First race of the season, expected to be a long season, again. We’re hoping to start things off with a decent result in Australia. Both Efimkin and Prevar are good riders to have for a race like this with several tough stages. The support they have is limited to Silin, but guys like Gruzdev and Vaitkus can do small miracles on the flat. Ulanowski will probably stuggle in this race, but we still hope he can do something, most likely on the final stage. Also worth noting is Suparman! Publicity is a key part of the sport, and we’re sure he’ll be a great asset, hopefully featuring in a break or two.

Hello! We have climbers!

Our win goal of the season, and we’re doing everything we can to make it happen. Krasnoperov is a big question mark, but we have faith in him. He should be one of the top contenders in this long race early in the season when most big riders are still on training camps on Tenerife and such. The support we give him here is quite impressive with Topchanyuk and Efimkin who did fairly well last year, Popovych, the experienced man and Silin who is a great bottle carrier when roads go up. For the sprints we bring Polivoda, the Ukrainian champion, who can easily survive a few hills. He doesn’t get any support, but he has worked on his positioning the last few months, something which was truly aweful at times.

Krasnoperov and Efimkin could both be the potential leaders as both lack in one of the terrains featuring in this race. As long as they manage to stay on their bikes this time we’re happy, and a good GC would be a nice bonus.

A race which seems like a good fit for a rider like Yevgeni Nepomnyachsniy. The Kazakh can ride over mountains, go against the clock and manage himself on hilly terrains, which are all present in Catalunya. The support we give him in this race is quite impressive with 2 equally good climbers in Popovych and Kashechkin, and Vorontsov who isn’t too bad either.

After having some moderate success in our home race last year we are back for more. With last years’ TT winner Nepomnyachsniy, Ukrainian talent Prevar and Polish sprinter Ulanowski we have 3 viable options to reach our goal to win a stage, just like we did last year. In addition to that we hope Yevgeni can ride a good GC again, possibly top 5.

Yeah, just skip this one, Krasnoperov will fail anyway…

Our Grand Tour debut will see the team traveling to Greece, and then Italy. We decided to bring the best Ukrainian riders we could without hurting our chances in Vancouver too much, and that’s lead to this team in which Krasnoperov, Prevar, Topchanyuk and Ulanowski may all be able to win a stage under the right circumstances. We also expect to feature in quite a few breaks, possibly challenging for the KoM jersey.

A team with a lot of climbing and TT talent. Yevgeni probably can’t complain about the support we give him in Vancouver with 2 equally strong climbers and a TTT squad which should do well if all riders finish within the time limit, which could be hard for Gruzdev in particular as he hasn’t been too strong recently. Yet we expect the team to be perfectly capable in helping Nepomnyachsniy towards a top 5 position.

A race which should suit Nepomnyachsniy pretty well. We only have to hope Krasnoperov is a better domestique than he is a leader, otherwise we may have a small issue here. 3 Oleksandrs and 1 Aleksandr may cause a few funny communication errors.

Vaitkus may have lost some top speed, but he still has the ability to put in a late attack. Suparman will obviously try to get some TV time.

Ulanowski isn’t the best sprinter, but with Interlagos GP on the same day we hope the field will be spread out pretty evenly allowing Maciej to sprint towards a top 5 here. Buts and Athanasiades are allowed to try and get in the break, as well as last year’s stagiare Andriy Orlov

Krasnoperov has to show he’s a decent climber at some point to get a new contract, and this may well be his best chance to do so. No flat stages which will hurt, no hilly stages which produce ridiculous gaps, only a big mountain. His support won’t be an excuse of not delivering, Popovych, Topchanyuk and Kashechkin could all lead a team with lesser ambitions, and Efimkin and Kononenko could do well in the CT.

Huge success last year with a second place for Vaitkus after a late attack when loanee Smirnovs finished tenth from the break. This could all repeat itself if Petrovski goes in the break, and Vaitkus goes in the finale. If this doesn’t happen we always have Ulanowski as a decent enough sprinter to gather a few points we could really use.

Normally Efimkin would always have been the leader here, but the season has shown Prevar is stronger right now. The support isn’t too great, but if Prevar continues to ride as he has done so far a good result may well come. There is no time trial to lose time on, and the first stages should fit him really well, perhaps even more than the pure specialists as he’s quite good on the mountains as well.

Our second, and last wildcard race of the season after the Giro. We’ve had some breakaway successes in the Giro, and the goal is to experience the same thing here in Switzerland. Nepomnyachsniy, Prevar, Popovych, Kashechkin and Kononenko are all possible winners from a break, and in particular stages 4 and 6 look quite promising.

Expectations? None, just here to have some fun, and gain valuable experience!

Another hill classic, not our strongest point, but last year Efimkin came in 9th here. We hope for a similar performance from Prevar this year, and if possible it’d be nice to Suparman attacking.

Mountains, mountains and more mountains. Even more chances for Krasnoperov to do things wrong! Also, this is our last chance to achieve one of our goals this season. We´ve set a top 5 goal here, which seems pretty ambitious right now.

These hilly races aren’t our strong point this season, but we keep thinking that one day Prevar will be slightly luckier and will actually win one of these, so why not Manx?

Well, should’ve brought Kashechkin and Topchanyuk here being the winner and 3rd GC last year, but we did not. Nepomnyachsniy has good mountain support here, and the TTT setup is pretty decent too, which should allow us getting a decent GC here once more.

Should be sprinters race with a deciding TT. We expect this scenario to fail, due to stage 3’s finish possibly allowing punchers to do well, like Prevar perhaps? If not we always have Ulanowski.

Nemiroff will continue sponsoring the team next season, but Children of Chernobyl won’t be presented by the company any longer, instead Nemiroff has chosen another project to get some attention, which project that is will be announced later.

KazAtomProm is the world’s largest processor of uranium products, and is based in Kazakhstan. The company will start sponsoring the team because of the fact a number of the best Kazakh cyclists are connected to the team at this moment, as well as one of the more promising time trialists of the country.

The team’s been based in Lviv for the past one and a half year, and finally we can announce the local newspaper will sponsor the team from 2016 onwards, something we expected would’ve happened last year already, but we’re still delighted the company will join our quest to make Ukraine a great cycling nation.

Our team has had a good two-a-half years being supplied by SCOTT. The riders are satisfied with the materials the company is offering, and therefore we’ve decided to renew this contract for another season. We’re still to announce our new name sponsor, but when that’s done we’ll be looking for a designer who can provide us with some bikes that’ll stand out in the peloton.

The same applies to Nalini, who have also been a part of the project since the very beginning. The clothing company has always provided us the top quality cycling clothes, both for cold races such as the Tro Bro Léon and hotter ones like the Middle East, and we’ve had successes in both!

Helmets have always been a discussion within our team, as we’re not officially sponsored by a company, and this will not change either. However, the team will provide the riders who do not have contracts themselves with brand new Catlike helmets.

Finally, Aerosvit Airlines also have seen their contract getting renewed. Aerosvit is responsible of taking care of the team’s distribution of materials and personnel to races all over the world.

Hopes? Maybe… The early mountain stages may not be ours with Krasnoperov, but the later stages could well favor those who go in breaks, which could be Topchanyuk and Kononenko, or even Vaitkus with a late attempt. A stage win should be plausible, but only if everything goes right. Oh, and Krasnoperov finished 8th in 2011.

Prevar’s first chance as sole leader with Aleksandr Efimkin missing. As it stands now Prevar would become the team’s absolute leader next season when the team is likely to ride in the CT, so this’ll be a good indication of how useful our talented guy really is.

Our most realistic shot at survival in the PCT, the Tour of Portugal looks like it’s a perfect for for Yevgeni featuring a long-ish TT and not too many difficult mountains. If he manages to ride like he did in Ukraine we may get a decent amount of points from this race, possibly getting us back in the fight. Maciej won’t get many opportunities here, but we hope he can at least try something.

With sending Ulanowkski to Portugal, we are forced to take another approach going into the Baltic Chain. Home rider Tomas Vaitkus will want to try to get a decent result here, and with a team fully focused on sprints he should have good support. If we can somehow get Buts in a break which makes it to the line he would also have a good shot at a stage win.

With the recent successes the team has had Nemiroff decided they wanted to use this as an opportunity to use the extra media attention. Therefore, the company has decided to reveal the new title sponsor earlier than was planned, but at the peak of attention the team’s been getting so far. Nemiroff is delighted to announce they will present a website the coming season that promotes Ukraine, even in the tough times the country is facing right now, visittoukraine.com.

www.visittoukraine.com is the site for people who need, or want, ideas about travelling to Ukraine and potentially do business there. The site offers information about cities, hotels, taxi companies and all other useful information a tourist, or businessmen would need. In order to promote the country other than just by making this website our title sponsor, Nemiroff has decided to reserve a small place in our monthly previews to highlight a city, place or event mentioned on the website, starting with some background information about Lviv, the city the team is based in, in January 2016 when hopefully the team will still have a PCT status. PCT status or not, the team’s new name will be: VisitUkraine p/b Nemiroff, and the management will try to further regionalize the team’s roster in the upcoming transfer period.

Images of the shirt, and a few national and world champion jerseys can be found below.