No surprise today with the announcement that the genius behind Lance Armstrong’s seven Tour de France titles, Johan Bruyneel, has signed on to be the general manager of the Astana Cycling team.

Bruyneel had announced his retirement in August after  Tailwind Sports, the operator of the  team for which Armstrong won seven Tours,  announced it would  disband after this season, ostensibly because  no sponsor could be found to replace outgoing Discovery Channel.

The dissolution of  the most successful outfit in cycling  left many questions, primarily  how in the world could the most successful outfit in cycling not find a sponsor?  The team not only thrived in the Armstrong era, but it remained powerful in the post Armstrong era with Alberto Contador winning the Tour this year. Contador is only 24, and the team around him  seemed primed to win many more Tours.

Yet,  Armstrong, a part-owner of Tailwind, said the group didn’t feel it was right to get a sponsor to commit $45 million over three years, what with the doping issues in cycling and the feuding among the governing bodies.

As they say on Mythbusters, it’s plausible. Still, it didn’t make sense to build a juggernaut and then just walk away. It’d be like John Henry walking away from the Boston Red Sox, or Big Stein folding the Yankees.

Apparently it didn’t make sense to Bruyneel either, and now just two months after “retiring” he’s back with Astana, and it looks like he’ll bring the remmants of Discovery with him. Contador, who’s young enough to challenge Armstrong’s seven titles, no doubt will wind up with Astana. U.S. champion  Levi Leipheimer and domestiques Sergio Paulinho, Benjamin Noval, Tomas Vaitkus and Janez Brajkovic probably won’t be far behind. And Russian Viatcheslav Ekimov, who rode with Armstrong, will be the assitant director sportif with Astana, just as he was last year with Disco. Most importantly, much of Disco’s support staff apparently is headed to Astana, too.

So, with Astana’s remaining riders and with Discovery’s remaining riders joining forces, Astana will be a powerhouse team with Discovery’s former support crew running the show. And now the proud  country of Kazakhstan,  which was embarrassed by the doping charges against former national champion Alexandre Vinokourov this year at the Tour de France, is sponsoring  what  looks like the  premier team in cycling and now stands to be known for more than doping and Borat.

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