cycling is that riders look to raise the salary once they win. When Peter wins, he wants more money", he explained. "When they start to win, that's okay, they have more and more money, and teams even increase them during the season, it happened with my riders last year. Unfortunately you cannot cut their salary but they have a bonus when they win, but if not they still have a huge fee, and that's really painful. They can have a huge part of your budget and they don't perform, but I can't do anything because they have a three-year deal. I don't like this model. Of course if I could find any legal possibility, I would decrease the contract. But we have to work with it."
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