Hi guys, it's MitchNL, and I'm gonna take you with me on this journey, where we will follow the career of two major cycling talents. However, there's something unusual about this story, 'cause these two promising kids are hailing from a country where cycling is extremely popular, yet this country doesn't have a professional cycling team, let alone a professional cyclist. I'm talking about Andorra.
This story is about the cycling careers of Sebastián Tavares and Imanol Izquierdo. Two talents who did perform well in some small youth races, and that made some teams from the Continental Tour interested in these best mates. They eventually chose to ride for the Burgos BH - Castilla team, since there are a lot of promising youngsters in this team, and they saw it as a nice way to develop themselves. That's also the goal of this story: develop this guys into top class riders, so that Andorra can have it's successes in cycling too.
Story Information
Spoiler
Database:
PCM.daily Expansion Pack for Patch 1.4.0.0.
Development of Attributes:
0.6
Difficulty:
Hard
I hope you guys are going to enjoy this as much as I’m gonna do. Well, I guess I'm ready with this pre-prologue, let's introduce the two cyclists we're about to follow!
Edited by MitchNL on 14-02-2013 20:52
Bon dia to you all! This is the beginning of the blog that follows our careers. But, before we start the season, let us introduce ourselves.
Hi guys, let me introduce myself first. My name is Sebastián Tavares. I was born on the 26th of October in 1993, that makes me 18 years of age. I’m 177 centimetres tall, and my weight is 62 kilograms. I grew up in the capital of our country, Andorra la Vella, where I started cycling when I was 10 years old, at the local cycling club. It had to take a few years, but my trainers saw a huge talent in me. I always finished at the first place when the finish was at a mountain. So, at 15 years old, they asked me if I could ride some races in France and Spain too. There I continued to do well, with last year (2011) as a highlight. I made it to third in the GC of a big youth stage race in the Pyrenees. There I proved that I couldn’t only be good when the road goes uphill, since I became second in the time trial. After that, some Continental Tour teams showed their interest, and I chose to sign for the Burgos BH-Castilla team, since it’s a great team to develop yourselves, and they also wanted to sign my best friend Imanol.
I would describe myself as a GC rider, since climbing and time-trialling are my major specialities, but I’m also fairly handy on the shorter hills. Attacking isn’t really something I’m good at, but I’m not bad at it either. Sprinting is something I really can’t though, and then there’s my worst fear: cobbles. Imanol loves those stones, but I absolutely can’t stand them.
My dream is to ride for a World Tour team in 6 years from now, and I really want to finish a Grand Tour in the Top 10 at least one time. But that’s a bit far away now, first I must develop into a rider who’s able to achieve those dreams.
Hey my friends, it’s Imanol Izquierdo speaking to you! My date of birth is the 12th of May in 1994, which means I’m 17 while I write this, I’m a bit of a monster, with my 189 centimetres and 91 kilograms. I’m from Escaldes-Engordany, a small village just outside Andorra la Vella. I started cycling at 9 years old, though my performances were not so good, I mostly finished a race in last place. Still, I was asked, just like Sebastián, to ride some races in France. At first, I didn’t get it, but after a while, I did understand why: they knew I wasn’t that good in climbing, so they wanted to test me on the flat. And I did great, I won one mass sprint finish in the Pyrenees stage race Sebastián talked about, and I finished second in a cobbled race in northern France. That made the professional teams interested in me, and when I heard Burgos already signed Sebastián and wanted me too, I immediately signed their contract.
Back in Andorra, I’m compared to Tom Boonen. My specialities are indeed cobbles and sprinting, and I can also get a nice result if the hills don’t go up for too long. I’m a reasonable time-triallist, but I’m by far not as good in that as Sebastián. And then there’s the mountains. The only thing I have with them is that Sebastián loves them, I really hate them since those youth races I talked about.
Just like Sebastián, I want to achieve a spot in a World Tour team before 2018, and maybe I can get into the Top 10 of a cobble classic. That’s just dreams for now, first we’re gonna make ourselves known at the Burgos team.
So, that’s who we are. Next time we are going to introduce the rest of the Burgos BH-Castilla team. See you next time!
Edited by MitchNL on 05-01-2013 18:12
Hey guys, it’s Sebastián and Imanol again. Welcome to the introduction of the Burgos BH – Castilla team for 2012! We’re going to introduce our team mates first, before we reveal the stats that the development department gave us and our race schedules for the upcoming season.
LEADERS
David BELDA
David is, along with Sebastián, the best climber in the team, but climbing is not his speciality. David is
specialised in the shorter hills, where he is the absolute leader of the team. He also brings a lot of experience into the team, since David with his 28 years of age is the only rider in the team who’s older than 25 years old. The highlight of his career was when David won the GC of the Vuelta Ciclista a León back in 2009.
Lluis Guillermo MAS
Lluis is the best sprinter in this team, although Imanol is not far behind him at that level. But that doesn’t mean he’s made for the flat, he’s also fairly handy on the shorter hills. He’s one of the biggest talents of the team, and because he’s only 22, he maybe can develop a bit more.
Damien BRANAA
Damien is also fairly experienced with 25 years of age. Damien is specialised on hills, but he can ride up the higher mountains as well. The highlight in Damien’s career was a stage win in last years Vuelta a Navarra.
OTHER RIDERS
Francisco Manuel ANTÓN Jóni BRANDÃO Nicolas CAPDEPUY Efren CARAZO Ruben JIMENEZ Pascual ORENGO Oscar SANTAMARIA Pablo TORRES Carlos VERONA
Sebastián TAVARES
Even though the manager wants me to develop myself, I’m already the joint best climber and the best time triallist in the team. That means I’m listed as ‘Protected Rider’ by the manager. I’m gonna ride a lot of races this season, I’m also part of the squad for the bigger Continental stage races we are going to ride, like the Vuelta a Andalucia, Vuelta Ciclista a León and the Volta a Portugal, and I’m also travelling to Croatia in March.
Imanol IZQUIERDO
I’m by far the best cobbler in the team, and I’m very promising at sprinting, so the manager has decided to also put me on ‘Protected Rider’. I’m not riding a lot of races this season, but I’ll probably ride most of the classics. I’m also going to Croatia in March, just like Sebastián, and the manager said he wanted to pick me as leading sprinter for one of the stage races in August.
Oh, we forgot to say something: there’s a development department in this team, and they decided to rate us on our abilities on a scale of 50 to 85. Here are the ratings of our team for this season:
So, that was our whole introduction, let’s begin the season now. See you next time when we review January for you!
Edited by MitchNL on 06-01-2013 20:52
@ pcm2009fan: Thanks! And who knows, Rodriguez doesn't know them by now, that's one thing I can assure you.
@ sutty: I certainly hope the same. It's not really a team story, but Tavares and Izquierdo will ride there till at least 2013, so for the first 2 years it wil be a Burgos story. By the way, also good luck to you with Team Type 1!
Anyone up for the team introduction later this evening?
@ sutty: I certainly hope the same. It's not really a team story, but Tavares and Izquierdo will ride there till at least 2013, so for the first 2 years it wil be a Burgos story. By the way, also good luck to you with Team Type 1!
PCM.Daily NFL Fantasy Football Champion: 2012 PCM.Daily NHL Prediction Game Champion: 2013 PCM.Daily NFL Prediction Game Champion: 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2021
@ Pelli: Thanks for the compliments! The idea of choosing Andorra goes back to last year's summer. I planned to start a story with a custom Andorran team by then, though I lost motivation even before that story started. I didn't want to let my Andorran plan go away though, so I came up with this.
Hi guys, Sebastián here. I’m going to take you through the month of January.
The Burgos team didn’t race any race this month, because our trainers preferred a training stage in Roses, Spain. A whole week we could get used to our team mates. We stayed on the flat for the first few days, training on our sprint train. My job in this train was to make some pace just before the line, since I’m a reasonable time triallist. Imanol and Lluis Guillermo Mas both got their chances to show how good they can finish, they even made a competition out of it, which Lluis won by a hair.
After that, we went into the hills for a few days. I felt good from the beginning, I could easily keep up with the likes of David Belda and Damien Branaa. The last day we went into the eastern side of the Pyrenees to test ourselves on the big mountains. I stayed with David and Damien for almost the whole time, but when I accelerated on the last climb, both of them couldn’t keep up anymore. I rode to the restaurant where we all should meet, I waited for about 3 minutes on David and Damien there. After that we all stepped into the bus, back to the training centre in Roses for a short recovery training before we went back to Burgos.
Now what’s more important, the results of January:
AUS Champs – Darren Lapthorne (Drapac)
Won before Jay McCarthy of Jayco-AIS in the BOTD. Evans was the first one of the favourites, he finished a minute behind Lapthorne.
AUS Champs ITT – Cadel Evans (BMC)
Evans proved after his 3rd in the Road Race that he is the best time triallist in Australia. Rogers and Porte completed the podium.
Santos Tour Down Under – Joost Posthuma (RadioShack)
Grabbed the orange leaders jersey while being in the BOTD on Willunga Hill. Arthur Vichot missed out the GC win by one single second.
Tour de San Luis – Jan Bakelants (RadioShack)
Got second after Lastras on Stage 3, but took the win on the fifth stage. Held on to the lead before Siutsou and Pinotti.
New Zealand Cycle Classic – Charles Bradley Huff (Jelly Belly)
Rode a decent TT, and finished in the Top 10 for the remaining 4 stages, with the win in the second stage as a highlight.
David BELDA 
Damien BRANAA 
Jóni BRANDÃO 
Sebastián TAVARES 
