It's hard not top be impressed by what Michael Drapac has put into Australian cycling. His 'rescue' of Darren Lapthorne seems to be another great example of this.
From Velonation:
Lapthorne cancels retirement due to contract offer from Drapac Professional cycling team
Having retired last month, disillusioned after the collapse of the Pegasus Sports team, former Australian champion Darren Lapthorne has secured a contract and is returning to racing.
Lapthorne is going back to the Drapac Professional cycling team, with whom he competed in 2006 and 2007, and with whom he won his national title. “I’ve ridden with them before and they were probably my best years on the bike so I thought it’d be a good place to go back to,” he told SBS’s Cycling Central.
He had competed for the past two seasons with the Rapha Contor team but said that he felt it was time to try something new. He jumped at an offer to compete with the new Pegasus Sports team, but it quickly ran into difficulties before the season even started. An inability to sign enough big-name riders meant that it missed out on the ranking points needed to secure the UCI ProTeam licence it was aiming for.
Equally significantly, the Alberto Contador doping case caused planned sponsor Red Bull to walk away from the deal. Further difficulties in raising the necessary budget cost the team its plan B, a Pro Continental licence, and the same issue meant that it missed out on the third option, a Continental licence.
Lapthorne’s morale was low and he walked away from the sport, starting work in a job at a car dealership in Bendigo. However Michael Drapac, owner of the Drapac Professional cycling team, convinced him that it was too soon to hang up his wheels and he was swayed. “It didn’t take long though I sort of got the buzz back,” Lapthorne explained. “It’s not just about riding the bike, it’s the mateship you’ve got with your competitors and teammates and I really missed that.”
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