The entire Italian squad at the UCI World Road Championships, including now double World Champion Paolo Bettini, rode the outfit's spare bikes during Sunday's race. Thieves broke into the garage of the hotel where the Italian and the Brazilian team were staying and stole both teams' bikes on Saturday evening. The stolen bikes have been estimated to be worth approximately 50,000 euro.
The theft was the second to take place during the worlds in Stuttgart, Germany, with the Canadian squad losing most of its bikes earlier in the week. Canada's national team were lucky enough to have German ProTour squad Gerolsteiner allow it to use the squad's Specialized bikes for the worlds races.
