The Abu Dhabi Tri Team is gone
After a very solid four year run the Abu Dhabi Triathlon Team announced today that this sponsorship effort has come to an end.
"The team, which was founded by Swen Sundberg, Dr. Werner Leitner and Faris Al-Sultan in 2009, can look back on many great athletic successes such as an Ironman European Championship title, an ITU World Championship title and multiple Ironman and Ironman 70.3 victories. Plus, the idea of a training camp in Abu Dhabi was handled well because of the experience with the local culture. All that though does not appear to fit the strategy nor the budget of the the Tourism Bureau that is currently restructuring. In any case, the negotiations between the Bureau and the Team went on for several months, and came to a not surprising negative experience," said a press release of the team.
"At least we now know that we are not moving forward. For several months Abu Dhabi kept us out of the loop, and did not forward information – but the situation appeared to be positive," added team leader Faris Al-Sultan, who found out about the surprising news on his 35th birthday.
What will become of the current athletes on the team is not clear at this time. In addition to Faris Al-Sultan, Paul Ambrose, Swen Sundberg, Jeremy Jurkiewicz, Maik Twelsiek, Kristin Moeller and Jodie Swallow are still listed as athletes on the Abu Dhabi Triathlon Team website, but Swallow (possibly uneasy about the uncertainty) recently moved back to Team TBB.
Here is a link to the site: abudhabitriathlonteam.com
