I thought there was an issue with Nizzolo that I missed something...
And why too early?
I don't know
I usually only present the new signings during the transfer period (not this year though) and tend to let the actual presentation for a moment closer to the start of the season
Lucas Schädlich is our strongest German rider for 2014 and our power horse in all TTT`s. With 26 years of age he still belongs to the younger riders of course.
We hope to get several top results in ITT`s with him as also small hopes for the German ITT Championship.
He joins the team together with Roux from Bacardi - Itera.
Tom Dumoulin
24 years - 70fl, 76tt, 76prl
50.000€
4.94 exp
Tom Dumoulin was our last signing and it actually took quite a while until the deal was done due to other FA activity.
The young Dutch is not yet maxed and should be even stronger next year, though he will already be a nice addition in 2014 as the team is riding a lot of TTT`s.
He joins the team from Puma - SAP.
Christian Müller
32 years - 68fl, 75tt, 75prl
50.000€
Christian Müller is our veteran in the TT area. He is supposed to lead our young TT talents to improve as good as possible.
We considered him pretty early in transfers and signed him in the first week on the FA market.
Berden De Vries
25 years - 68fl, 74tt, 74prl
50.000€
Berden De Vries joined our team quite anonymously. He wasn`t really scouted before and in the search for some time trialists we came up with the Dutch.
Unfortunately he is already maxed, so there is not much chance to see him improved but for 2014 he belongs into our TTT plans.
Frederik Frison
22 years - 68fl, 72tt, 72prl
50.000€
3.0 exp
Frederik Frison could probably also be listed in the talent presentation as he is one of our youngest riders with 22 years only. But as pure time trialist we decided to mention him here.
At the moment he is not one of the strongest, but we will give him enough races to collect the needed experience to improve. In 1-2 seasons we hope to have a valuable time trialist with him.
He arrived in a swap deal with Team Bpost who get the more ready Michiel Van Aelbroeck.
Daan Olivier is without a doubt our biggest talent and goes into his 2nd season with us.
He also is our youngest rider this season and so next to his helper roles for our climbers he is supposed to go for a top10 in Avenir. Next year then we hope for a top 5 or even the podium there.
We don`t expect big results from him in his PT debut but hope that he can play a nice role already.
Thomas Koep
24 years - 73mo, 72hi, 70tt
58.000€
4.33 exp
Thomas Koep is in his 3rd season with the team even though he was on a loan deal with Vesuvio last year. So he already collected experience in the PT.
In 2014 he is said to ride his first Grand Tour though. With one step lef we are really looking forward to his season and even more to next year.
Kristian Sbaragli
24 years - 72fl, 72sp, 74acc
50.000€
3.8 exp
Kristian Sbarabli is in his 2nd season and is a big sprinter talent even though he sees himself more as a leadout rider later being able to position his leader perfectly.
As one of our Italian talents he of course hopes to ride the biggest Italian races, but at the moment it`s not sure if he can make it into the Giro squad.
Davide Villella
23 years - 70fl, 72hi, 76acc
63.000€
3.17 exp
Davide Villella is our 2nd Italian talent. Last year he was loaned to Kappa - ENI and was already able to celebrate his first professional win, which was a nice surprise for us.
This year we expect him to go into breakaways and make the next step, which will be becoming a valuable puncheur for the biggest classics and stage races.
Francesco Bongiorno
24 years - 74mo, 71hi, 65tt
60.000€
3.25 exp
Francesco Bongiorno is one of Italy`s best climbing talents and already a decent climber in his young age.
He is riding with us on a loan deal with Puma - SAP, where he will ride again next season.
Here he already gets the chance to ride the biggest races including the Grand Tours.
Youcef Reguigui
24 years - 70fl, 71mo, 69tt
50.000€
3.01 exp
Youcef Reguigui is another loaned in talent from Jaguar - Eritel. He is our only Non-European in the squad but as we like to improve the cycling quality in Africa we are happy to have him here.
He is the strongest in the mountains but in general seems to become a decent stage racer for smaller races in especially.
The full team has been announced now and we are very happy with it.
In especially reducing the number of different countries worked pretty well in the end with the big focus on 4 Nations: Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium.
As a team obviously needs some helpers, we also signed 2 Spaniards and 1 French rider. Reguigui on loan is an exception.
First page also updated with roster information etc.
Now that the transfers are gone, all riders have signed their contracts. Even though our headquarter in the Black Forest is a perfect training area, most riders are still in their holidays or riding in their home countries.
Exceptions are our five German riders and the three loaned in riders as signing contracts did took a bit longer for those. So a full squad of 8 riders was able to present our 2014 equipment for the first time.
Thurau and Koep going over the Black Forest hills the fastest
Sprinters Guardini, Krieger and TT specialist Schädlich a bit behind
All 8 riders did train well during their holidays and have already a decent fitness level. Everybody is waiting for the season to kick off with the Badaling International in China although not all will start their season that early obviously.
Not in the Black Forest yet, but also being caught on camera, our two Dutch time trialists Martijn Keizer and Lars Boom. Both prepare their season in the Netherlands at the moment.
Having our newest TT equipment already, they did a first test on those bikes.
And it did not take long until the first pictures made by some pedestrians were published in the social media. So here they are. The first pictures of our TT equipment on the road.
Lars Boom and Martijn Keizer on the TT bikes
After seeing our equipment the first time on the road, we again have to thank designer OlegTinkov for that great work. We think that the jerseys and equipment can be seen within the peloton nicely. In especially the lovely beer lady on the back should be a nice picture from the helicopter view.
With those shots we most likely say goodbye until the season start in China. So let a (hopefully successful) nice first PT season start!
The first PT race in 2014 is just like last year the Badaling International in China. The hilly opener is a great chance for the divisions best puncheurs to test themselves.
We send more or less our best possible squad there hoping for a good result. With 6 new riders and comebacker Villella we will ride the race. Only Daan Olivier is not making his debut in our team colours. So we might not see the best understanding that early in the season but nevertheless our minimum goal is a top 15.
Luis Leon Sanchez Gil
Leader
Anthony Roux
Co-Leader
Björn Thurau
Free Role
Alessandro Ballan
Free Role
Davide Villella
Domestique
Daan Olivier
Domestique
Ruben Bongiorno
Domestique
Frederik Frison
Domestique
Tour of Qatar
Is it a sprinter race or one for the prologue specialists? Probably a mix of it even though the very best bonus second collectors might surely have good chances to stay on the podium in the end.
As we did not have one of those best sprinters, we decided to send our time trialists here next to our young sprinters.
So Lucas Schädlich, Lars Boom and Tom Dumoulin have their race debut here as also our top sprinter Andrea Guardini.
It`s hard to predict the race outcome here, so setting a goal wasn`t easy neither. A top15 surely is wanted as also a good result in the time trial and eventually a top 10 in the sprint stages. But at least having some point scorers is important for us here.
Guardini against the man he'll replace next season in Qatar will be nice, hope to see both him and Haussler do well. Looking forward to hopefully some good results for your team from him
@jph27: Can`t say Guardini did too well. His only mention was when he was dropped in 5 panflat stages. Haussler neither performed a lot.
Race Summary: January
Badaling International
The season opener was a first test for our hilly leaders. So Luis Leon Sanchez Gil was the clear leader here with Anthony Roux being his lieutenant for most of the season.
The race itself was very hard as the pace was high for most of the time. In especially in the last kilometers when several groups chased each other, there was no time to rest.
Luckily Luis Leon was able to jump into one of those groups, while Roux missed the opportunity. So in the end when the groups refusioned he was able to sprint for a good result. Ending in 13th position in a sprint of 20 riders was the maximum and we are very happy with that result.
The winner of the 2014 Badaling International is veteran and living Man Game legend Frank Schleck, who was able to create a gap in the end to celebrate a solo win ahead of the group.
Another mention has to go to Daan Olivier. As 37th he overperformed today and gave us a good sign of his talent.
"I had good legs today and was able to ride with the best. Unfortunately Anthony did not feel that well so early, but with Daan and Björn I had solid support in the final and was able to save as much energy as possible", Luis Leon Sanchez Gil said to a Spanish newspaper.
1
Frank Schleck
Vesuvio - Accumalux
2
Jan Bakelants
Bouygues Telecom
3
Damiano Cunego
Lotto - Australia Post
4
Damiano Caruso
Good Energy
5
Alejandro Valverde
Team Vueling Airlines
6
Yuri Trofimov
Tinkoff Credit Systems Bank
7
Tejay Van Garderen
Wikipedia
8
Francesco Ginanni
Pokerstars.com
9
Riccardo Ricco
Festina-Canal+
10
Aleksandar Flügel
VolksWagen-Mapei
...
13
Luis Leon Sanchez Gil
Rothaus - Aegon
37
Daan Olivier
Rothaus - Aegon
59
Björn Thurau
Rothaus - Aegon
84
Francesco Bongiorno
Rothaus - Aegon
100
Davide Villella
Rothaus - Aegon
116
Anthony Roux
Rothaus - Aegon
161
Frederik Frison
Rothaus - Aegon
176
Alessandro Ballan
Rothaus - Aegon
Tour of Qatar
Our ambitions were to ride decent sprints with Guardini and a top10 result with Schädlich in the GC.
In the end this only worked a bit.
When coming to the sprints we have to say, that we can`t be happy as the team did not even try to sprint. Once Schädlich was going for it on his own but did not have the speed to perform very well. Guardini did usually hide somewhere back in the peloton.
Due to splits our time trial duo Schädlich and Boom though made the step into the top10 already before the last stage, where we had high hopes to get our first top10 stage result of the season. Unfortunately Schädlich only finished on a bit disappointing 11th, while Boom wasn`t even a top30 rider in the end, which was caused by a bad form and some headwind most likely. Tom Dumoulin was our 3rd rider being able to avoid splits on all previous stages and was just a bit slower than his country man.
So speaking about stage results a very anonymous race by us. But when looking at the final GC, the team is pretty happy.
Schädlich just finished inside the top10 while Boom and a strong Dumoulin finished the race as 17th/18th. So some solid point scoring here and hopefully we can get our first top10 stage in February, where we actually are quite optimistic for good results in the triple header.
Dumoulin as 2nd in the U25 ranking and a 4th in the team rankings also to mention as we get some bonus points that way.
Pretty decent results in the opener, especially as its going to be the toughest puncheur field aside the Ardennes I'd think.
Qatar went well too, I think the last stage had to feel pretty disappointing but at the end its still decent amount of points gained. It's a bright start and definitely right way to avoid relegation
Thanks Alakagom. Feel as you said. Looked disappointing and was a bit as well, as a better result was very close. But in the end some solid scoring. If I can continue like this, it might become a better season than expected. But coming to the mountains I don`t expect a lot of good results and moving backwards quickly.
Race Preview: February
Chrono des Herbiers
I would lie, when saying that we don`t have ambitions here. Time trials are an important point scoring pool for us this season and so we send our strongest three riders to France.
Schädlich had two consecutive top10`s here as 8th and 6th. It will be hard to repeat last years result with the huge field of time trialists in the PT. But then again a late top10 - early top15 is his goal. And with Keizer we even got a stronger time trialist at the start, who was also able to top10 here once, who definitely aims for another top10 in his Rothaus debut.
Lars Boom`s ITT in Qatar was disappointing, no question. But his form should be better now and so he also aims a top25 here. In total we should score a good amount of points here even though a podium or top5 might be too hard against the likes of Coppel, Cancellara, Fiedler, Phinney?, Zabriskie, Cornu, Kittel...
Martijn Keizer
Leader
Lucas Schädlich
Co-Leader
Lars Boom
Co-Leader
Tirreno-Adriatico
The Tirreno - Adriatico starts the triple PT header with clashing races Paris - Nice and Catalunya. Surprisingly though we were able to send 3 pretty all around teams to all three with a GC leader and sprinter, while not even using Martijn Keizer! So we have some hopes to score decent in all 3, while other more one dimensional teams might score better in one of those but less in others.
In Italy we send a strong containing 4 Italians, which was important to us and due to our growing amount of Italians, this wasn`t too difficult.
Our leading duo though are Lars Boom and Anthony Roux, in one of his pretty rare chances to go on his own. Both are decent puncheurs, who might not be able to go with the best but surprise here and there. Both have some kind of free roles here and time will tell, who is the main leader. Goal is a top20-25 only here and so it`s the weakest expectation in that week.
For the sprints we hope to be much more challenging than in Qatar and we again send Guardini to go for top10 results. With great support by Ballan, Nooytens and Sbaragli, positioning should be the biggest problem for him.
Completing the roster is loanie Bongiorno, who gets a chance to ride in his home country as well mainly supporting the two leaders but also having chances to join breakaways.
Lars Boom
Leader
Anthony Roux
Leader
Andrea Guardini
Sprinter
Alessandro Ballan
Free Role
Francesco Bongiorno
Domestique
Kristian Sbaragli
Domestique
Sven Nooytens
Domestique
Paris-Nice
Paris - Nice is the most mountaineous race this week and this also let us consider to avoid sending our strongest rider in Keizer as we expect a climber packed field here. So it`s our 2nd climber Gomez Marchante getting a chance to lead our team. He actually has a good history in that race with a 5th and 7th in the GC as also a stage win. Being that high in the end would be a surprise but a top15 is possible we hope.
Therefore the hilly stages are the important ones. If he can avoid huge time loss there and then fighting for every second in the two mountain stages, he could have a nice race.
As there is a TTT here we support him with strong time trialists in Schädlich, Dumoulin, Müller and Frison. Won`t be enough to go for a top result there but might reduce the loss.
Reguigui and Villella are still talents but will also help Gomez Marchante in the uphill stages as long as possible, while Alex Krieger has one of the very few chances to lead our sprint team. Due to only 2 sprint stages here we hope for a less contested field and eventually some decent results by our young German.
Jose Angel Gomez Marchante
Leader
Alexander Krieger
Sprinter
Davide Villella
Domestique
Lucas Schädlich
Domestique
Tom Dumoulin
Domestique
Christian Müller
Domestique
Frederik Frison
Domestique
Youcef Reguigui
Domestique
Volta Ciclista a Catalunya
The Volta Ciclista a Catalunya probably the race with the biggest ambitions. Luis Leon Sanchez Gil is riding his home race in the hope to reach a top10, which might be possible on that course.
With Olivier, Koep and Thurau he has three talents to support him. All are decent puncheurs and should stay with him until the final. So hopefully this leads to some scoring for our team.
The sprints are for our new sprinter Nizzolo, who makes his debut here. So we don`t now what to expect. Two very flat stages might suit him and so we hope for decent results. Berden De Vries and Sep Vanmarcke mainly will be here to support him or eventually join a breakaway.
Luis Leon Sanchez Gil
Leader
Giacomo Nizzolo
Sprinter
Thomas Koep
Domestique
Björn Thurau
Domestique
Daan Olivier
Domestique
Sep Vanmarcke
Domestique
Berden De Vries
Domestique
Milano - San Remo
Milano - San Remo. Our win goal! Well. This was at times, when Bellis still was our leader.
So we don`t expect to fulfill that goal any longer. But still we send our strongest squad in the hope to get a nice result. Therefore we go the all hilly way without a sprinter to avoid a double tactic that fails in the end.
Luis Leon Sanchez Gil also leads us here in the hope for a late attack. Also Roux or Boom could do well here in case they have still good legs in the end.
Former MSR winner Ballan comes back to one of his favourite races in the hope to help the team with his experience. And then you never know. When feeling well, he could still throw in a huge attack.
Supporting the team are our roleurs Vanmarcke, Nooytens, Thurau and Villella. The depth here hopefully helps us a lot and makes us stay with the favourites for a long time.
I won`t say a goal here as it`s too unpredictable. If the tactic works a bit, then a good result hopefully can be reached. But it could also end in a fiasco when other teams make it a sprinter race. This is to avoid by us.
Great reviews and previews, i enjoyed reading it. Not a bad start for a PT newbie team in first two races, shame that ITT in Qatar did not went so good as expected for Rothaus.
I will see you in Herbiers and Catalunya as our wildcards, Mr. Ignatiev says hello.
The Giro d'Italia is not far from us and the first Grand Tour of the Year will also be the first GT ever for our team.
We never asked for a wildcard to the biggest stage races in cycling but now being in the Pro Tour it`s obvious that we are riding.
Even though our team improved a lot in the climbing area, it`s still far from being a GT team. Neither do we have a top10 climber, nor a sprinter for the top3 of a stage. But we see it as new challenge and have sent strong teams to all GT`s of the season.
That said it`s Spanish veteran Gomez Marchante, who is responsible to show our colours in the Italian mountains. The field is expected to be as strong as a GT deserves, so we can`t really hope for the to spots. But being somewhere around the top15-20 would be a good GT debut. As last preperation he is racing the Tour de Romandie at the moment fine tuning his form.
Other than that we have send out best sprinter Guardini to this race, who is hoping for some sprint results even though there are not many opportunities in this years editon. But seeing him fighting for some stage results would be great to see.
But obviously our biggest hope is a stage win and therefore we have send some nice riders, who are expected to try their luck in all those breakaways. With Ballan, Thurau and Villella we have some experts for this and expect them to be seen a lot.
But while Bongiorno easily could have replaced Reguigui here obviously, it did not 100% work with their season schedules and experience plans.
And Nizzolo would have been great but having 2 similar sprinters while not the very best is rarely a smart thing to do. So I decided for loaned in rider Guardini and give Nizzolo a chance after being maxed.
But obviously you see how my team is moving from Germany/Benelux a bit towards Italy, while I still planning to keep the actual focus but to add one country. Edited by roturn on 19-09-2014 11:07
The Giro just finished and here a short recap.
The first two weeks pretty much went very disappointing with only 2-3 breakaway appearances and weak climbing by our leader Gomez Marchante, which moved him out of the top40 for a while.
Additional our young talent Villella unfortunately crashed and was suffering from an injury since then.
The 2nd week ended with 3 abandons as our sprinter Guardini was not able to make it inside the time limit just like his team mates Sbaragli in his GT debut and Ballan.
And the 3rd week did not really went any better as the 15th stage also saw our riders Krieger and great fighting Villella to fall out of the time limit. So with only 3 riders left everything looked like an awful GT debut even though Gomez Marchante for the first time showed climbing form as 16th on that stage moving up to 24th in the GC not far from our top20 goal.
Unfortunately though the 16th stage was the only real flat stage and as we lost our two sprinters on the previous days, we went to this stage without any hope.
But then the whole Giro totally changed for us. The 17th stage was the last hill stage and so we expected to eventually drop a bit again, but Gomez Marchante proved us wrong. He followed the attacks and joined the fight for the KoM jersey. Also he proved to be one of the strongest this day and only Popovych was able to go with him to fight for the stage win, which in the end was taken by our Spaniard, who was able to celebrate his 3rd GT stage win and the first one in the Giro.
Gomez Marchante beating Popovych to win Stage 17 in the Giro d'Italia
Being 6th in the KoM competition and as 21st in the GC, Gomez Marchante decided to repeat his KoM hunt on the next day, one of the hardest in the Giro. And after taking enough points during the stage to take over the KoM lead, he was also the last breakaway rider staying ahead of GC leader Cunego to take his 2nd win. So within two days the Giro became sensational for us. With this win he also climbed up to 19th overall being right where we wanted him.
Gomez Marchante also wins the 18th stage ahead of Cunego
While the 19th stage was a stage to rest a bit, the 20th stage was again one for our team. Once more Gomez Marchante proved his brilliant 3rd week form as he joined the breakaway also on this one. Different to the other two stages though, he was not the strongest. This time the Russian Kolesnikov attacked an he was not able to follow. But as 2nd he once again gained important time and delivered a strong stage result. It also saw him moving up one more position to 18th.
Gomez Marchante only beaten by Kolesnikov on the 20th stage
The last stage was a time trial, where he secured the 18th in the GC as also the dominant KoM win. Afterwards he was having a nice hotel room party with the only two remaining helpers: Thurau and Reguigui. In especially the Algerian loanie from Jaguar - Eritel was an important piece of our Giro lineup being the luxury domestique GM needed in severaly mountain stages, while Thurau was one of his important domestiques on all other terrain. Due to the abandons unfortunately those two weren`t able to get a lot of freedom on their own, but reaching our team goals in the end was a good bonus.
Also scoring wise the race became successful as Gomez Marchante was the 6th best scorer in total moving our team into the middle of the Giro scoring ranking.
Gomez Marchante celebrates the KoM win in the Giro 2014
Winner of the Giro was Damiano Cunego, who proved to be the King of the Giro by beating Pluchkin and Madrazo.
Since our last Giro update many races have been finished in June. There would be the 2nd GT with the Vuelta a Espana, the clashing Tour de Suisse and Dauphine and yesterdays classic Grand Duche in Luxembourg as also the cobbled opener in Italy Strada Appia Antica.
This recap will look back to the results we have reached there in the close fight against relegation.
Strada Appia Antica
To start the recap, our cobblers got yet another chance. While not having the very best, our depth worked well for us in this race. With Vanmarcke as leader but Ballan, Nooytens and Boom being strong domestiques, who all could get a good result on their own, we wanted a top10 here.
During the race it became obvious that Ballan and Boom were the main support and they did a great job while still finishing just inside or outside the top30.
Late in the race Nooytens looked really strong being at times a group ahead of Vanmarcke actually. It was a stunning performance by the Belgium but could not avoid the final attacks by the big favourites Bewley, Cancellara etc. that decided the race.
But in the first big group behind those, our duo Vanmarcke/Nooytens has found a good position for the sprint and it was again Nooytens to impress. Behind sprinting cobblers Blythe and Breschel he finished as 8th just ahead of our leader Vanmarcke making it two in the top10 and an awesome race in general beating a few stronger cobblers such as Vanspeybrouck or Burghardt.
Vuelta a Espana
With a great Giro d'Italia performance Gomez Marchante was also our leader in his home GT and our sponsor was hoping for a Top10 result here, which was rather difficult to reach though.
First we have to admit that point wise this Vuelta was quite disappointing as it was similar to the first 2 Giro weeks with less interest in the breakaways and if one of ours was in the group, it was for no pointers or a peloton catch.
But the GC looked pretty fine with Gomez Marchante just outside the top10 for most of the race. In the end he could not close the gap and so he finished on a good 13th as 4th best Spaniard and improved by 5 positions in comparison to the Giro.
So who had expected a Rothaus rider in the top20 twice in this years GT's so far after two years of ignoring the mountains completely?
Different to the Giro though GM was not as offensive as hoped and so he could not fight for the KoM jersey and neither coming close to a stage win. So his 13th in the GC more or less is our only point collection.
It also must be mentioned that our young riders were of great help and also finished the race: Olivier, Bongiorno, Reguigui and Thurau with Krieger just missing the time cut at the last mountain stage unfortunately. Earlier our other two sprinters Guardini and Nizzolo already had to leave the race for the same reason.
Tour de Suisse
Once more and the third consecutive stage race, it was Gomez Marchante to represent our colours. Different to others, who want to reach their top form for the Tour de France, he will get a rest afterwards.
The race itself was comparable with the Vuelta as he was just outside the top10 and again finished in 13th spot within one minute to the 11th unfortunately.
Criterium du Dauphine Libere
With two mountain stages but also a very difficult hilly stage and some focus on time trialing, we decided to send Luis Leon Sanchez as team leader. The Spaniard was impressive so far this season and was not disappointing us.
Pre season we had high hopes to get many points out of this race but after seeing the startlist we were no longer as confident.
That said the hilly stage played out nicely as hoped and gave him a nice gap to some of the better climbers.
Even though the loss on the mountain stage had to be expected the final time trial saw a strong finish by him as 4th on the stage and a result of 7th in the GC. Unfortunately though he was just 5s behind Gesink and 8s behind Sicard and even the 4th Rujano was only 35s away.
So while getting a nice result as we had hoped for, this could be considered a bit of bad luck seeing us so close behind in both stage races.
Classique du Grand-Duche
To finish the June races, we head towards Luxembourg for the Grand Duche Classic, which is similar to Liege Bastogne Liege for example.
So yet another race for our leading scorer so far: Luis Leon Sanchez with nice support by our hilly team Roux, Boom etc.
The race itself, we did not show our jerseys a lot, which might be considered a bit negative on the first view. Then again I call it smart riding as the competition in those kind of races is just too strong and attacking too early rarely helped in those races this season.
So both LLS and Roux did try to stay with their group and did not follow the strongest puncheurs. In the end LLS sprinted in the first big group to 13th (once again bad luck 13th this month I guess) but within the same time as the 4th, while Roux won the sprint of the 2nd group just seconds behind solist Gastauer for 19th. Boom coming in minutes later but within the 3rd group as 34th also has to be mentioned, so a good race in general.
Tour de France Preview
Last but not least the biggest cycling event is soon to be started. Sooner than you might think.
As said, it`s not Gomez Marchante with the GT triple for us. And it`s not Luis Leon Sanchez neither, who gets a full season focussing on the shorter stage races and classics.
Our leader is Martijn Keizer, who used the Tour of California as last preperation, where he did finish on a strong 4th behind 3 well known stage racers Phinney/Gesink/Velits and ahead of some, that might be his direct opponents in the Tour de France.
Unfortunately our mountain depth is not as impressive as possible and without LLS and GM, there is no real luxury domestique for him. So the combination of young talent Thomas Koep and Lars Boom must be enough for him late in the mountain stages.
With one TTT on the block and Keizer being an excellent time trialist himself we decided to give him the best possible support (not as much as in the TTT classic though). This means also at the start we will see Lucas Schädlich, Tom Dumoulin and Frederik Frison. Obviously with those talents, we will not see their best result yet as it might take another year to their full strength.
For the sprints Nizzolo will get his chance and eventually grab a top10. That he will stay in the race until Paris seems rather unlikely after his Vuelta disqualification after missing the time cut. But he will surely try.
Last but not least we had to bring our only French rider to this race. Anthony Roux will mainly support Keizer in his weakest terrain, the hills. Other than that we hope to see him aggressive on many stages fighting for a stage win or good results on his own. He is normally a perfect rider to do so and his home GT should give him yet another boost.
Our goal? Well, a stage win would obviously be perfect but hard to get with better sprinters, climbers, puncheur and despite having two experts, also time trialists.
GC wise we hope for another top20 in a field, that is expected to be the strongest of all GT`s. If we get this, we might even end this season with a top20 in every single stage race, which shows our biggest plus this season: team depth.
It will certainly be an interesting opening TTT, there really is a great chance for the winning team to score a fair few points early on in the race. Rothaus could be an outsider there, it depends how the non TTists hold you back.
I think Roux has good chances of a stage win somewhere - also Keizer could do a Gomez Marchante of course. It could also be a quiet race for Rothaus much like the Vuelta.
Lucas Schädlich
Tom Dumoulin
Frederik Frison
Kristian Sbaragli
Youcef Reguigui
Badaling International 
Luis Leon Sanchez Gil
Anthony Roux
Tour of Qatar 
Frank Schleck
Yuri Trofimov
Tejay Van Garderen
Sam Bewley
Fabian Cancellara
