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[CT] Elta-Hellenic Post
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| aidanvn13 |
Posted on 03-05-2015 13:56
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Classics Specialist
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It's a very "strange" design for a kit. But don't take it in the wrong way, it's absolutely beautiful. Those NCs are just awesome! One of my favourite kits in the whole MG pack. 
Nice to see a team solely committed to Greece. Good luck! Your toughest goal will probably be the KoM jersey in Iceland. It's mostly a lottery when it comes to KoM jerseys in PCM.
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| Ad Bot |
Posted on 21-11-2024 21:25
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 12-05-2015 19:05
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
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@aidanvn13 : Thanks for this comment, i'll tell the shirtmaker about it  As my team will probably be more focused on sprints, you're probably right about the Iceland KoM goal.
At Elta, we were very stressed about the start of the transfer season. But we did a very good saturday, with 7 of the 8 riders targeted joining our team for 2015, an better bid being made on the american Thomas Peterson. He was the only non-greek of our saturday selection, so the first base of Elta-Hellenic is 100% greek.
We start with Perikles Ilias. After the disbandment of Magna-Ryanair, the 29 years old rider went to free agency. Quite strange, nobody except us made a bid on this decent fight and hilly cyclist. He should assure us some good points on tough races.
7 years older, Vasileois Simantirakis also signed a one year contract. Despite his start of decline. He still can produce a good cyclism on the mountain races. He seems to have the motivation to take part to a lot of breakaways troughout the season.
For easier stages, we managed to get the two best greek sprinters behind Georgos Tzortzakis. We are of course talking about Christos Volikakis and Apostolos Bouglas. The first is a pure sprinter, while the other can pass over some hills.
Apart from them, we also got the cobble racer Georgios Karatzios, the rouleur Neofytos Sakellaridis and the all-rounder Ioannis Tamouridis.
Other free agents are on their way to Greece, and deals has been made with some teams. Stay tuned !
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 13-05-2015 21:49
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Domestique
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An other group of riders incoming !
Saturday, we had probably the best free agents we could afford to sign. We now have to expand our team with a couple of other riders.
Our first target was Petros Gkazonis. He doesn't have an extraordinary level, but he will be helpful when the races will become harder. After him comes Christos Katrakis. He's one of the best greeks when time-trials happens. He's also a good fighter who likes breakaways. We also get an interesting leadout for Volikakis : Ioannis Drakakis. He have an excellent stamina, to ride more than his rivals of the CT. Konstantinos Efstathiou is also here for the sprints, and will try to get decent results of TTs. Georgios Bouglas is a little less faster than his brother Apostolos, but will try to do all he can to imitate him. To finish, we signed two foreigners : Clive Ebejer from Malta, and Timotheos Skettos from Cyprus.
There is now 14 cyclists in this team, and 4 riders are nearly sure of being part of this adventure !
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| sgdanny |
Posted on 13-05-2015 21:52
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 3591
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Really nice team and will be fun to follow
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| Ian Butler |
Posted on 13-05-2015 21:56
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Tour de France Champion
Posts: 21854
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Love your Greek enthusiasm here.
It reminds me a lot about my own team, so I really like what you're doing here
Unfortunately, I don't know any of these riders, but I guess I'll get to know them  |
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 19-05-2015 13:38
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
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@sgdanny : it's always fun with little countires
@Ian Butler : I only heard about half of them ^^ Thanks for your comment 
19 cyclists for a great season !
After getting an important number of free agents from Greece, Cyprus and Malta, we had chats with other teams from various countries. Like this, we got 4 new riders : Vassilis Adamou (Euskaltel), Aleksejs Saramotins (ELKO) and Jaroslav Kulhavy (ONCE) signed a one year-contract. They flew to Greece with Kyriakos Skettos, on loan from Chernobyl, and the spanish Juan Carlos Rienda, who finds a team after the disbandment of Santander.
With 19 riders, the Elta team is ready for 2015. We have good cyclists for a new team, and could get interesting results in nearly all races. More detailed previews will probably come, together with the race selections.
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 25-06-2015 18:07
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Domestique
Posts: 423
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While some other rookie teams are showing their successful new riders on a lot of early races, the greek team of Elta-Hellenic Post struggled in the first two months with only 2 races : the Clasico San Cristobal in Cuba and the Barcelona Classic near to Montjuic. We didn't catch any breakaway and didn't open our scoreboard too. Jaroslav Kulhavy missed the good attack on the caribbean hills, and finished about 8 minutes behind the first winner of the season, the portuguese José Mendes of Severstal-Mercator. A month after, we got back on the road in the Barcelona Classic, but the peloton was cut and our hopes of points for Volikakis and Apostolos Bouglas were over. Only Drakakis and our loanee Kyriakos Skettos could follow the peloton, and took the 50th and the 64th of this C1 classic. We're aiming to be in better shape on our races in march and april, when we'll ride more than in the first months.
Mendes created a 1 minute-gap to assure his win in front of Rabon and Acevedo.
An impressive sprint from Daryl Impey leads the south african to his first win of the 2015 season.
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| knockout |
Posted on 25-06-2015 18:14
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Grand Tour Champion
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Those PCS images look awesome!
Slow start of the season But that can turn quickly. Especially with the huge amount of Breakaway wins every race can be the one to change it
A Big Thank You To All MG Reporters! |
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| LeSuisse |
Posted on 25-06-2015 18:28
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Amateur
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Résultats difficiles pour mon équipe préférée mais on y croit ! On espère plus de succès sur les prochaines courses
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| Silvio Herklotz |
Posted on 26-06-2015 02:30
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Protected Rider
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those images are pretty cool. Like them very much.
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 16-07-2015 13:41
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Domestique
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@knockout : Thanks When is my Giro del Trentino, i think i'm not far from my first victory
@LeSuisse : Merci But maybe in english next time ? ^^
@Silvio Herklotz : Thank you
An hopeful ride in Trentino
Since we raced only for days since the start of the season, we wanted to get our first points on the slopes of the Trentino. We came with our best climbers Kulhavy and Rienda, but also riders like Volikakis and Simantirakis. The inaugural team time-trial but us about 30 seconds behind all the other favorites, while Wilmann of Akzonobel was taking the yellow jersey. On the second stage, Vasileios Simantirakis took the breakaway, and, with Giger of Actavis, finished only one minute behind the stage winner, Mikel Nieve (Indosat). The third day, we saw a bunch sprint dominated by the australian Michael Matthews (Compal). Volikakis seemed to be out of shape, but Simantirakis took a surprising 13th place. The next day, Vassilis Adamou went into the breakaway, and was helpful for Jaroslav Kulhavy who attacked at the start of the final climb, but got beaten on the line by Novak (In-n-Out) and Anacona (De Laval). Simantirakis finished just behind and kept a place in the Top 5. Unfortunaly for us, he was tired on the last stage, finished far behind Pierre Rolland (Generali) and went down to 13th overall. Kulhavy was very close to the Top 10, as he went back to Greece with the 11th place.
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 17-07-2015 20:58
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Domestique
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Joined: 27-01-2013
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When we built our planning, we forgot that the Giro del Trentino was followed just one day after by the GP Tokyo. That would explain our globally bad performance from Christos Volikakis (last in 160th place) and Kyriakos Skettos (134th), who had to fly quickly to Japan just after the final stage in Trentino. Only one of our riders followed the insane pace of this long race : Ioannis Drakakis. He did what he could and finished 20th. It's a easy win for Michael Matthews (Compal) in front of Ben King (Gatorade) and Matteo Pelucchi (Lierse SK), despite attacks by Strava and Team Type 1 cyclists. We hope to take some points on our last race of march, the Seskin Classic.
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 23-07-2015 21:39
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Domestique
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A solo ride for Karatzios
This race has a very high level with some top puncheurs of PCT, and we asked a wildcard for it. We hoped for a breakaway, and it happened. But not one followed Georgios Karatzios, who had to ride nearly all the race alone. We weren't that far from a big surprise in Ireland, as our rider got caught by the winning trio in the final climb, at 5 kilometers from the finish. Georgios finally finished in favorites' peloton, 51 seconds behind Monfort, who beat Wilco Kelderman and Jonathan Bellis on the finish line. The photo finished had a problem, so we only know the rankings of 3 Elta boys : Karatzios is 14th, Ilias 48th and Tamouridis 49th. It's now time to go to Belarus for the Zimnyanya GP, while the best riders of the WorldTour peloton will start the Giro in Greece !
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| The Rider |
Posted on 24-07-2015 17:32
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Grand Tour Specialist
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Very nice reviews so far, roro. I especially like the written passages.
After a slow start, mainly because you haven't raced much(!), things are looking up with some decent results in Trentino and a great showing at the Seskin Classic. |
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 30-07-2015 17:33
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
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@The Rider : Thanks a lot I hope to take my first win in Langkawi with Rienda, he is doing great there right now
Looking forward for better sprints
Christos Volikakis hasn't been who we want him to be since the beggining of the season, and this race was the one for him : no hills and not too long. But again, he was not there while all his rivals were present for the final sprint. His supposed leadouts had to make a huge effort to take his place, and can't make better that 34th (K.Skettos) and 35th (Drakakis). Apostolos Bouglas and Ioannis Tamouridis were also ghosts on this belarusian race. And it probably won't be better on the Cauberg Classic in ten days...
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| sgdanny |
Posted on 31-07-2015 14:53
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Classics Specialist
Posts: 3591
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Gratz on having two guys on the podium in Langkawi, though would've enjoyed sharing it rather than being left out
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 31-07-2015 19:46
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
PCM$: 200.00
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@sgdanny : Ahah, i didn't expect to get two guys on a single podium And i put Skettos on the 6th stage podium too
Jaroslav Kulhavy and Periklis Ilias weren't registered on this race, so we planned in the bus to take a breakaway that would reach the finish line first. But we failed to get in it, so we just saw the race from behind, with only Georgios Karatzios not doing too bad (46th at 3'57). The swedish Matthias Wengelin took the win in solo for Carlsberg in front of Capecchi and Rabon. To illustrate our bad day, Konstantinos Efstathiou even got overlaped by Wengelin in the Cauberg ! Will Rienda and Volikakis race better and bring back some points in Athens from Langkawi ?
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 06-08-2015 13:08
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
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We were coming to Malaysia with a lot of doubts, but it quickly dissapeared (at least in mountains). Juan Carlos Rienda was making is first race as a leader for Elta, and assumed his responsabilities in the 2 difficult stages. On the 3rd day, he missed the good attack but finished in the top 5, in front of a lot of other climbers. And two stages after, we put 2 riders on the podium ! Petros Gkazonis dropped his breakaway companions, and was caught not far from the line by Atapuma and...Rienda, who jumped in the 3rd place overall, that he would keep till the end. While we calmed down in the 6th stage, our loanee Kyriakos Skettos went in the front, and finished second just behind Jonathan Millan from OTP. For the rest of the tour, it was just sprints, and Volikakis was still not good, not doing better than a 19th place. April is now over, let's go for May and races in Germany, Japan or even Namibia !
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| roro_352 |
Posted on 09-12-2015 20:22
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Domestique
Posts: 423
Joined: 27-01-2013
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National Championships to finish the year
We couldn't have dreamt a better ending to season than a win in our home national championship. With 12 of our cyclists on the starting line, we had a big chance to win today. And after a breakaway with Katrakis and Karatzios being better climbers than Vlatos (Festina), it was easy to guess in which team was the winner. Katrakis was favourite, but Karatzios made the better sprint and will wear the blue and white jersey for one year. We don't forget the good results of Simantirakis and Katrakis, 2nd and 4th behind the untouchable Vlatos, and the easy titles of Clive Ebejer in Malta.
Important news : The jerseys that our team will wear next season won't be made by Jésus de Nazareth. Who can it be then ?
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