Veteran Spaniard rides with RadioShack for the last time
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Jose Luis Rubiera (RadioShack)(Image credit: Fabrice Lambert/sportbreizh.com)
Jose Luis 'Chechu' Rubiera will retire at the end of the 2010 season.(Image credit: Bettini Photo)
José Luis Rubiera (Astana)(Image credit: Jon Devich)
Team RadioShack veteran José Luis “Chechu” Rubiera will end his international career at the Tour of Lombardy on Saturday after 16 years as a professional.
The 37-year-old Spaniard will ride a criterium in Oviedo on October 30 but the final Classic of the season will be his last truly competitive race.
During his long career, Rubiera rode for Kelme, US Postal Service, Discovery Channel, Astana and RadioShack. He was often a key rider in Lance Armstrong’s Tour de France winning teams, contributing to five of the Texan’s seven Tour victories. He was also part of Alberto Contador’s Astana team when he won the 2009 Tour de France.
Rubiera also won two stages at the Giro d’Italia and finished in the top ten overall at the Giro d’Italia and the Vuelta. His best result this season was tenth overall in the Vuelta Ciclista a Castilla y León.
“I think it's time now to enjoy my family and spend more time at home”, Rubiera said in a statement from the RadioShack team.
“I consider myself very lucky to have had the good fortune to do what I liked best during all these years. I enjoyed and did my job to the best of my ability. I felt the love of many fans around me and I was proud to have such support with such a modest record. I hope that all fans will continue to enjoy cycling and that the difficult times we are undergoing now will soon be only be a bad memory. Hasta pronto. We’ll meet on the road. I’ll remain a cyclist all my life.”
The complete RadioShack line-up for the Tour of Lombardy is: Jani Brajkovic, Mathew Busche, Chris Horner, Markel Irizar, Gregory Rast, Ivan Rovny, José Luis Rubiera and Haimar Zubeldia.
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Stephen is the most experienced member of the Cyclingnews team, having reported on professional cycling since 1994. He has been Head of News at Cyclingnews since 2022, before which he held the position of European editor since 2012 and previously worked for Reuters, Shift Active Media, and CyclingWeekly, among other publications.
