Palm Classic: Last season none of our riders made the top 30, we're hoping for a very different start with Cav and his full train as well as Sagan, who's starting his World Cup campaign. The team is a little rusty when it comes to setting up a sprint train, though.
Toowoomba: Another race which will be very different to last season, when Fuglsang and Thomas finished 5th and 8th. This year Toowoomba sees our weakest line-up all season except for the TT races. With Stannard, Pöstlberger and Cano none of our riders have more than HIL 73.
Christchurch: One of 6 CT.2 races we booked this season for our domestiques to enjoy, we don't expect any results. Having moved up from the development team Gonzalo Garcia (24 years old) is the nominal leader, it is also the first race for Gao Lei (23) and Diedrich (22). I probably won't mention these races in further previews.
Pais Vasco: Our only February race. Majka returns after finishing 5th last season, the course looks just as hard this year and we hope he can repeat the result. However, support in hilly terrain is sorely lacking this season, which might become a problem.
Apologies for that lame wordplay, but we blame the champagne. Dominik Nerz started the season in style for new team Magnum - Madshus, as the German impressed in the Tour of Indonesia (CT.2). The Magnum leader won three out of six stages, which saw him win the GC, take home the KoM and finish second in the points classification as well. Strong domestique duties by veteran Kreuziger (9th) and Hämäläinen (23rd) also secured the team's classification for team Magnum. Exactly the type of performance that makes a manager (almost) forget about the terrible racing by Rui Costa and Van Avermaet in New Zealand.
Yellow jersey Nerz on his way to winning the mountain time trial
Palm Classic: We weren't quite sure how the AI would handle Cav and Sagan riding together and were happy to see that both of them were well-placed in the final kilometres. Though we aren't quite sure why only Dennis van Winden was with them, rather than Arndt or at least Wagner or Dibben. To our dismay a late crash took down Cav and he could only finish 40th in his first race for his new team. Sagan profited, though, and was 3rd behind Coquard and Kittel. A fine start to our WT and WC campaign.
Toowoomba: Possibly our weakest WT race lineup this season. Consequently, we didn't see much of our riders. 7th in the TTT is respectable, Cano Gonzalez finished 3rd in the U25 classification in his first professional race and didn't leave us completely without points.
Christchurch: We can only ask for breakaway participation and Diedrich excelled in that regard, he was in the first breakaway which was caught and then also made it into the second breakaway.
Indonesia: The good performance in this CT.2 race by our U23 captain Max Fritsch deserves a mention. 16th overall, the best performer among all development team riders. Well done!
January was quite an exciting month to start off our campaign. We participated in four races, with some mixed results, but our first race marked the start of our time in the sport with a big high. Leigh Howard started us off with 9th place at the WT Palm Classic, achieving our goal of a top 10 finish. A crash somewhat marred the finale, but in Howard's words after crossing the line, "staying upright is part of the race." He of course wished the rest of the competitors who had fallen all the best, and hoped for them to have better outings later in the season - though, he was quick to add, "just not at races I'm in."
Howard took a break from racing for the rest of the month, focusing on the heavy season to come, while some of our other riders took the spotlight. At CT.1 La Tropicale Amissa Bongo, Ben Swift and Jesse Kerrison managed to bag a handful of top 10 stage finishes, but they were still finding their legs after the off-season, and couldn't yet bag the victory they craved. A much more subdued showing at the WT Tour of Toowoomba followed, not having the same bombast as our first World Tour race, however 5th place finish on stage 5 by Louis Meintjes was a small highlight. The month was capped off by a decent ride from Dylan Girdlestone at CT.2 Christchurch - Akaroa, where he fought strongly in the main selection and finished off the race in 5th.
The team ends the month 18th in the World Tour, 16th in the Continental Tour, and 28th in the Prestige rankings. Leigh Howard sits 22nd in the World Tour, and 9th in the World Cup on account of his Palm Classic finish. We expected this month to be much less active than it turned out to be, so now we hope that good things will continue to follow in the season to come.
The first month of racing of our first season as a professional team has been done and dusted. Cadejo – BikeXpress travelled to Indonesia for its debut and the results achieved by the riders on our first ever race brought excitement around the team’s headquarters. Sebastian Lander snatched a podium presence finishing 2nd on stage 5, while the team further added 3 top 10 appearances, the same Sebastian Lander coming 7th and Guillaume Boivin 8th on stage 4 and Yelko Gomez finishing the TT of stage 6 on the 9th place. That last result meant that Yelko Gomez also secured the 15th position in the general classification and a Top 15 for our team in its first ICL race. Also in Tour d’Indonesia Sebastian Lander came 5th in the points classification, Dustin Browne 8th in the U25 standings and the team positioned itself in the top half of the teams classification.
Our second presence in the ICL circuit, at Christchurch – Akaroa, is seen more as a training session than anything else, since our best placed riders, Sebastian Lander (31st) and Andrey Amador (32nd), crossed the finish line at more than 10’ behind the race winner.
At the end of the month, in the ICL rankings Sebastian Lander is our best positioned rider, sitting on the 44th place of the Continental Tour individual standings with 29 points, while the team is on the 21st position. In the Prestige Rankings Sebastian Lander is on the 85th place, the highest of our cyclists, and the team is on the 39th place.
In February the team tackles its first focus race of the season, Tour de San Luis, with the hopes of a good result. It is in Argentina where two of our more experienced riders will make their debut for the season, Julian Arredondo and Diego Ochoa. Besides the Tour de San LuisCadejo – Bike Xpress will also race this month in Tour of Oman, Volta ao Algarve and National Capital Tour. The team’s line-ups for the 4 races of February are as follows:
TOUR OF OMAN
Conrad Bell Dustin Browne Pedro del Mar Yelko Gomez Ciriaco Guirado Iurgi Salgado Jonathan Soler
VOLTA AO ALGARVE
Andrey Amador Mark Arthur Guillaume Boivin Andrew Clarke Sebastian Lander Darren Matthews Anders Newburry
TOUR DE SAN LUIS
Julian Arredondo Guillaume Boivin Sebastian Lander Darren Matthews Anders Newburry Diego Ochoa Thomas Rose
NATIONAL CAPITAL TOUR
Mark Arthur Guillaume Boivin Dustin Browne Andrew Clarke Yelko Gomez Ciriaco Guirado Iurgi Salgado
Education First have started the new ICL season in 1st place with a flying start. This is thanks to the teams great success in every race so far this season. First off was the Tour of Indonesia a mountainous race where Kern and Uran went 1-2 on the opening stage. Stage 2 and 3 saw us take more top 5s, while stage 4 our best rider was placed 6th, just one spot out of a top 5. Stage 5 and 6 also went well, as Kern took another stage win, while Uran did enough to finish 3rd in the GC. Pauly and Yamamoto also rode to strong results in 8th and 12th respectively, giving the team great depth results.
The next race on the schedule was La Tropicale Amissa Bongo. Kern and Plesner were able to take some decent stage placings, and finish just outside the Top 10, in a race that was full of selections in the final sprints.
Finally we went to New Zealand for the classic Christchurch - Akaroa. Giovanni Pizzi pulled off an amazing solo ride to take the win, just holding off Pieter Serry. In his first race days with the team, he was able to take what may finish as the most memorable win of the season for his sheer courage.
Unlike the teams unofficial mascot a duck, which cannot fly long distances, EF x Palace - Nippo will hope to fly high all season. It will be a tough job, but the teams confidence is now growing, and expectations will continue to rise as long as this sort of consistency and success is followed up in February.
The team entered just for one race this month, neither sponsor nor manager were expecting great things, but aiming anyway to a possible top10 and good results in stages.
La Tropicale Amissa Bongo
The season started with a CT.1 race where we had low ambitions, so Hofland and Stuyven thought that was perfect splitting stages into the main group at the finish line. GC paid for this attitude with a humble 11th for Jasper.
At least were collected some top10 results but never higher than 4th.
Positive note: Zingle and Nass were able to join some breaks. We are happy in particular about Steven's tenacity, who showed some flashes of talent in his first race for our team. He is still young and the future is promising.
In a transfer season filled with big name FA signings and record wages, Bosch Cycling Team kept its profile rather low, focusing on talent development and maximum support for Silvio Herklotz.
Our biggest move was a trade swap with Deutsche Bahn that saw Alexander Brus leave for the WT and Julian Runge come into our team.
The bigger picture we had in mind there was as follows:
For the combined amount of Brus' wage and the transfer fee we received, we managed to exactly pay for Runge's wage AND add a second German stage racer in Ingo Breuer from Free Agency.
So overall, we gained two good German allround stage racers to support Herklotz while losing one slightly better Austrian, without sacrificing age or potential.
Signed straight from Free Agency were two youngsters in Andy Janssen and Kevin Richter, who are on track to become a pure climber and a pure time trialist respectively.
Particularly Richter is an intriguing prospect at age 20 with solid potential, we're excited to develop him alongside Ahrens in the coming years. Janssen will come in handy as a support rider for Herklotz and Auer, and bolsters the Dutch fraction in our team.
A late addition was the solid cobbler Lewis Pugh. After some other bids fell through, we were happy to see him still available. The Brit will strengthen our cobbles squad around his countryman, future top rider Harrison Adams.
Training Camp Report
After the conclusion of the 2019 season and his second consecutive victory in the Continental Tour Individual Rankings, Silvio Herklotz approached team management and told them he felt things have become somewhat stale.
He further explained that he wanted to spend the winter with our sprint team around Fabian Schnaidt to become a more allround rider, as his climbing skills have obviously become sufficient for the races the team focuses on as long as we're part of the CT circuit.
As a result of the time spent with pure sprinters, our initial team evaluation before transfer season began showed significant improvement of Silvio's top end speed, indicating that the work in winter was fruitful and his watt output is now unmatched among all climbers of the first and second tiers.
Even the best puncheurs in the world are mostly unable to produce such power on flat terrain, with only a few riders like World Champion Yates and Lutsenko being another step above.
Furthermore, the work on predominantly flat roads increased his rouleur abilities as well, where he now sits atop all climbers 76 and up worldwide.
With Free Agency predictably being a crazy mess, and Dominik Nerz rejoining our division to resume the German rivalry, the team then decided that while a more allround Herklotz would already be able to dominate the division as is, it would still be somewhat of a waste of an entire year if no stage racing progress at all were to be made.
So as the first large FA bids were reported and management decided against joining the frenzy, the team set aside nearly 20% of its budget to fund an extensive training camp in the Austrian Alps where Herklotz was supposed to further hone his TTing skills in the valleys as well as his climbing abilities on the surrounding mountains.
With March and therefore his season start approaching fast, the results have become clearly visible, and we're happy to present them in a more straightforward way here.
Silvio Herklotz' race program in 2020 consists of two WT classics to test how his improved skills match up against the world's best riders now, plus five C.1 races (4 SR/1 clas) and four C.2 races (2 SR/2 clas).
While sadly no German races fit his strengths this season, we're happy that most of his racing will happen in the immediate vicinity, mostly in France and Switzerland.
Both WT one-day races are projected to be very selective, but end on flat roads, which might give us a chance to overperform thanks to his sprint ability.
A Top 10 result on both days would be great, and if Herklotz can hang on until the flamme rouge, anything is possible.
Meanwhile, the team goals for the 9 CT races, stage races and classics alike, can be summarized rather easily: We want to win them all.
After a somewhat tame start in January, we've really picked up the pace in February with a slew of great results! Things kicked off at the CT.2 Volta ao Algarve, where some of our domestiques and secondary captains got a chance to show what they were made of. Neil Brick performed admirably with top-ten finishes on both sprint stages, while Joshua Atkins followed it up with a top-ten of his own on stage 4.
Next up was the CT.1 Vuelta a Mallorca, where we didn't have our expectations too high, hoping for stage wins at best. While we did not claim our first win quite yet, we had a far better race than expected, with Jesse Kerrison and Nathan Haas getting three top-tens between them, and Angus Chapman claiming 2nd on Stage 3 and in the GC. Dylan Girdlestone also joined Chapman in the top 10 on that stage and in the GC, rounding off a great team performance in Spain. "I can't say I'm not a bit gutted to have missed out by such a small margin," Chapman said after the race, "but it still feels like a huge step up in performance for the team, and we're hoping it's a sign of even more to come."
The CT.2 Tour de San Luis didn't start off all that smoothly for us. Brick was back in attendance and managed a top-ten finish on stage 2, but it was a fairly subdued performance. Atkins' second stint as GC leader this month started off a bit shakey, finishing outside of the top ten on stage 3, and losing more time on the stage 4 time trial. As the race progressed, however, Atkins certainly came into his own, improving to a 6th place finish on stage 5, and then 2nd on stage 6, slinging him back up in the standings for a brilliant 3rd place on the GC. To put the cherry on top, one of our youngsters Ioannis Foster managed to get into the successful breakaway on the final stage for an encouraging 8th place finish.
At the CT.2 National Capital Tour, a home race we had been looking forward to doing well in, our riders did not disappoint. In the opening time trial, Campbell Flakemore demonstrated his prowess on the first time of asking, taking a win which would also go on to seal a victory in the GC after a stage 3 which did not break up as much as anticipated. Leigh Howard got off to a slightly rocky start in his steady buildup for Milan - Sanremo next month, finishing only 8th on stage 2. However, anybody doubting his abilities would be silenced with a powerful win on the final stage, and second in the points classification. "I don't really know what to say," Flakemore stated after the race. "The team's first win at a race, and we win three times, that's a pretty special performance, and to have such a bump and it's only February, it gives me high hopes for the rest of the year."
We remain on the same points in the World Tour, dropping us one place to 19th, however we are still the top Continental team, and it isn't our immediate focus in any case. In the Continental Tour, Chapman and Flakemore both move themselves up into the top 20, and the team on the whole has leapt up tremendously from 16th all the way up to 5th. Only 12 points separate us from 3rd, and while the season is still early, our ambitions of a top ten in the Continental Tour are starting to seem like a little bit of an undershoot. Our performance in the Prestige rankings, now sitting 5th as a team despite having no riders in the top 20, speaks towards a strength in depth that pundits had previously dismissed, and we don't see any signs of that overall team form slipping any time soon.
Vuelta Ciclista al Pais Vasco: Just the one race this month. After Toowoomba we didn't want to have two potential zero point races in a row and thus made Majka the captain for this race. It was a brutal race with time gaps growing bigger and bigger every day. Rafal went into the final time trial as 7th overall, had a great ride and won the stage, our first win of the season. At the start of the race he had hoped he might gain a couple of GC positions with the TT but the gaps were too large, so he remained 7th in the end. Certainly a good performance by him, his team mates disappointed a little, none ever joined a breakaway or added any further points.
The season starts in earnest with a whole bunch of important classics.
Omloop: The first cobblestone outing for our new star Sagan, supported as he'll always be by Stannard and Dibben and the rest of our cobblestone team. Flowerman won last season, so our expectations are pretty high.
Classica T-A: Our first visit to this race, thanks to being part of the World Cup competition. It will probably end in a mass sprint, we don't expect Sagan to score many points, though he has a good lead-out train with Wagner and Arndt he can use.
Strade: Bibby, part of the early breakaway, was our best rider here last year, finishing 17th. Sagan was 12th, the terrain is a bit too tough for him and we can't offer good support, so we don't expect much.
Roma Maxima: Another new race for our team – and another race Sagan won last season. While we can't expect him to win again, he brings solid support and should be in the mix.
Tachira: Majka was 3rd here last season, but this time we only bring the duo of Tao Hart and Ruben Fernandez to this pretty long stage race. At least we have two cards to play and hope that one of them can celebrate a good result, maybe make the top 10.
Milano-Sanremo: Our first goal race, and of course it feels like quite the gamble, knowing the unpredictability of La Classicissima. But we bring Sagan and Cav, who won the two previous editions, so we decided to roll the dice.
Dwaars: Not part of the World Cup and so it's a rare race being lead by Stannard and Dibben. Ian surprisingly reached COB 77 in his last season before the decline hits, maybe it'll pay off with a good result.
E3 Prijs: Stannard and Dibben are back to supporting Peter Sagan in yet another race he won last season. But the competition has improved again this year, Sagan shouldn't be disheartened if he remains without a win in March.
Gent-Wevelgem: Next to Sagan we are also bringing Cavendish in case the race ends in a mass sprint again, but Cav doesn't have his normal sprint train, the focus is on Sagan.
Palm Classic
La Tropicale Amissa Bongo
Latvijas Balzams - Olainfarm: January Preview
Dominik Nerz started the season in style for new team 
Magnum - Madshus, as the German impressed in the Tour of Indonesia (CT.2). The Magnum leader won three out of six stages, which saw him win the GC, take home the KoM and finish second in the points classification as well. Strong domestique duties by veteran 
Kreuziger (9th) and 
Hämäläinen (23rd) also secured the team's classification for team Magnum. Exactly the type of performance that makes a manager (almost) forget about the terrible racing by 
Rui Costa and 
Vuelta a Mallorca
Tour de San Luis
CADEJO - BIKE XPRESS - JANUARY REVIEW
Guillaume Boivin 8th on stage 4 and 
Yelko Gomez finishing the TT of stage 6 on the 9th place. That last result meant that Yelko Gomez also secured the 15th position in the general classification and a Top 15 for our team in its first ICL race. Also in Tour d’Indonesia Sebastian Lander came 5th in the points classification, 
Dustin Browne 8th in the U25 standings and the team positioned itself in the top half of the teams classification.
Andrey Amador (32nd), crossed the finish line at more than 10’ behind the race winner.
Julian Arredondo and 
TOUR OF OMAN
Conrad Bell
Iurgi Salgado
Jonathan Soler
Mark Arthur
Ricardo van Dongen
Tour de Romandie
Qinghai Lake Cycle Cup
Il Lombardia
