Tadej further improved his climbing abilities and he'll need them as he's set to participate in some of the hardest mountain races on the calendar. His schedule has a bit more of an Italian taste as 3/5 races are there, but his schedule is actually very similar to last year. Tirreno replaces Paris-Nice as the week long stage race. The Grand Tour shifts to the Giro where he'll be making his debut. He'll return to East Java where he'll aim to improve on last year. Tour of Ukraine is replaced by the race in Scandinavia and he'll be racing the Lombardia monument to close out the season.

knockout wrote:

I'm quite happy to see Pogacar in the Giro. Of course, i have some expectations for all the races on his schedule but not facing him in my most important GT is already solid news for me

ember wrote:

Cool calendar for Pogacar! Not knowing what the big three does for a GT, it still feels like it could be a Giro without any of them, making Pogacar a clear favourite for the overall, or at the very least to fight for the overall win in the Giro

SotD wrote:

Nah, Giannoutsos is not happy

Jasper is set for his first season with us. His race schedule doesn't contain any surprises. As the team's lead sprinter he'll have to compete against the elite in the main sprinter races. The main decisions were which Grand Tour he'll go to and a few of the other stage races. We thought for a long time that he would go to the Giro, but in the end we did a 180 and he'll be going to the Vuelta instead. It's not an obvious choice as it's probably got the least sprint opportunities, but there is a chance to go into the red jersey on the opening stage and perhaps the sprint field won't be as strong as in the other two GTs.

AbhishekLFC wrote:

Straigtforward calendar I'd say for Philipsen, except probably the GT decision. He should be very good for sure!

Glad I avoided Pogacar with Haig

knockout wrote:

Makes a lot of sense imo. With Pogi at the Giro, Vuelta for Philipsen is a solid gamble to take.

Even though this is posted as the 3rd part of our leader schedules, we actually expect Ivan Siric to be our 2nd leading scorer. He was already that last year and with further training we hope to see him mix it up with the best cobblers in the Pro Tour. Outside of the cobbled classics his other races clash with Jasper Philipsen. This is intentional. We know Ivan is not quite fast enough to be a sprinter, but we hope he can be an effective lead out, especially at the Vuelta.

With the length of the Pro Tour calendar Michal will have plenty of chances where he is our best climbing option. Whether that manifests in him being a genuine GC option is something we will find out. Ideally he can balance the former with some attacking riding to best make use of his skill set. Without a proper hills leader he will tackle some classics like Grand-Duche, Fleche and LBL. In Scandinavia and Lombardia he can hopefully form a good tag team with Tadej Pogacar.

Pascal's schedule is all about the first half of the season, especially the early part. Outside of Milano-Sanremo where he will hopefully work well with Jasper Philipsen, all his other appearances are in stage races. He is on paper our team's 2nd sprinter, but he is primarily looking to compete in the tougher flat or easier hilly stages with a sprint finish. We anticipate that Ronde van Nederland and hopefully the Tour de France will be his two main scoring races.

Martin Hvastija:

We don't have a rider suitable for the GC so our all effort will go towards supporting Pascal in the opening two stages. We have to hope he can upset some of the better pure sprinters on stage 1 and has good legs for the uphill finish the next day. We are counting on Fred Wright to be a key domestique on both stages.

Gorazd Stangelj:

It's a debut race for Michal Schlegel and while all the time-trialing kilometres don't suit him, the undulating road stages should. We also may use him as a final lead out rider of sorts for Pascal who is itching to score some points after a disappointing first outing in Tasmania. Our main two domestiques here should be Papanov and Wright.

Martin Hvastija:

We didn't have big expectations at this race, but we hoped we could be more competitive than what we showed. Improvement is needed in the upcoming races otherwise we will quickly find ourselves down the ranking table.

Race score: 5/10

Martin Hvastija:

We don't have a dedicated leadout rider for Jasper, but we should have plenty enough to keep him in a good position until the last 5 km or so. After that we'll be relying on him to pick the right wheel. There is no better way to start a season than with a stage win as it takes some of the pressure off, so that will be our aim. Matic Groselj is our best bet to score some depth points in the GC.

Gorazd Stangelj:

On the whole this race has to go down as a slight disappointment. With both Schlegel and Ackermann we anticipated that we would impact the hilly stages in a positive way. In turn we got zero points there and lost time in GC. Martin Papanov and Sergio Chumil both scored more points than we expected, but apart from that we leave Portugal with a sour taste.

Race score: 5/10

Martin Hvastija:

I'm not going to lie. After three stages things looked very bleak as we couldn't navigate the sprint finishes. But everything fell into place on stage 4. Jasper had perfect position and great legs to take advantage of it. A 3rd place on stage 5 completely turned the race for us. From zero to hero. Matic and Veljko also did a fine job in the final time-trial to score a bit of depth points. As a team this was an important result for us so we don't fall too far behind the other teams, but also for Jasper it's a brilliant start for him personally.

Race score: 9/10

Martin Hvastija:

The main cobbled season doesn't start until next month, but this race has been a happy hunting ground for Ivan in the past two years. Every cobbled race with him is important in the larger scheme so we have to be on it. The supporting riders aren't quite top notch, but hopefully they can assist Ivan for the most part.