In an interview with Spanish radio station Cadena Ser, Alberto Contador has responded to the attacks made against him by Oleg Tinkov.
“He has been part of my career, which fortunately is finished,” Contador said. “I have new challenges ahead now. I will not waste energy on him. He doesn’t do anything for me. He has a lot of money, but doesn’t know how to manage it.”
Tinkov called Contador a “sad person” because he “never really wants to drink champagne and is always careful about what he eats because he’s focused on winning the Tour de France.”
The Spaniard responded: “If those statements came from a person that you had affection for, then you’d care. In my case, it does not affect me at all. I was taught a set of values, among them respect, you should always have respect for people.
“There are people who perhaps do not think that way, that’s the way I see it. I’ll drink Champagne with friends, not with him.”
Tinkov bought the team from Bjarne Riis at the end of 2013 and kept Riis as team manager until the spring of 2015, when he parted company with the team by mutual agreement.
“I knew that everything would change with his departure,” Contador said. “He was a team leader who could manage a group of 70 people. You can come along with lots of money but you need to have a set of skills to manage well – Riis had that, Tinkov didn’t.”
