Stölting is good, but A step-up to PCT will give Andy the chance to ride bigger races in the mountains, and a German team is good. And 6th at the NC is good.
Also, Andy takes a mountain stage win that almost confirms the Giro win today as well.
Hey guys,
it´s time to say goodbye. Lately I had my last races with Team Stölting.
Firstly the GP Kranj in Slovenia, where I captained our squad for the last time. Adria and Felbermayr controlled the race and caught the breakaway until we reached the last hill. On this last climb with Stölting I gave myself a last go, attacked and looked behind who´s with me. Odd Christian Eiking looked at me, and completely flew away.
Now it was clear that I wouldn´t have any chance to win it today, but until the end of the climb only Pöstlberger overtook me. Eiking won the stage in the couple sprint. While a group of seven riders reached me, whihc lead at least to P10 in this race. Not the result I dreamed of, but at least I brought my team some points.
The last race for me was the Münsterland Giro, where my only chance was to get in a breakaway as the race was flat as the Netherlands. But even that wouldn´t happen, because I didn´t want to chase young man Pollitt, who was in the breakaway. So this day was nothing to do for me despite enjoying my last race in orange-white-black and the fans on the circuit around Münster.
Subsequently Jochen invited us to a final season ceremony. Maxi and I had kind of a farewell party as as we both left for Bora Argon18. It was really sad, because in the year of cycling at Stölting a special relationship between the youngster and me grew. So I´m glad that I can still give a part of them something back with our shared mountain training camps. Also I promised to invite them to Luxembourg if I ever win a stage of Le Tour again. It´s a long way to reach that, but the year with Stölting was the first step and the next season with Bora will be the second.
Hey guys,
[img-r]https://i1033.photobucket.com/albums/a413/BlackAkinfenwa27/Bora1_zpsuo7opwwr.jpg[/img-r] Today I had my first day training with my new teammates, which you can see on the right hand side. You can also see that I have pretty many options to ride for myself, despite Dominik no one climber stands above me in our team structure. Additionally we have some experienced (Malacarne, Huzarski) as well as promising (Konrad, Mager, Ravasi) riders in our team, who likes to ride uphill.
I will give my debut at the Vuelta Ciclista a Mallorca. Then we will see how my legs are and how we continue the season. The guys at Bora are still a bit scared of my knee, so they told me that I have much freedom in choosing my races, but shouldn´t do too much to take care of my damaged body.
Overall the structure of the team is great, we have a good mix of sprinters, classics specialists, GC boys and allrounders in our team, captained by Sam, Dominik and Simon. Our directeur sportivs Ralphe, Enrico and Christian seem like they really know their job, while Andre and Steffen I know better as I raced against them in their Euskaltel year.
The best thing about riding for Bora is the ability of riding more mountain races. My pace on flat sections is still crucially bad, for getting some results I have to see the road kicking up. It´s also nice to have the chance of on the one hand riding wildcard races in the World Tour, but on the other hand also races I never thought of. For example I will give myself a go at the Tour de Langkawi, a race I never even thought of participating. But on races like this I can help the team best and bring some results for them and for myself.
Bis bald, Andy
By the way, look at the sexy bike I´m riding this year!
Hey guys,
we stayed some days in Mallorca to train before changing the location but not the country. The next target was the Vuelta a Murcia.
The pre-race favourites were Sky lead by Simon Yates, Movistar (D.Quintana) and Tinkoff (Atapuma). Patrick and I should get a result for us, but as we both are weak in the flat we should both leave it late. The race was pretty calm, a weak break and a small attack by Kennaugh on the big mountain lead to nothing. The pace went low until 4km to. All tried to bring themselves into a decent position to start the final climb, and I did well. At least Sky and Tinkoff were too strong on the last climb, but a P6 is still a very satisfying result this early in the season.
Now we will stay in spain, heading for our campaign at the Ruta del Sol.
Hey guys,
I´m updating you from the capital of Malaysia, where the Tour de Langkawi just ended.
Seven flat stages were here, plus a mountain stage in the middle. The whole tour no breakaway suceeded, Ruffoni was the man who took most of the sprints. I took on the last mountain stage, but sadly couldn´t deliver. A lack of form on the day cracked me at the end, so I came in fith while Zardini took the win and the Tour in front of Atapuma and Barbero. Place 6 was at the end my result.
Two weeks before that I rode in Andalucia, but had a bad time there. Getting ill on the first tough stage I handed the captain role over to Thurau, who finished eleventh. After 6 days of pain I came home with P19.
Now I have to think about what to do now, feels like the illness came really in a bad moment and now I´m out of my rythm.
Hey guys,
lately there has been a big one for me! I started the GP Nobili Rubinetterie - Cittá di Stresa (1.HC) with nearly no ambitions, as mostly the sprinters who survive the two climbs battle for victory.
My original plan was to attack when we hit the climb the first time, but the pace was too high. The second time uphill I went for it, just reaching the breakaway on top of that hill together with Roy. They worked together with me, but we got caught already on the descent. So everything looked like a bunch sprint, when AG2R suddenly upped the pace and launched an attack for Bakelandts. We had to cover that for Scott so I went right on his backwheel; soon I attacked him when he showed some trouble on a small drag, going for it with 4k to go.
Noone really chased me, but van der Poel went unleashed his sprint very early to catch me. But this time I didn´t crack and finished it off in front of the flying dutchman and Scott.
A great victory for both Bora and me, which showed us that we are still on the right way top go for glory. I will have a small race break, the next big target could be Frankfurt.
By the way, I´m thinking about pausing this story, because at the moment there is not much attention to it, mostly due to the overload of fictional cycling action on pcm.daily at the moment.
This story seems also not something you could really identify with it, wopuld it help to cut the nation change of Andy out?
Hey guys,
I have a very long day behind me, riding the race to the honour of the big Miguel Indurain. The profile contained 192.7k around Estella, from where I´m writing you today.
The 1.1-categorized race was interesting for our team, as we didn´t had a clear leader here: Konrad, Facchini and I should try what´s possible to get.
Three pictures just show how it went:
The first one is from my attack on the penultimate climb, where no one wanted to follow me (14.4k). Second shows my big advantage on the final ramp with just 1.6k to go. Movistar, Lotto-Soudal, Tinkoff-Saxo and Katousha didn´t want to work together. The final one shows my celebration on the finishing line. Gorka Izagirre took the sprint for minor places in front of McCarthy, while vdP, Wellens and INtxausti couldn´t deliver as they were expected to.
For me it´s just a great one, especially looking at the man who gave this race his name, and it´s my first back-to-back victory since a looong time.
lately two races were in my calender. Firstly was the
Circuit Cycliste Sarthe - Pays de la Loire (2.1)
With Gescke as a captain and me in a free role we thought about taking at least the Top 5, despite the strong french riders.
Stage 1&2 were bumpy, but not enough to create any time gaps. So we sat back, having no sprinter here. Stage 3 was a short TT and a disappointment as I lost 40 seconds on just 6,9 km.
Toughest stage was stage 4, where the last climb should bring the first significant time gaps, and gave me some hope to rise up in the GC.
But it turned out not to be my day.
The climb wasn´t long enough for me, so I had to leave it on P12 without any chance of taking the victory of Julien Simon.
The last stage brought a last chance to take something from this, so I went into the breakaway together with Durbridge, Yamamoto and Othman.
When we reached 26 km we only had 40 seconds, so I went for solo glory.
But at least it wasn´t my tour. The peloton caught me with 8 remaining km. Luckily Simon moved up some places and saved us a Top10 GC, while I couldn´t deliver in France.
But there was a second race to come directly after Sarthe...
Klasika Primavera de Amorebieta (1.1)
The 171.5 km long circuit around Amorebieta is mainly dominated by the light spanish puncheurs and climbers. On the day Simon and I wanted to break that spanish phalanx and take the victory to germany.
Racing was tough as the pace was incredibly high, especially on the climbs. Last time climbing the Montecalvo all blew up, and Villela was the first one to cross the line down in Amorebieta. I placed myself fifth, having threee Lotto-Soudal riders around me (Vanendert, Vervaeke, Wellens).
Geschke finished on P9 also in the top ten with Villela winning.
1
Davide Villella
Team Cannondale - Garmin
4h00'52
2
Enrico Battaglin
Bardiani CSF
+ 50
3
Daniel Moreno
Team Katusha
s.t.
4
Tim Wellens
Lotto Soudal
+ 2'03
5
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
s.t.
6
Jelle Vanendert
Lotto Soudal
s.t.
7
Louis Vervaeke
Lotto Soudal
+ 2'38
8
Michał Gołaś
CCC Sprandi Polkowice
s.t.
9
Simon Geschke
Bora - Argon 18
s.t.
10
Moreno Moser
Team Cannondale - Garmin
s.t.
So this time the italians could put it away from the spaniards, who only placed Moreno in the top 10.
For now I have a three week break until I start racing again in Frankfurt.
Bis bald, AndyEdited by Croatia14 on 22-08-2015 16:59
Hey guys,
do you remember that vuelta stage some years ago, where Tony Martin went for a solo breakaway right from the beginnning, having a great battle with the peloton and just got caught out by the Cancellara-lead bunchwith 25 meters to go. It was one of the most epic solo-battles in modern cycling, and I think today no one could do something like that better than Tony. In spite of that I exactly tried this at the race around Frankfurt. 55th Rund um den Finanzplatz Eschborn-Frankfurt (1.HC)
For some reason no one went with me when I attacked right from the beginnning, and as we reached the Feldberg I was sure to try the whole way on my own. The peloton, lead by Giant-Alpecin and FDJ for the main protagonists Demare and Kittel, gave me a maximum advantage of nearly nine minutes, when we climbed the Mammolshainer Berg for the first of four times.
For a short moment I thought I could really make it, as I had still over three minutes when we went over the hill the last time. But Giant was too strong for me, when Lars van der Haar reached out to catch me, leading the leadout for Kittel. Bauhaus sat on the tail of the Giant train behind a Cofidis rider, while Selig got caught out early.
5 km later the sprint for the victory began. I had already lifted my legs, there was absolutely nothing left to offer for Bauhaus. He came in tenth, while at the fore Demare won the sprint from way behind, beating Kittel and Bonifazio on the line.
Although I really had no chance it was a great day for us, showing the Bora jersey all the way on german TV as well as getting some racing toughness for the upcoming may events in Poland and the USA.
Hopefully I can deliver something like that later in my career.
And 6th at the NC is good. 
Gelsenkirchen, 11.10.2015 
Murcia, 14.2.2016 
Kuala Lumpur, 11.3.2016 
Stresa, 20.03.2016 
