http://triathlon.competitor.com/2011/02/news/trekk-swiss-addresses-the-elephant-in-the-room_20308
Heard this first from Inside Tri. It sounded as if Michael Raelert decided to jump ship, lured perhaps by the Erdinger team and the opportunity to be on the same team as his brother.
Thoughts?
ha, just posted identical thread. you’re probably right about joining his brother. in addition to being his coach, andy and michael seem very close.
Meh. K-Swiss sponsors plenty of triathletes that aren’t part of the Trek/K-Swiss team.
In the sport of Triathlon, one of the main reasons you’d even want a team (besides sponsors) is for the camaraderie. I don’t know, but I’d be willing to guess he gets his fair share of camaraderie from his bro. Then between the two of them, and their results, they should be able to find more than enough sponsorship.
Yeah, Team Raelert has a pretty strong resume…
Haha. I saw your post after I posted mine.
I’m not sure what to make of the marketing director’s comments about Michael Raelert “losing his team.” Was it an effort to placate the rest of the team, or was he really bitter about the whole affair?
Also, how does Michael stay as a K-Swiss athlete while not being on the team.
They state that he is a Kswiss athlete but NOT a trek athlete. It’ll be interesting to see what he chooses. Blue maybe, but…who knows. Where is the video of them riding in the Canary Islands!!!
Michael made the point last week of saying he was part of team Erdinger as part of a Q&A session out in Las Playitas. I didn’t think anything of it at the time but now it makes sense. I presume it’s all about the euros and nothing more sinister.
SteveMc
There are a lot of K-Swiss athletes that aren’t part of the K-Swiss/Trek team - now he’s one of them. From a marketing perspective, just because he didn’t want to be part of the team doesn’t mean you should drop him from your roster completely (unless there is bad blood). Michael is arguably the most talented triathlete in the world (LC at least) and it would be a miss to not have him wearing your product. While it isn’t ideal to not have him on the team, it would be worse to have him running in another shoe.
Drew
Sounded to me like Trek/K-Swiss wanted him, but he didn’t want to go with them. He’s gonna race with his bro, and that’s all the team he needs.
How does he stay with k-swiss? Easy, just like Mirinda Carfrae,Luke McKenzie, Terenzo, Belinda Grainger, etc. See this page for all the other triathletes K-Swiss sponsors. http://www.kswiss.com/content/kswiss_athletes/#/triathlon . Only some of those listed on the page are part of the Trek/K-Swiss super-squad.
True, but it’s hard to reconcile how they can continue to sponsor him as an athlete after he’s decided to break from the team. I suppose that the opportunity to be the footwear/apparel sponsor for the 2010 IM 70.3 World Champion and possible 2011 IM World Champion was too good to pass up. In any case, there are no guarantees that he won’t switch apparel and footwear sponsors midway through the season, either.
He was still riding a Trek, from last year I’m assuming, in Fuerteventura. Not sure what they will be on as the racing season approaches though.
In any case, there are no guarantees that he won’t switch apparel and footwear sponsors midway through the season, either.
Yes there is. His contract. It’s safe to assume that the Trek/K-Swiss deal expired and he didn’t renew, but K-Swiss offered a separate contract for 2011.
*Edit: For the record, I have no inside knowledge about any of K-Swiss’ athlete signings. These are my personal thoughts.
Drew
Yeah, Team Raelert has a pretty strong resume…
For some reason the Raelerts always make me think of the Frank and Andy Schleck.
If you have two athletes who are good enough you can go off and start your own team.
Ah, but as we’ve witnessed in professional cycling, you can always buy yourself out of your contract (or have your new sponsors buy you out of your contract). I am not a sponsored athlete, so I haven’t seen any such contracts, but a well-written contract should include a clause (or series of clauses) that talk about the costs of early termination, or whether that’s even a possibility.
Thanks. I’m sure that he will be a very hot commodity for all companies out there knowing that he needs something, anything to ride in Kona!
Looking at your signature line, I would’ve guessed that you were a K-Swiss sponsored athlete. 
I am, but not on the level that these guys are (hopefully someday!).
To your earlier post, if Erik V. is making an announcement that he is still a K-Swiss athlete, my guess is that Michael was happy/willing to commit to K-Swiss for 2011. To be honest, I’ve never seen an individual athlete sponsorship contract that has a buy-out clause in my professional or personal experience. There are absolutely clauses for failed payments, misconduct, extensions, etc. but I would think it odd if an athlete asked to put a buy-out clause in an individual sponsorship contract unless it was after a stipulated amount of time, which is never mid-year (again, in my experience).
Drew
I think the guy was spouting a bunch of bunk, trying to make them look better, and instead he made himself look bad. All those people in the room are adults and professionals, they didn’t need the speech. Let’s be honest here, they lost a great athlete from their team, it kinda sucks, move on.
You guys are making WAY more out of this than you need to.
His brother Andreas is already a K Swiss athlete to begin with. I can’t believe no one has brought that up.
Athletes in all sports switch teams all the time. Doesn’t mean they switch shoes etc… every time they go to another team.
Trek/K Swiss sponsors the team, not the individuals on the team. I’m guessing you’ll see Michael and Andreas using the same sponsors that sponsored Andreas last year except this year it will be a team effort instead of an individual one.
Is it really that hard for some of you all to think clearly?? Jeez!!
I don’t think we’re making WAY more out of this than what the marketing director insinuated because based on his comments, it sure sounded like it was more than just Michael Raelert not renewing his contract when it expired. Like coltank17 said, the marketing director made himself look bad by injecting that much drama into announcing Raelert’s exit from the team. The fact that he went into the whole charade of how they “didn’t lose Michael Raelert, but Michael Raelert lost his team” raised a couple of flags.
I agree that there is a difference between switching teams and switching sponsors, and Raelert is just switching teams and not necessarily sponsors. For all we know, he might continue to race on a Trek. But a high-profile athlete like Michael Raelert switching teams the year he is poised to break out into the Ironman scene certainly warrants a closer look.