Statement from Team Owner Michael Ball in response to questions regarding Rock Racing’s absence at the 2009 Tour of Missouri:

“Rock Racing is not among the teams competing at the 2009 Tour of Missouri because we were not invited. We were told the exclusion was a direct consequence of Rock Racing’s inability to send our “A” squad to the 2008 Tour of Missouri, which at the time, overlapped with the Tour of Britain, a race we had already committed to and invested significant resources in, months before we received a Tour of Missouri invitation. In an effort to “punish” our team, it’s the fans who ultimately suffer. They deserve to have the best race with the best riders, and this year, that will not be the case.

It’s also very disappointing that we have been left out of one of the biggest races on the U.S. calendar especially when Rock Racing has been one of the strongest supporters of the sport overall. In 2008, Rock Racing sponsored seven domestic races and invested millions of dollars to support the efforts of the same race organizers who chose to keep us out of Missouri in 2009.”