Bicycle Racing News and Opinion,
Tuesday, October 20, 2020
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2020 Tour de France | 2019 Giro d'Italia
He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot. - Douglas Adams
Current racing:
- October 3 - 25: Giro d'Italia
- Oct 20 - Nov 8: Vuelta a España
Upcoming racing:
- Oct 21: Driedaagse Brugge-De Panne
Latest completed racing:
- October 18: Ronde van Vlaanderen
- October 14: Scheldeprijs
- October 11: Gent-Wevelgem
- October 11: Paris-Tours
- October 7: De Brabantse Pijl/ La Flèche Brabanconne
- Sept 27 - Oct 5: Tour of Portugal
- October 4: Liège-Bastogne-Liège
- September 29 - Oct 3: BinckBank Tour
- September 30: La Flèche Wallonne
- September 24 - 27: UCI World Road Championships
- September 22: Paris-Camembert
- August 29 - Sept 20: Tour de France
- September 15 - 19: Tour de Luxembourg
Bike teams switch bike brands they ride
Mitchelton-Scott (GreenEdge Cycling) sent me this:
GreenEDGE Cycling has signed a new multi-year partnership with Bianchi that will see its men’s and women’s teams ride the Italian bicycle manufacturer’s high performance models from 2021 and beyond.
Mitchelton-Scott will be on Bianchi bikes in 2021.
Bianchi, a proud and historic brand with over 130 years of experience, will support the team with performance aero, all-rounder and time trial bikes (including top of the range Specialissima, Oltre and Aquila models) in its pursuit for success across the entire racing calendar.
The new partnership will be driven by innovation and inclusive communications, with both parties motivated by high performance and a truly global approach. Bianchi’s Reparto Corse ‘racing division’, will work side-by-side with GreenEDGE Cycling’s performance team to shape the future of bike racing.
The end of the 2020 season will bring to a conclusion a long and successful partnership between GreenEDGE Cycling and SCOTT Sports – a founding sponsor of the team in 2012. The long-standing relationship, a testament to its strength, helped GreenEDGE Cycling grow into the world-class team it is today.
Fabrizio Scalzotto – CEO, Bianchi:
"We are thrilled to announce our new partnership with GreenEDGE Cycling, the ideal team to pursue our new sponsorship cycle with a strong international approach in order to support our constantly growing presence in all continents.”
“In addition to the performance aspects that will enable Bianchi to innovate and further develop our new road racing products, we will work together with GreenEDGE Cycling to boost inclusive communication with our global fans and stakeholders."
Gerry Ryan – Owner, GreenEDGE Cycling:
“As we approach our tenth season at the top level of world cycling, we are invigorated by the opportunity to partner with Bianchi, a proven brand with a long and proud history, as we look towards the upcoming seasons.
“We have witnessed the incredible success of riders using Bianchi equipment and are inspired by their plans for the future. The UCI WorldTour is consistently seeing more technology innovations and we are confident our collaboration with Bianchi will result in our riders racing on the most cutting edge road and time trial bicycles that will deliver many victories in the world’s biggest races.”
“It’s been an incredible journey with SCOTT Sports, who believed in the GreenEDGE Cycling project before it was a reality. Our partnership has spanned nine years, a testament to its strength and we have lived all of the highs and lows of our story so far with them. We thank SCOTT for the support and wish them the very best for the future.”
That said, Here is the bike news Team Sunweb sent me:
From the 2021 season onwards, the athletes of Team Sunweb’s Men, Women and Development Programs will race on SCOTT bicycles. The iconic, Swiss based global bike brand with American heritage and the WorldTeam today proudly present their partnership.
Team Sunweb will change from Cervélo to Scott bikes for the 2021 season. Sirotti photo
SCOTT’s large world class engineering team has designed some of the fastest road bikes to date and is fully committed to never settling for the current standard but keep setting new standards for road, aero and time trial bikes.
Team Sunweb’s DNA is very much similar, its distinguished elite sports approach has built a reputation as the “keep challenging” model and is even visually illustrated by its iconic central two stripes on the race kit. These two ever rising stripes reflect the passion to always keep improving, one stripe to show the continuous progress of the athletes and specialists, and the other stripe to reflect the continuous development of the modern performance environment in which they operate. This aligns well with with SCOTT’s “NO SHORTCUTS” approach, to always strive for new ways to make their bikes faster.
For the global high performance bicycle brand and the pro road cycling team to come together one day was somewhat of an inevitable, given the team’s focus on every detail obviously also includes the choice of the best road bikes out there. SCOTT’s passion to design bikes which make the difference is a natural fit to the team with such an eye for detail.
In its pursuit of success in Grand Tours, classics and sprints, the team will race next year SCOTT’s Addict RC for climbing and lumpier races, the SCOTT’s Foil for sprint races and the SCOTT’s Plasma for time trails, all bikes will come with Syncros components, a sister company of SCOTT. Syncros is a bicycle components and accessories brand built on the principle of obsessive, precise design and production through their in-house engineering and design team. Team Sunweb will ride the latest road one-piece cockpit, the Creston iC SL, for Addict RC and Foil with intelligent internal cable routing and ergonomic focused design.
Furthermore, the riders will use the newly launched SCOTT Centric plus helmet, SCOTT’s Cadence aero helmet and SCOTT’s Split time trial helmets.
“After nine years with GreenEdge Cycling / Mitchelton-SCOTT, we believe it was time for a change and we found in Team Sunweb the ideal partner for a new start,’’ says Pascal Ducrot, Vice-President of SCOTT Sports. “They are one of the leading WorldTeams with a very young and ambitions team, but most of all they share with us that absolute determination to use every single day to get better; the team does so on the bike whereas we do so with engineering and developing new technology to build the fastest bikes out there. We are confident that this partnership will deliver from the start some fast, exciting and successful racing with both the men and women programs. Our engineering team is looking forward to work closely with Team Sunweb’s engineering and biomechanic specialists to integrate their input and feedback in the development of the next generation of our road bikes.”
Words of excitement also sound from Team Sunweb when it comes to the new partnership. Narelle Neumann, Team Sunweb’s Head of Science: “SCOTT has an unprecedented track record in designing the fastest race bikes on the grid and to always introduce new revolutionary technology. Despite SCOTT’s premium reputation today, their engineering team have the dynamic of an energetic challenger while they live and breathe the absolute will to keep revolutionizing the bikes of the future, and keep presenting race bikes which effectively make the difference at races at the highest level in the world. It’s a great honour for our riders to race SCOTT bikes. And it’s a privilege for our tech specialists to work alongside SCOTT’s engineering team on their continuous journey to keep revolutionizing road bikes.”
And Jumbo-Visma will ride Cervélo:
Team Jumbo-Visma will ride Cervélo bikes from 2021 onwards. The Dutch cycling team and the innovative bike manufacturer have signed for a partnership for multiple years. The men’s team, the development team and the new women’s team, announced this morning, will be supported by Cervélo.
Jumbo-Visma will change from Bianchi to Cervélo. Sirotti photo
Cervélo’s composites and aerodynamics engineers will develop future products with Team Jumbo-Visma to help the team reach its goals. Primoz Roglic, Tom Dumoulin, Marianne Vos and our other riders will have the choice to select the most suitable bike for any race with the R5 disc, S5, P5 and Caledonia. The women’s and development team will be equipped with Reserve carbon wheels, co-designed by Cervélo.
Richard Plugge, managing director of Team Jumbo-Visma: “This is a great step for our team. Cervélo is an innovative brand and an industry leader by technology. We are very happy that our cycling teams will be riding on Cervélo from next year. I am confident that we can further innovate to build even faster bikes together. Working together and striving for the best is our daily objective.” The Dutchman is excited about the collaboration. “We look forward with confidence to work with Cervélo. The brand is part of Pon, just like us they are a Dutch global company. It is great that two Dutch brands that make a global impact have found each other.”
Cervélo’s managing director Nick McAdams: “We are very proud to partner with Team Jumbo-Visma. As one of the best teams in the world, they have the riders on board to race Cervélo bikes all year long, in every category and in all kinds of races. They also have a lot of specific knowledge that will help us make the riders faster. We are very much looking forward to our cooperation and to seeing the team riding Cervélo from next season.”
After seven years, Team Jumbo-Visma says goodbye to the current bike partner Bianchi. Plugge: “We would like to thank Bianchi for the collaboration. They supported us through thick and thin in recent years. Bianchi has contributed to building the team we are today and together we have achieved great results.” A few examples of the big achievements are a victory, podium spots and multiple wins in the three grand tours, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Milano-Sanremo. That makes it for now 177 victories in total on Bianchi bikes. “The Vuelta is our last road race on this bike. We will do everything we can to conclude the collaboration in style.”
Team Jumbo-Visma will race on Cervélo bicycles for the first time in January.
Tomasz Marczyński and Tosh Van der Sande re-sign with Lotto Soudal
Lottto-Soudal sent me this:
With the contract extensions of Belgian Tosh Van der Sande and Polish rider Tomasz Marczyński, both until the end of 2021, Lotto Soudal’s squad is increasingly getting shape. These two riders are well-known riders of the WorldTour team as Marczyński and Van der Sande will start their sixth and tenth seasons respectively with the Belgian squad. The two teammates will be at the start of the 75th Tour of Spain tomorrow. Lotto Soudal now already knows the names of 27 riders for 2021. For the moment, eighteen riders of the current team will see the arrival of nine new teammates.
Tosh Van der Sande will be wearing Lotto-Soudal colors in 2021. Sirotti photo
It was as a junior world champion in the points race and winner of Liège-Bastogne-Liège U23 that Tosh Van der Sande (29) arrived in the team in 2012. He then proved to be an essential support for its leaders in the most difficult races, but he also knew how to seize his chances, as in the Tour de Wallonie last season where he won a stage.
“Sprinting with a small group after a difficult stage is the scenario that suits me best. This will already be the case from tomorrow in my sixth Vuelta,” says Tosh Van der Sande. “The Tour of Spain has quite a few complicated stages and we intend to be very active there, as we are in the Giro at the moment. I already felt very good at the Flèche Brabançonne and now that the worries of contract extension are behind me, I will be able to have fun on the bike. Also, I'm really looking forward to being in 2021. The team has been significantly rejuvenated. I still feel young myself, but I hope I can represent something for my young teammates. I will take my responsibilities and they can count on me. "
Like Tomasz Marczyński, Tosh Van der Sande lives in Spain. Marczyński (36), quadruple champion of Poland (three times on the road, once in time trial), already won two stages in the Vuelta and he is determined to win another one.
“It’s been a tough season so far for everyone and for me. I’m happy to have come back from illness and to be able to show what I’m capable of in this last Grand Tour of the season. The confidence of the team in me means a lot to me. After five seasons with Lotto Soudal, people are starting to get to know me. They also know that I will be able to guide all these young riders who are arriving next year. With my experience, I will show them around the peloton. I am already happy because youth is the future and there are certainly great talents in this group", says Tomasz Marczyński.
Provisional list of Lotto Soudal riders for 2021:
Filippo Conca, Steff Cras, Jasper De Buyst, Thomas De Gendt, John Degenkolb, Caleb Ewan, Frederik Frison, Philippe Gilbert, Kobe Goossens, Sébastien Grignard, Matthew Holmes, Roger Kluge, Andreas Kron, Kamil Małecki, Tomasz Marczyński, Sylvain Moniquet, Stefano Oldani, Harry Sweeny, Gerben Thijssen, Maxim Van Gils, Brent Van Moer, Tosh Van der Sande, Harm Vanhoucke, Florian Vermeersch, Viktor Verschaeve, Xandres Vervloesem, Tim Wellens.
Team Jumbo-Visma starts women’s team in 2021
The team sent me this news release:
From 2021, Team Jumbo-Visma will start its own women’s cycling team. With this, Team Jumbo-Visma is taking the next step in the development of the team. The team also has a World Tour formation and a Development Team. The expansion with Team Jumbo-Visma Women was realised in collaboration with main sponsors Jumbo and Visma. Parkhotel Valkenburg is also committed to the new women’s team.
Team manager Richard Plugge has had the ambition to start a women’s team for some time. “The time is ripe to get started. It is fantastic to be able to make a major contribution to national and international women’s cycling through your own women’s team. With the arrival of this women’s team, we complete Team Jumbo-Visma, embracing talent recognition, development and top sport at the highest level. In addition, it is fantastic that we can also offer young girls perspective for the long term within our Academy model”, Plugge said.
The team will be led by Esra Tromp, former team manager of the Parkhotel Valkenburg women’s team. Tromp looks forward to the coming years with this team with great confidence. “The goal of the team is to build the best women’s team in the world so I happily jumped at the opportunity. The team consists of talent and experience and has a very nice balance. We will make a major contribution to women’s cycling with the knowledge and experience available within this organisation.”
In addition to Tromp, Team Jumbo-Visma is collaborating with Marco Postma, former coach at Cycling Academy Gelderland and the Dutch cycling federation, among others, and the Belgian Lieselot Decroix, ex-professional cyclist and movement scientist. They will both work as race coach. Former professional cyclist Marieke van Wanroij, also coming from Parkhotel Valkenburg, takes the role of performance coach.
Team Jumbo-Visma Women will start under a continental license in 2021, as UCI regulations do not allow a new team to enter the Women’s World Tour directly. The team, the riders and the sponsors have confidence in a great program for 2021, including all the important races.
In line with the philosophy of the organisation, the team will strive for growth and development in order to lift the team to great heights together. The team will consist of the following twelve riders: Marianne Vos (NED), Jip van den Bos (NED), Riejanne Markus (NED), Anouska Koster (NED), Nancy van der Burg (NED), Romy Kasper (GER), Aafke Soet (NED), Teuntje Beekhuis (NED), Julie van de Velde (BEL), Pernille Mathiesen (DEN), Karlijn Swinkels (NED) and Anna Henderson (GBR).
Mariannne Vos will be on the new team. Sirotti photo
Multiple world champion Marianne Vos is one of the big names of the new team. “I am proud to be part of Team Jumbo-Visma. The vision and ambition of the team appeals to me and I look forward to starting together.”
Women’s cycling is on the rise and the intention is to accelerate this, together with main sponsors Jumbo and Visma and the other partners behind it. The women’s team will fully integrate in the existing organisation, the current cycling teams and speed skating teams, where sharing knowledge is also of unique value. One team where all guidance, knowledge and facilities are the same for both men and women. Team Jumbo-Visma is one.
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