{"id":320812,"date":"2025-12-01T15:47:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T15:47:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/320812\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T15:47:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T15:47:06","slug":"biniam-girmay-signs-for-andres-iniestas-new-nsn-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/320812\/","title":{"rendered":"Biniam Girmay signs for Andres Iniesta’s new NSN team"},"content":{"rendered":"

Girmay joins a team with a storied recent history, as Israel-Premier Tech. <\/p>\n

The team, which was co-owned by Canadian-Israeli billionaire Sylvan Adams since 2014, had come under fire from riders, sponsors and pro-Palestinian protesters this year, relating to the Israel-Gaza war.<\/p>\n

The Israeli military launched its offensive on Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.<\/p>\n

Gaza’s Health Ministry says the Palestinian death toll is now 70,100.<\/p>\n

Adams has close ties with the Israeli government, and once proclaimed himself the self-appointed ambassador to Israel,<\/a> as well as accompanying government representatives on a trip to the White House during US President Donald Trump’s first term in office.<\/p>\n

The protests during September’s Vuelta a Espana extended to disrupt the whole three-week race, with the final stage in Madrid cancelled during chaotic scenes, which included some riders being pushed off their bikes by protestors. <\/p>\n

One of the team’s best riders, Canada’s Derek Gee, left the team, saying riding for them “weighed heavily on his conscience”, and subsequently claimed to be the subject of a 30m euros lawsuit against him over his contract.<\/p>\n

The team have never confirmed any details of the dispute other than it being with world governing body the UCI’s arbitration board. <\/p>\n

BBC Sport understands the arbitration process is ongoing despite the change in team ownership. <\/p>\n

Title sponsor Premier Tech eventually withdrew its support,<\/a> along with bike supplier Factor before Iniesta’s company, who he owns with Joel Borras, took full financial control and registered the team in Switzerland with a “Spanish structure”.<\/p>\n

One of the appeals for Girmay will have been a been the potential doubling of his salary, which was believed to have been more than a million euros a year at his former team, making him one of the highest paid riders in cycling.<\/p>\n

Another is the team’s ongoing association with community projects, such as the building of a cycling track in Rwanda. <\/p>\n

He says: “In Eritrea, cycling is our culture \u2013 it’s in our blood. And as an African rider, I want to develop African cycling. This team already did incredible things [as Israel Premier Tech]. <\/p>\n

“We need people who can give opportunities, bring riders to Europe, or give them the facilities they need.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Girmay joins a team with a storied recent history, as Israel-Premier Tech. The team, which was co-owned by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-320812","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cycling","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}