No place in Spain for Durán, goes Portuguese

Former Basque hope Arkaitz Durán has finally found a team for next year - but it's not as glamourous a team as his performances this year might have merited. The 26-year-old Azysa-Telco'm-Conor rider will in 2013 wear the colours of Portuguese Continental outfit Efapel.

BiciCiclismo erroneously reported in mid-August that Movistar had picked up the talented Vitoria-native (a story this site subsequently bought into). Movistar chief Eusebio Unzué admitted he'd held talks with the rider most known for skipping the sub-23 ranks altogether by joining Joxean "Matxin" Fernández's Saunier Duval as a fresh-faced 19-year-old in 2005, but an agreement wasn't reached, and Durán will thus have to ride with a foreign team next year as neither Euskaltel nor Caja Rural had room/wanted the gangly all-rounder in their ranks.

Arkaitz Durán is known to have enjoyed a rocky relationship with outgoing Euskaltel head and alma mater Miguel Madariaga in the past, perhaps explaining why a rider widely regarded as a freak of nature in his youth never donned the jersey of his home team.

Photo: El Diario Vasco