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A quick mid-weeker to pick up on one of those quotes that guaranteed to infuriate me.

I was reading Richard Moore's latest piece on Team Sky in The Guardian Bradley Wiggins dismisses claim that pro cycling hates Team Sky.

It was this section about Marc Madiot's annoyance that infuriated:

"Other criticisms, such as those made this week by Marc Madiot, team manager of Française des Jeux, seem to owe more to the fact that Team Sky, through Facebook and Twitter are communicating with fans using all the means at their disposal. It irritated Madiot that Sky ­publicised work in a wind tunnel. 'We also put riders in wind tunnels,' said the former double winner of Paris‑Roubaix, 'but we don't put out a press release about it.'"

Well perhaps if you did put out a few more press releases then perhaps your team might be a bit more visible. Or perhaps if you paid attention you'd see one of your riders gaining a cult reputation on Facebook after the Tour Down Under: Arthur Vichot.

Cycling needs to sort out its PR, not just on the doping front but on the fan front. The most successful of the new teams in the last few years have realised that a few autographs by the team bus just doesn't cut it these days.

A successful online presence doesn't take much more than internet access, a copy of wordpress and a five quid a month hosting deal to get started. Yes that seems to be beyond the abilities of a lot of top flight teams.

Sky got their online media presence right by investing the same time, effort and thought that they claim in their race preparation. There's plenty that Madiot could learn from them off the road instead of playing the humpy French team card.

I'll set aside the issue of someone who is employed to write for the team site writing about the team. I'm not the only person out there who thinks there's something odd about the issues of conflict of interest when it comes to Sky's reporting on the Team. Moore is a great writer and journalism but he writes for their official website and so I'm also a bit uncomfortable with his reporting on the Team.

A lot of people have seen the signing of Oscar Pereiro Sio as simply an attempt to bolster the Astana squad with an experienced rider who can be there when it matters in the high mountains.

His ability to sacrifice his own interests in working for Alejandro Valverde over the last few years will have been a characteristic that appealed greatly to Contador. This isn't a guy who is going to give him grief or take off in search of a stage win while the real battle is happening behind.

That's pretty vital to a guy who has lost his trusty domestique Sergio Paulinho to Radioshack. Contador still faces having to ride on someone else's team with the return of Alexandre Vinokourov to "his" Astana team.

What is so brilliant about signing Pereiro is that it's a very astute political move given the situation.

We can assume that ASO are going to be asking questions about Astana's inclusion on the basis of Vinokourov's presence. They've not forgiven him for his actions in 2007 which essentially amounted to kicking them in the balls while they were out cold after the Floyd Landis debacle.

Now name the only team in cycling with two Tour de France winners on their roster.

The answer is Astana with Alberto Contador and Oscar Pereiro.

The former is the defending champion who was unable to defend his title in 2008 because of the repercussions for Astana of Vinokourov's ban.

The latter is the rider robbed of his moment of glory on the podium in Paris as a result of Floyd Landis' ban.

In pure political terms the weight of their achievements/history combined may be the necessary counter to Vinokourov's disgrace, which still drags like ten tonnes of shit behind Astana.

We know that being defending champion in 2008 wasn't enough on its own to swing the balance in Contador's favour, albeit the politics then included Johan Bruyneel on the scales.

Given the passing of time and their record, the two riders may be enough to convince ASO not to exclude Astana this year.

Women have the little black dress. Very few women have just the one.

This should tell the predominately male cycling population something. Sadly, far too many choose to ignore a simple truth: black is the most stylish of colours.

Rapha understand this, that's why their classic jersey is black. So did Henry Ford.

For nearly a hundred years cycling seems to have survived with shorts only really available in black. Some would argue this was out of necessity and lack of other viable options in the fabrics available. I'd argue that it was because it works and looks good.

You think Eddy Merckx and Jacques Anquetil wore black shorts for no good reason?

Or Gino Bartali and Fausto Coppi?

The latter had jerseys handmade from silk for him by Castelli. If he'd wanted shorts other than black he would have had them.

Take any cycling jersey you own and pair it with any shorts you like. It will always look better with a plain black short.

The World Champion's jersey has always looked better with black shorts. That's not a matter of opinion, that's a matter of fact.

And the same goes for any of the famous jerseys. The trend for shorts matching leaders jerseys started in the 1990s and has never been as cool as some riders and fans would have you believe.

For every Mario Cippolini resplendent in head-to-toe white and rainbow, there's a multitude of Michael Rasmussen looking like a jaundiced famine victim at Le Tour...

(Note Alberto Contador sensibly opting out of white shorts with the Best Young Rider jersey. Remember: you win the jersey not the shorts and matching socks.)

Or like a smallpox outbreak on a bike...

So to recap: If you are serious about looking good on the bike, get some black shorts.

You may also be interested in reading Roadcycling UK's Cycling Style Guidance Notes by Richard Hallett

Dave Brailsford in a BBC interview says that the Team Sky project is all about inspiring participation.

But I keep on coming back to the same question I asked back at the Worlds in September: where are the women?

It's not like there aren't great squads that could do with a sponsor and come ready formed. Say, for example, Equipe NÜRNBERGER Versicherung who have just folded due to their new sponsor running away at the last moment.

Take a look at some of the riders on their 2009 team roster and factor in that Nicole Cooke was due to ride for them in 2010.

Actually, let's go back to the basics of a team with a British core: Lizzie Armitstead has moved teams this season, along with Sharon Laws, to join Emma Pooley at Cervelo.

Pooley's pretty happy where she is, but if you say the other two were on the market along with Cooke and all the riders in her now defunct Vision 1 Racing team, then it's not hard to assemble a race-winning roster of a dozen or so riders without having to look too hard.

Throw in a good handful of young British riders who could benefit from the development opportunity with 2012 in mind and it's looking pretty progressive.

But given that both Vision 1 and Nurnberger have gone under for want of a sponsor, perhaps women's cycling is still at an awkward chicken/egg stage where it needs a raised profile to attract committed sponsors but can't raise that profile without committed sponsors.

I've spent the last year or so trying to do something about the profile by writing about women's cycling where I can but it's tough to get race information without being at the races, something no one is currently willing to pay me to do.

One solution would be more races organised alongside the higher profile men's ones, like they do at the Tour of Flanders and Amstel Gold. Then there'd be no excuse for journalists not having access and the ability to cover the races.

So what are your thoughts on the lack of a Team Sky women's squad and how women's cycling can raise its profile?

Like ying and yang, for every list of bad news, there is good. So here's my predictions for good things that might happen this year. (I've updated this to correct a couple of errors and add a couple of links 04/10/2010)

• The arrival of significant new teams will increase interest in cycling outside of the specialist press

Like it or not, Team Radioshack and Team Sky will be the two teams that people will be interested in beyond cycling's core audience.

On the one hand you have the Armstrong factor: a sporting star who has transcended the boundaries of their sport and spilled into the wider public consciousness.

On the other a global corporation trying to push forward on the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) platform as well as looking to acquire a brand association with Britain's most successful Olympic sport.

Then there's BMC, who've signed a host of talent, including World Champion Cadel Evans and will be looking to be this season's Cervelo Test Team by making a big impact in the major races and raising the profile of a bike manufacturer.

The gulf between BMC and Team Sky, both cultural and budget, is striking. BMC are the modern evolution of the "trade team" model whereas Team Sky is the arrival of modern professional sport in cycling's parochial world.

Witness the way they used contract law to ensure that Bradley Wiggins was able to make his much-cherished move and their attitude to rider selection and media management. It has more in common with the management style of Manchester United than Astana.

• Sponsors and broadcasters will wake up to the growth potential of women's cycling

Someone will spot the low investment cost and figure out that Cervelo Test Team and Columbia-HTC have got a pretty good model to build on. I can't be the only person who thinks Team Sky have missed a trick by not having ambitions to put together a women's team around any one of Nicole Cooke, Lizzie Armitstead or Emma Pooley. Same goes for Radioshack with the pool of talent in North America.

• The professional peloton will start to get a little bit less white

Let's face it, for all the increasing internationalism of the top flight calendar, there is an alarming absence of non-white riders in the big teams. Fumy Beppu is one of the few and a favourite in our household.

Daniel Teklehaimanot from Eritrea could be in the vanguard of African riders to break through. He's got a great story - life and career threatened by heart condition - and sixth at this year's Tour de l'Avenir ahead of some highly-rated riders like Stetina and Gallopin say he's got the ability to step up.

It was the Rwandan Adrien Niyonshuti, riding for MTN who garnered particular press interest when he raced alongside Lance Armstrong at the Tour of Ireland and the story of Team Rwanda writes itself.

Eritrea is cycling mad, a legacy of Italian colonialism, and there could be no more fitting country to produce the breakthrough rider. Combined with projects like Kenyan Cyclist and Jock Boyer's marshalling of the Rwandan national team it represents the beginning of something important.

I've got other predictions but I'm always keen to get other people's in the hope that it will provoke debate and bring knowledge to the table.