@Croatia - Yeah Higuita is very cool I'm not 100% happy with how my last few days went either. Not having any problems in planning with my full contract talents but obviously most stagiaires except Huynh won't get up.

@valverde - Cheers! Yeah Higuita went way too high but I had the money there and did it Huynh is interesting, Track-Sprint is very nice in terms of his SPR and RES combined with 69HI, but the prologue gain to 75 isn't quite worth it. Another reason I like that less is his 71FL, as a 3rd-4th man in the train probably I would probably like more FL. 75ACC isn't great either. But still with the RES interesting to consider that still against the punchy sprint/baroudeur type.

George Bennett
28 | Maxed | 135,000

FLA	MON	HIL	TT	STA	RES	REC	COB	SPR	ACC	FTR	DH	PRL
67	78	76	65	75	74	79	58	65	73	55	63	65
67	80	76	65	75	74	79	58	65	73	55	63	65

@whitejersey - Yeah I hope he can become a more prominent rider in his niche of races and provide some entertainment

@tsmoha - Yihaa indeed! Must say your reaction was the one I was most looking forward to seeing And I guess you can contain the jealousy of another 80+ Oceanic rider existing due to your own awesome training this off-season

@Jakstar -

@valverde - Yeah it's a shame I didn't have the money when he was a bit younger to turn him into a more rounded stage racer, at 28 I'm not sure if I'll take him further now. But I do love his MO/HI and you're right that some TT would complete the package Thankfully I can avoid TT-heavy stuff with him. Hopefully before he declines we get to see him in a GT or two

@SotD - Haha, about time indeed! Thanks

@ryant - Oh I still need Meintjes very much

And yeah I'm hoping his calendar is the right one to make use of other people's planning and his own skills, but that's what everyone wants anyway so maybe I've totally failed Luckily since he already did so well in those events last year with 350+ points and 78MO, 80MO should lift him up even higher!

@Abhishek - There's been a lot of desire to do it from my side and also other managers cheering for it, so it's cool to finally give our Kiwi the boost he deserves! Yeah hoping he can step up his MO/HI game from competing in 5-7th to pushing those top guys for the podiums, but it depends a lot on startlists. Thanks a lot, as always can't wait to ride alongside you, especially now our leaders will clash a little bit less

@sammy - Yeah it was much needed in this squad and much wanted in this team, so I share your hope that this is an important training!

A race we stupidly didn't even attend last year, we hope Mekseb Debesay will be amongst the favourites, if not the outright favourite, for this cobbled chrono event, and so it was a no-brainer for the win goal, given it is the only classic or stage race we had a chance of winning with our pre-transfers squad (and still is). And best of all, even if Debesay falters we expect Shaun Nick Bester is a solid top 5-10 possibility who could potentially back him up on a huge day. We know that's technically revealing our squad for this race already, but it's hard not to!

A risk perhaps, but after Stanislau Bazhkou's huge overperformance in the Chernyk stage on his way to a podium here last year we couldn't not back him to achieve that (or even just a top 5) again in his specialty of the hill stage race. If he can limit losses (or even better just straight up beat the top puncheurs as he did last year) on Stage 2 this should be a very real possibility for us.

Another one that we surprisingly already achieved last year after George Bennett rebounded from a difficult first 9 days by being part of the grand GC escape group on Stage 10 which ultimately made up the top GC rankings, with himself in 5th. In that case with his altitude training camp under his belt and hopefully a better opening week in the hills, this should be easy peasy?

Our debut at this race, it'll be a very tough one for George Bennett in what is sure to be a big field. We're hopeful but also acknowledge this might be the least likely - but who knows? We know he can handle the hills better than a lot of stage racers so he could either make gains there or otherwise hope that said stage racers are scared off!

A slightly ambitious rankings goal but it only made sense to look upwards a few positions. In such an open PCT field we have no idea if we can do it or not but we suspect it would require every leader to fire on all cylinders and that we are better off aiming to be the best of the bottom half again. We are hoping to have an enjoyable and fruitful season with no relegation fear (for now) and next to no promotion hopes. Maybe we're feeling so good because we just took a look at our squad's stats in 2021...

sammyt93 wrote:
Predictions so far seem really undecided on your team, judging by your leaders I'm guessing planning will make a big difference to your season, hopefully it's enough to stay up as your prediction for 2021 has lots of depth in it if you can just survive this year to be able to keep your core together.

Our season began in Australia for the both the Classic and the Tour of Down Under, before travelling north to Indonesia for the Tour of East Java We had decently high hopes for Houle in the TDU, whilst Rowe looked to attack in the season opener where the brave had previously been rewarded. East Java was PTHC and so would be a tough one.

Rowe did indeed attack in the Down Under Classic but couldn't quite pull it off with a motivated chase of teams eager to start the season with a win. He ended up 13th, with our new signing Morne van Niekerk mixing it up and claiming some minor points with a 30th place finish.

The Tour Down Under was a real mixed bag, Houle couldn't do much in the four flat stages. On the major GC deciding day another new signing, Dyrnes, did well and finished with the leaders, and would end up 10th on GC, not bad but not great. Houle got our first podium of the year on Stage 5 in a reduced bunch kick which contained more pure sprinters than we'd have liked, and would end up 19th on GC. Not a disaster, but not what we might have dreamed of either.

The Tour of East Java was predictably a rough one for Bennett, who ended up all the way down in 19th on GC - Grmay in 22nd provided some more points, at least. The race was brightened by two youngsters, Kennett and Higuita, who hatched a plan to take the white jersey for a day on Stage 1, going into the breakaway together and earning bonuses for the both of them that left them 1st and 2nd respectively overnight and picking up a few points, the latter also was 2nd in the KoM standings at the day's end. Joseph Areruya was also sighted in the breakaway on Day 2 for the second year running, mixing it up on the early climbs, but they did not survive to the finish.

Not a lot of great choice this month which is a shame, so I'll plump for

Our youngsters in the breakaway fight in East Java - Credit to Abhishek

With our leaders all underperforming slightly, it has to go to the pleasant surprise of the month:

Fighting for bonuses to earn a day the white jersey - Tour of East Java

We have five riders out on loans this year: Novardianto (Podium Ambition), Schreurs (bennelong) and Schleck (Vesuvio, duh) in the PT and Habtemichael (McCormick) and Fouche (NENT) in the CT, making this a much more exciting year to watch our loanees than the previous ones!

On opening day of the season Novardianto and Fouche were in action, Jams in Badaling had a tough time much like the rest of his much more gravitationally-inclined team, he was their third best finisher in 107th, maybe he could have cracked the top 100 but it appeared he was chatting with old teammate Jonathan Salinas as they finished together. Fouche just edged him out, finishing 105th, doing work early in the day for his leader Boivin, who ended up 6th.

Jams continued on to the Tour of Qatar, as did Hamish Schreurs, and both of them were in service of Aussie sprinters in the form of Caleb Ewan and Leigh Howard, the former would come 7th and win the white jersey, the latter 5th with a stage win as well. The boys mostly did work early in the stages on the front and protecting their leaders, but Jams did mix it up in the leadouts once or twice. Both also finished very strongly on GC, Hamish in 61st as his team won the teams classification, whilst Jams finished very very well in 33rd as the third man in on his team again, bringing in a useful 15 points and netting him our Loanee of the Month award to add to his 3 previous Rider of the Months. With all five having the potential for breakaway success throughout the season this should be an interesting column to follow!