After initially being the best team in CT not to promote, pushing even more focus on #RouxGate in Tour of Britain from our side at least, we got an email from MGUCI that they were investigating the possibility of promoting us as Ferrero – Samruk weren’t keeping up with the deadlines required to be racing and eventually disbanded.

To some it might have seemed like an easy thing to say yes to, promoted after our first season in the CT, why not? We sat down and talked to CEO of WJSportsManagement, the company behind the team now known as Nordstrom – BioWare, previously Goldcorp – Nordstrom Rack, to talk a bit about the coming season, including title-sponsor change, unexpected promotion, renewals and his vision for the team for both the upcoming transfers and more long term and more.
Q: We’re sitting here in the office in your home in Denmark, why are you operating out of Denmark when the team is based in North America?

A: When I initially started the planning for the team it was going to be a team based in Denmark with a Canadian and American focus on the side but as we sat down to discuss with several partners it became quite clear that the Danish market was quite saturated and we decided to shift the full focus onto the North American side of things but I decided to stay in Denmark due to the familiarity and easy travels for the better part of our European schedule.

Q: Ok, that’s all and good but can you run us through your favourite moments of the 2017 season?

A: There’s too many to point them all out! I think the great performances from GVK, albeit expected, were fantastic. Pellaud’s Tour of Britain was very good until he had to abandon that race sadly, he later crowned a good season with a Swiss NC and that is also fantastic news!

Q: Let’s talk promotion, how does the plans you had laid out for the team?

A: It wasn’t an instant yes on my part and it did take some time to say yes because my plan for the team was always to build a strong core and then promote with that while pushing down the wages. *he lets out a grin accompanied by a slight laugh* And our wages have not gone down this season so already there our plans got spoiled in having to hand out wage hikes to almost the entire team to get them to stay around. Because while we might be able to get better riders in on slightly cheaper wages for PCT level, but I am a man of my word and the only two riders who we have let go in the renewals process are Michal Golas, who had a lot of great showings, his Viana was fantastic, but he was just declining too heavily for us to consider keeping him around at PCT level. And Rob Britton who in all honesty never showed his caliber even at CT level. This means that the main core of our team is still around with Joao Gaspar and James Piccoli coming back their loans with valuable PT experience.

Q: In CT your main focus was the classics, focused mainly on the strengths of GVK and Pellaud will anything change going into PCT?

A: Going into PCT the level of competition will be a lot tougher than last year and Simon, in specific and Gillaume to a lesser extent will have a hard time even finishing top 10 in these fields where we last year saw riders like Burghardt and Hagen dominate their respective classics fields, and as much as I love the guys they are not at that level that’s for sure. They will still get their chances to race for themselves next season without a doubt but its not unlikely to see stronger captains coming in to give us more power. Also, our goal list (not published yet), will also show that our focus has shifted a little bit and you will see and unfamiliar terrain being a focus for us during transfers.

Q: Talking about shifts Nordstrom has moved to being main title sponsor of the team and the team is now racing under an American license. What’s the reasoning behind this?

A: We really enjoyed our time with Goldcorp last year, but the mining industry didn’t really enjoy the relationship and they didn’t see any growth in their brand from pumping money into the team and decided to pull the plug on the deal back in what must have been early August. The guys over at Nordstrom saw our vision and believed in it, and even that much that they put their main chains as our sponsor instead of the “Rack� brand this year, and as much as I grew to love Canada over the course of last year, a part of the multiyear that we have struck with Nordstrom was a requirement that we now race on an American license and move our HQ to USA as well.

Q: To me it sounds like the deal with Nordstrom didn’t require you to bring in a second title sponsor, but you still chose to bring in BioWare, can you expand on that?

A: Yes of course I can! We wanted to stay true to our Canadian fans and we found a good sponsor BioWare that won’t take a lot of the spotlight away from Nordstrom but still be happy to work with us on multiple projects over the 2018 season. Unlike the Nordstrom deal this BioWare will only be with us for the 2018 season, but we very much appreciate their contribution to the cycling world!

Q: If we go back to talking about the riders on the team who were your standout transfers last year and could we maybe see an updated wage sheet if we ask nicely?

A: The wage sheet will be available in a bit we still need to finish up the last few graphical things about it! My favourite transfers last year was securing GVK for sure and he is a guy I see as a franchise rider and would be very hardpressed to see leave the team at all unless we disband! I really think that the signing of Joao Gaspar was pretty clutch and his impact will be seen next year as he is gonna help the team do bits in both mountain stages and hilly classics while he might get to chase a break here and there! Tyler Farrar at 55k last year was an absolute bargain too and he took home Battenkill on home soil, no complains from me that’s for sure!

That will be it from now, but I will try to get a hold of WJ a few more times in the transfer window and over the course of the season to get more reactions from the man him self.
/The Media Intern at WJSM