MS squad for San Sebastien - Nieve, Impey, Durbridge, Tuft, Hayman, Hepburn and Bauer - A.Yates was supposed to be leader but is still suffering injuries from his crash in the TDF.
No Power?
Power is riding the Tour of Utah and the Colorado Classic
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And in a surprise Wout Van Aert has signed for Aqua Blue Sport - It will give the team a better race program next year - If only MS can convince Mattheiu Van Der Poel to switch to the road - Classics rider and has a fast sprint.
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Strictly not true. Aqua Blue has acquired his contract. TBD if it’s enforceable or that he wants to be there.
And maybe not even true.
The question is who does Van Aert ride for in cross and road in 2019. He needs a team.
I seriously doubt he’ll have any trouble finding a team (or teams).
Kind of surprised we’ve heard nothing about Porte’s movements.
I would have thought that would be announced 1st August.
Confirmed that Brayan Chaves will ride the tour of Utah as a stagiare - He’s done plenty of donkey work for the conti team, so he must have showed something - Rest of the team is Power, Meyer, Bewley, Haig and Hamilton - Hope that MS give Stannard a ride as a stagiare - I doubt Stannard needs to ride L’Avenir and would be more suited to the Tour of Britain - Possibly this could be Ewan’s next race.
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Freddie Ovett ( son of Steve ) wins a stagiare position with BMC - I doubt he is WT level rider, though with luck could be a PCT level rider.
He smashed the 1:20 (Mountain Highway climb to Sassafras) time on strava. The 1:20 is perhaps the most popular hill climb in Melbourne. 32 seconds faster than Brendon Canty!
He rode pretty well in the Sun Tour IIRC.
He’s been a million miles off the pace at the Tour of Qinghai Lake - I don’t rate Alexander Evans that highly and reckon Ovett is at a lower level - Anyway will be interested to see his calendar.
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Reckon Brendon Canty will be struggling to stay at WT level, sadly.
Has had a shocking year. I believe he’s been struggling with his back,
Another career killed at Argyle cycling.
5th on the queen stage so not terrible. Was a DNS on stage 9, so perhaps something was ailing him.
Qinghai Lake is a mostly flat course. Looks like he’s limited to being a pure climber.
Canty has been a disappointment and I expected more of him - He should definitely get a gig at PCT level - EF Education First is another one of those mystery teams like Dimension Data, Katusha, Trek Segafreddo and to a lesser extent AGR2 - They seem to make an art form of being unsuccessful - DD shouldn’t be at WT level and EF are borderline.
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Pretty sad when Canty was getting better results with Drapac than with Argle. You wonder how it can go so wrong.
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A.Yates to ride the Colorado Classic which probably suggests no Vuelta.
Wouldn’t leave much time between races, and lots of traveling on top of that. I think you’re right.
Leaves room for another pure climber to support Simon or a lead-out guy if they do decide to take Ewan.
Yates doesn’t need any race days between the TDF and the Vuelta, so if he rides Colorado then the Vuelta is out - Think Ewan is cactus - May only get TOB and one or two one day races - His manager has made life unnecessarily difficult for Ewan - S.Yates reproduces his Giro from and he has to podium - Porte rides his best and he is top 2 - Upon reflecting on the TDF think Porte was a certain top 5 and possibly a podium contender.
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If Ewan’s being that big a dill you’d think he must have a contract elsewhere already?
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