The Se­lec­tion Com­mit­tee of the T&T Cy­cling Fed­er­a­tion and its Tech­ni­cal Di­rec­tor Erin Hartwell could face le­gal ac­tion for the con­stant omis­sion of cy­clist Quin­cy Alexan­der from the T&T team.

This stemmed from a re­lease by na­tion­al coach and tech­ni­cal di­rec­tor Hartwell yes­ter­day, de­mand­ing that Alexan­der's fa­ther Nigel Alexan­der be per­ma­nent­ly banned from at­tend­ing train­ing ses­sions at the Na­tion­al Cy­cling Cen­tre (NCC) in Bal­main, Cou­va af­ter he was ac­cused of bias and un­fair treat­ment against his son ahead of the World Cham­pi­onship.

Hartwell in his re­lease said, "Af­ter train­ing Alexan­der ap­proached the na­tion­al team group and loud­ly be­gan ac­cus­ing me of bias and un­fair play against his son in not rec­om­mend­ing him for the World Cham­pi­onships."

He not­ed, "I at­tempt­ed to in­form Mr Alexan­der that Quin­cy is in­el­i­gi­ble for con­sid­er­a­tion for the World Cham­pi­onship ac­cord­ing to the TTCF's own poli­cies and pro­ce­dures for Worlds' se­lec­tion. It's not my pol­i­cy, it's the TTCF's."

Ac­cord­ing to Hartwell the rant of the se­nior Alexan­der took place in full view of cy­clists Njisane Phillip and Keron Bram­ble, both mem­bers of the coun­try's world cham­pi­onship team, as well as oth­er se­cu­ri­ty per­son­nel who lat­er sought to re­move him from the en­vi­ron­ment.

Guid­ed by the rules of the In­ter­na­tion­al Cy­cling Union (UCI), the TTCF re­quire that for cy­clists to com­pete at the World Cham­pi­onship, they must have com­plet­ed at least one of the World Cups. How­ev­er, world cups se­lec­tion is done by the TTCF's Se­lec­tion Com­mit­tee based on rec­om­men­da­tions of the coach.

The com­mit­tee com­pris­es chair­man Joseph Roberts, David Fran­cis, Robert Far­ri­er who is al­so pres­i­dent of the cy­cling fed­er­a­tion, Rowe­na Williams, Carl Williams, Robert Far­rell and Ash­ton Williams who joined in Jan­u­ary.

Alexan­der (Quin­cy) told Guardian Me­dia Sports yes­ter­day that he has been the tar­get of con­stant vic­tim­i­sa­tion since Hartwell took over and a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter was served on the TTCF.

He said, "I in­tend­ed to con­sult my lawyers for se­lec­tion on the world cham­pi­onship team since Hartwell has not pro­vid­ed proof of which rid­ers should be picked based on per­for­mances and times. He has de­lib­er­ate­ly not se­lect­ed me, and has not even at­tempt­ed to work on ar­eas he says I am weak."

He con­tin­ued, "I think he is just be­ing un­fair to me. In fact, my lawyer, who de­ter­mined that Hartwell was un­fair and bias in his se­lec­tion of the Pan Am team, will again be called on to act on my be­half."

Al­though Quin­cy was told he could not make the world cham­pi­onship team be­cause he did not com­pete at the World Cup, but was in­formed he could make the team for the Kilo­me­tre Time Tri­al event, on­ly if he pays his own ex­pens­es.

Guardian Me­dia Sports was in­formed that Hartwell rarely us­es times made by rid­ers to jus­ti­fy his rec­om­men­da­tion for se­lec­tion, and com­mit­tee mem­bers do not ask for any.

A mem­ber of the com­mit­tee, speak­ing on con­di­tion of anonymi­ty, said he ab­stained from vot­ing on the se­lec­tion of the team for the New Zealand and Hong Kong World Cups in Jan­u­ary be­cause Hartwell did not sup­ply da­ta on the cy­clists' times.

He pro­vid­ed Guardian Me­dia Sports with emails to ver­i­fy his claim. The emails showed a re­sponse from Hartwell with on­ly times for Nicholas Paul, Phillip and Bram­ble, but no men­tion of Quin­cy was made. In­for­ma­tion was al­so sup­plied for Kwe­si Brown but with no times. The com­mit­tee mem­ber said that the process for the se­lec­tion of teams must be fair.