Ladies and Gentlemen,

I'm proud to welcome you here in Madrid at the Headquarter of Movistar to celebrate our performances in the first three months of the year.

Before I want to talk about any results I want to thank César Alierta, CEO of Telefonica, who made everything you will see today possible. Without him and his company we would not be here. Thank you.

I also want to thank every other sponsor who helped us with the paychecks of all these fantastic riders by paying us with either money or materials we need to achieve big wins. Thank you, too.

And last but not least, I want to thank every mechanic and every other staff member. You all are doing an important job without being noticed at all by our loyal fans. Our success prove that you make your job fantastic. Thank you.


So, having this part finished for today, take your seats and drink some champagner. We have reasons to celebrate!

This will be a long night and all of our riders can party tonight as much as they want!

We want to start this with a review of the races, you, our sponsors, have marked as important for us:

In mid-February, the first important race for us was the Volta ao Algarve.

It was told us that we want a top 3 in the general classification there so we sent a strong squad including the best portuguese cyclist in this day: Rui Costa.
After our team brought him in a good position before the final time trial he managed to get a strong second place behind North Korean wonder talent Kim Po-Ding. Next one was the Clasica Almeria where we were expected to get a top 10 result. After a good sprint by Rojas we managed to get 6th.

And then you wanted us to achieve big in the two important stage races so far: Tirreno-Adriatico and Paris-Nice. And to make it short: We destroyed all other participants by winning both.

And then it was time for another classic and another stage race with both races taking place in wonderful Spain. Nearly all of you wanted us to show our jersey in the Volta a Catalunya. After several talks with you, we wanted to get onto the final podium. But unfortunatelly, Benat missed it shortly by getting fourth. We think that we got much race time here so we presented you like you wanted but we missed the needed luck.

And finally it was time for the GP Indurain. You guys, wanted me to win it. And we wanted that, too. The reason is simple: Who else than the best spanish team should win a race named after one of the best spanish cyclists of all time. Unfortunatelly, Alejandro missed the win by a few centimetres after a race where we controlled the peleton all day. Even though we didn't win this one we gave you much television time in spanish TV there.

Having said that i want to continue with some epic moments of the last few months:

But before, I want to talk about the epic moments i want to talk about the horrible moments. We asked our staff members to name their most horrible and most epic moment and made the following ranking:

Damn! Moment #5:




Damn! Moment #4:



Damn! Moment #3:



Damn! Moment #2:



Damn!Moment #1:




These was the moments that our staff members disliked the most but there were other moment's where we could have celebrate more. The top rated results are in the following countdown:

Epic Moment #5



Epic Moment #4



Epic Moment #3



Epic Moment #2



Epic Moment #1



And when looking at these results I have to say that there were much more positive as negativ results...

And before, I continue my moderation today I want to open the buffet.
But before you go there, please fill out your choices for the awards on the voting papers which are under your seat. They will handed out later tonight so please fill them out within the next 60 minutes.

Jesleyh wrote:
Very nice review there
Really looking good.

I was the first one who posted 5 Epic moments though, grr

@ Jesleyh: I know that you were kidding And screenshots will come in a few minutes
@ Dippo: Our doctors don't have the medicine that let Szmyd win any big race. Perhaps he needs too find any virus... (Btw, what is PPRD ?)
@ all : Finally some feedback. Keep it coming

@Dippo You did not get anything wrong. I was just a bit confused somehow
@Ollfardh I think you have to wait a bit longer as the next update is not the last one I am planning to do today

Okay, I hope the buffet tastet everybody so I want to continue with the Fan Picture Contest. We asked our fans via Facebook to send in their best photo of our team and invited the 5 winners today. They get some bonus rewards I will explain in the next minutes.

#5

Price: You will receive a trikot of our team with a signature of every rider from us.


We loved the fact that this photo showed how Rui Costa attacked on the exact place where his name was written over the road.

#4

Price: You will get a new smartphone sponsored by our sponor O2 and a full internet, SMS and telephone flat for the next two years.


This was made during Paris-Nice: It shows the strength Valverde has proven the whole race the best.

#3

Price: Pablo Lastras will come to an signature hour to a place of your choice. The date has to be confirmed by the team. In addition you will get a product of Adidas Eyewear of your choice.


This photo shows the attacking spirit that our riders have proved the whole season till now. Even when this attack by Pablo Lastras wasn't successful we think that this photo is fantastic.


#2

Price: You can chose a one-day-race in the next two months were you want to sit in the car of one of our sport director. Beside, you will get the bike that Alejandro used during the race you made a photo of.


We did not liked the result of this race but we think the photo this fan made is really nice as it shows how close it was.

#1

Price: The Winner of our Fan Photo Contest can sit with one of our director sportives during 7 stages of this year's Giro d'Italia. Please contact us early to say on which stages you want to use it. Beside that, you will get TT bike Valverde used during that stage.


The winning photo is from the time trial in Paris-Nice where Valverde got second and secured the GC win.


In the background you see Maxime, Rui and Eloy still counting out the awards so I present some interesting stats to you:

Selwink wrote:
To who should I sent my personal data? I'd like to receive my 3 prices

of our riders were 23 or younger at the beginning of the season.



wins we could celebrate till today. These divide into 2 GC win, 1 one-day race win, 2 stage win, 1 point jersey, 1 young rider jersey, 2 mountain jersey and two wins of the team classification.



CT racedays we will race in the next 2,5 months



different riders have already scored points for the UCI ranking. This proves how many great riders we have in our squad.



Race days had each of Intxausti, Costa and Cobo in the early season. Noone of our team has had more.



amount of top 5 results we have already achieved in this season:





points per race day Quintana achieved for us. If you want to know how many PPRD every other one in our squad has, take a look at the following table:



I hope you find these stats as interesting as i but now we come to the next highlight today: It's award time:

We already talked about this earlier today and just like our staff you say that Sylvester Szmyd was the most unlucky rider till now. Runner-up by a big margin was Alejandro Valverde for his second place in GP Indurain.



He did not win anything this season but he helped the team by constantly scoring points and getting top ten results: Rui Costa. The second most votes received Andrey Amador who has many good top ten results despite of never been the leader till now.



In a very close vote Pablo Lastras got two votes more then three other riders. Noone stood out but many showed aggressiveness.



Cycling is not only about the best rider but also about the best team mates. We see that every year again and therefore the best team mate gets awarded by us, too. Albert Llanet got one more vote than Benat Intxausti: Congratulations.



He went into the breakaway, fighted until the very end and then outsprinted the others. In a very obvious vote Vladimir Karpets received the majority of votes.



After Tirreno - Adriatico you had no chance to vote another one then Nairo Quintana. He received 98 % of the votes.

This concludes the official part of tonight's gala. I hope you will come again in a few months when we repeat this. Till then, follow our team on TV, Twitter or on our homepage.

And now, i want to ask everyone to switch off their cameras and smartphones. You don't need to worry about nasty pictures tonight.
Enjoy!

@Ollfardh 24 riders is really impressive!

And I hope you know now why i wanted to get the deadline extension I asked for
Most of the texts I had only as notes when i asked you and i did not had the time on monday to publish them one by one over a few hours like i wanted to do so I'm glad you accepted it

Selwink wrote:
How did Quintana get 98% of the votes while Valverde won PN and came 2nd in Indurain?