Giro 2008 team talk 1

The 2008 Giro d'Italia dominates the thinking of all the top pro teams. The biggest pieces of news over the weekend was the late invitation of Team Astana to race and Alessandro Petacchi (Milram) non startiing because of illness.

Astana join the entry at the last minute, and at the expense of NGC Medical-OTC, for the 2008 Giro d'Italia. The teams are Ag2r-La Mondiale, Barloworld, Caisse D’Epargne, Cofidis, Le Credit Par Telephone, CSF Group-Navigare, Diquigiovanni-Androni , Euskaltel Euskadi, Francaise Des Jeux, Gerolsteiner, High Road, Lampre, Liquigas, LPR Brakes, Quick Step, Rabobank, Saunier Duval-Scott, Silence-Lotto, Slipstream, Team CSC, Team Milram and Tinkoff Credit Systems.

Some squads are also riding the Four Days of Dunkirk, The 54th running of the traditional stage race takes place over six days, contrary to its name. The start is on Tuesday (May 6) and ends on Sunday.

Quicksteps team leader for the 2008 Giro d'Italia will be twice World Champion Paolo Bettini who will be, right from the first few days, looking for an important stage win. Italian Champion Giovanni Visconti will be looking to do exactly the same as this year the Giro starts in his homeland of Sicily.

The Quickstep team will be looking toward Juan Mauel Garate for the general classifications. Garate gained 4th place in 2002, 5th place in 2005 and 7th place in 2006. The Spaniniard, who has recently gained 7th place at the Tour de Romandie, won the Giro 2006 Dolomites stage that finished at the end of the San Pellegrino Pass climb and also the green jersey as best ‘climber’. Another important player, especially during the up-hill sections, will be Russian Alexander Efimkin who recently proved his excellent form both at the Fléche Wallone and the Tour de Romandie.

Young ‘climber’ Kevin Seeldraeyers will be taking part in his first great stage race. He has recently recovered from a bout of bronchitis that forced him to pull-out of the Giro del Trentino. Seeldraeyers will be looking to gain experience in the Giro and hopefully gain a great result in one of the Dolomite stages. He’ll also be looking to reach the Milan finish line too.

Completing the team line-up for the Pink Race is Hubert Schwab who wore the white jersey as best youngster at the Giro 2007, and experienced athletes such as Ad Engels, Mauro Facci and Andrea Tonti. All of these riders will be riding for their team captains and have already taken part in some of the great stage races.

Riders: Paolo Bettini, Alexander Efimikin, Ad Engels, Mauro Facci, Juan Manuel Garate, Hubert Schwab, Kevin Seeldraeyers, Andrea Tonti and Giovanni Visconti.

Four Days of Dunkirk
Riders: Matteo Carrara, Wilfried Cretskens, Dmytro Grabowskyy, Leonardo Scarselli, Gert Steegmans, Kevin Van Impe and Davide Viganò.

Tinkoff sports manager Bordering Ever has announced officially the team for 2008 Giro d'Italia, and the team will be Alberto Loddo, Alexander Serov, Nikolay Trusov, Sergey Klimov, Light Mazzanti, Evgueni Petrov, Vasil Kiryenka, Pavel Brutt and Mihkail Ignatyev.

"One of our objectives are stage victories" explains Ever.

"An offensive team, willing to suprise". This is the analysis by Fabrizio Bontempi, Lampre's sport director, about Lampre team that will take part in the 2008 Giro d'Italia.

The team is: Fabio Baldato, Paolo Bossoni, Marzio Bruseghin, Francesco Gavazzi, David Loosli, Mirco Lorenzetto, Mauro Santambrogio, Simon Spilak and Sylwester Szmyd.

The 2008 Giro d'Italia has seen the race organisers make a dramatic U-turn when they invited the previously blanked team at the last minute.

Though pleased, team principle Johan Bruyneel did acknowledge that the late invitation presents many challenges for Team Astana. “Preparation for a Grand Tour involves intensive planning, both for our staff and riders. Many people may not realize that riders schedule their season-long training programs around these three-week races. The one-week notice is certainly an extra challenge, but I’m confident that our Team will show up motivated.” - more

The team will be: Assan Bazayev, Antonio Colom, Alberto Contador, Vladimir Gusev, Maxim Iglinskiy, Andreas Klöden, Levi Leipheimer, Andrey Mizurov and Dmitriy Muravyev. Sean Yates and Alexandr Shefer will direct the squad.

Four Days of Dunkirk
Riders: Koen de Kort, Benoît Joachim, Aaron Kemps, Roman Kireyev, Berik Kupeshov, Gregory Rast, Tomas Vaitkus and Andrey Zeits

Daniele Bennati has broken the ice and his thoughts are on the 2008 Giro d'Italia.

With a sprint he won the last stage of the Tour of Romandie and he had definitely forgotten the problems with his left knee that cost him the start of the season.

The 27-year-old Liquigas sprinter from Arezzo says, "Alessandro Petacchi’s absence will change things. His Milram guaranteed line up, helped order the sprints." "But now it will all be more difficult. Even if I have a few more problems in the group sprints, I’ll still try to capitalise on my ability to keep pace with the leaders even on the climbs. What’s my goal? To win at least one stage"

Team manager Roberto Amadio, has announced the team - Daniele Bennati, Kjell Carlström, Dario Cataldo, Vladimir Miholjevic, Vincenzo Nibali, Andrea Noè, Franco Pellizotti, Alessandro Vanotti and the UK's Charles Wegelius.

Bennati said of his win at the Tour of Romandie; "My team-mates did a great job of piloting me to the best of their ability until the final kilometre stretch. From that moment on, I tried to capitalise on the train set up by High Road for Cavendish, I got up to Zberg’s wheel, launched into a sprint 180 metres out and the spurt took me over the line".

The Tuscan sprinter admitted with relief that "The knee injury is in the past, but I haven’t forgotten everybody who has been there for me over the past few months."

Vincenzo Nibali rode the the ‘pink route’ with Franco Pellizotti. They rode the time trial in Plan de Corones and on the Monte Pora climb: "These stages are very difficult, in particular the time trial that has a lot of climb with a steep ascent".

The Silence Lotto line up for the 2008 Giro d'Italia is Cornu Dominique, De Greef Francis, Devenyns Dries, Gates Nick, Lloyd Matthew, McEwen Robbie, Steurs Geert, Vandenbroeck Jurgen and Vanhuffel Wim

The Cofidis team for the 2008 Giro d'Italia is Mickaël BUFFAZ, Kevin DE WEERT, Bingen FERNANDEZ, Nicolas HARTMANN, Mathieu HEIJBOER, Yann HUGUET, Damien MONIER, Nick NUYENS and Rik VERBRUGGHE.

Team CSC line up Gustav Larsson, Chris Anker Sørensen, Jens Voigt, Stuart O'Grady, Bradley McGee, Anders Lund, Michael Blaudzun, Jason McCartney and Nicki Sørensen. for the 2008 Giro d'Italia.

"It's kind of a mixed team we've chosen. There's both guys who're going for the overall result as well as several who're able to go for the individual stages and we're also hoping to do well in the team time trial," comments team owner Bjarne Riis witting on the team's website.

"Gustav and Chris will be trying for the overall result and we're quite excited about that of course. At the same time Chris will have the chance to go for the white Youth Jersey, which Andy Schleck won last year. We also have a Grand Tour debutant with us in Anders Lund, who's done well and it'll also be interesting to see how he does under pressure. Jens and Stuart are there to build up their form towards Tour de France after they've both taken a break recently, but we know both of them well enough to know that they're able to win a stage or two at any given time. But that goes for everyone in the line-up – we'll be going for stage wins as soon as the opportunity comes along," concludes Bjarne Riis.

The Euskaltel the Basque Region squad for the 2008 Giro d'Italia are: Koldo Fernández, Iñigo Landaluze, Aitor Galdos, Markel Irizar, Dioni Galparsoro, Alan Pérez, Iván Velasco, Josu Agirre and Lander Aperribay.

The 'orange' squad will rely on Koldo Fernández's sprint and Iñigo Landaluze to escape from the peloton to obtain some victory.

Riccardo Riccò and Leonardo Piepoli will be the team leaders at the 2008 Giro d'Italia, starting this Saturday.

The team is: Eros Capecchi, David Canada, Iker Camaño, José Alberto Benítez, Raivis Belohvosciks, Luciano Pagliarini and neo-pro Ermanno Capelli, who´ll replace Manuele Mori. (Knee injury)

Team Manager Pietro Algeri, writing on the team website, believes Piepoli has good chances to achieve good results. He´s also confident that Riccò will do very well. The Italian rider was training in the steep Dolomites last week and he hopes he´ll get better results than last year. He was 6th in the GC and took one of the queen stages. "Riccardo has recovered from the bronchial problems that affected him in the classics. We hope he´ll be blessed with fine weather so that he can get even better. His goals? Stepping up to the podium. Astana´s late-minute invite will make things harder, as they´re a very strong team. But Riccardo will try hard and have a successful Giro d´Italia, I´m sure. Piepoli will focus on high-mountain stages, and our other riders make up a balanced team who can work for the leaders and also notch up stage wins."

Team Barloworld spent a two-day stage in Adro, near Brescia, to continue their build-up towards the 2008 Giro d'Italia. The he nine riders taking part to the Corsa Rosa are: Mauricio Soler, Enrico Gasparotto, Francesco Bellotti , Felix Cardenas, Christian Pfannberger , Patrick Calcagni, Stephen Cummings, Carlo Scognamiglio and Geraint Thomas and all did a 80-kilometre training to rehearse the team time-trial they'll have to tackle in the Giro opening day, next Saturday in Palermo. See also 'Soler climbs Plan de Corones' and 'Terrible and seems to never end'.

Italian Continental pro squad LPR Brakes name their nine riders for the 2008 Giro d'Italia, joining past winners Daniolo Di Luca (2007) and Paolo Savoldelli (2005 and 2002); will be Paolo Bailetti, Gabriele, Bosisio Riccardo Chiarini, Danilo Light, Giairo Ermeti, Jure Golcer, Danile Pietropolli and Alessandro Spezialetti. "We have all the cards to do well" said team head Bordonali . "Team LPR will not want to disappoint".

Italian Continental Pro 'Wild Card's' CSF Group-Navigare line up is Emanuele Sella, Julio Alberto Pérez Cuapio, Domenico Pozzovivo, Matteo Priamo, Maximiliano Ariel Richeze, Tiziano Dall'Antonia, Luis Felipe Laverde Jiménez, Fortunato Baliani and Filippo Savini.

"We're taking the start without any kind of pressure - Roberto Reverberi explained - We'll try to get some stage victories, with all our athletes and without aiming at the GC, even if Pozzovivo showed he's in good shape and could battle for that, despite the time trials. It would be great to get the green jersey for Kom, so we'll have a go for it with Sella, Baliani and Laverde Jiménez".

Milram have been suffering a spate of injuries and sooner had Erik Zabel and Ralf Grabsch returned to service after knee injuries, then team manager Gerry van Gerwen was faced with two new injured riders. The German ProTour team's latest additions to the sick bay were the young riders Artur Gajek and Martin Velits.

A painful bruise on his buttocks is keeping Artur Gajek from riding and forcing him to a ten-day training break, but Slovakian rider Martin Velits has been harder hit. The twin brother of U23 World Champion Peter Velits has been diagnosed with a break in his right wrist, which requires surgery.

"Martin will be operated on in Slovakia as soon as possible. We won't be able to count on him again until the end of August,“ said a frustrated Gerry van Gerwen. "It's not that bad for Gajek. He ought to be able to race again the end of May.“

Both Milram youngsters are suffering from injuries suffered in races. Gajek hit the hard pavement in Istanbul during the Tour of Turkey's opening prologue. His teammate Velits crashed onto his right hand during the Ronde van Vlaanderen. After riding a number of races with pain, x-rays provided the final diagnosis for the 23 year-old.

"It is like we are hexed,“ said van Gerwen."Our string of injuries just keeps getting longer and is causing us difficulties. Despite our personnel problems we will try to get the maximum for everyone – for the riders, the race organizers and our sponsors.“

Over the weekend, sprinter Alessandro Petacchi had to cancel his start in the Giro d'Italia due to a severe case of bronchitis. Earlier, Erik Zabel had to skip the two Classics Liege-Bastogne-Liege and Rund um den Henninger Turm following a crash, and is preparing to ride his second Giro starting Saturday. Allrounder Ralf Grabsch also had to take a break because of knee problems and will start Monday in the Neuseen Classics.

Four Days of Dunkirk
Team Milram is sending eight riders to the start at the Four Days of Dunkirk Directeur Sportif Jochen Hahn will oversee a mixture of experience veterans and young talents.

The team will be led in northern France by allrounder Martin Müller. He will share his experience with the young German riders, including Dominik Roels. Young Dutch rider Niki Terpstra, who showed his potential in the Spring Classics, returns to racing after a brief break from competition.

The 54th running of the traditional stage race takes place over six days, contrary to its name. The start is this coming Tuesday in Dunkirk. After six stages and a total of 1,065 kilometers, the race ends on Sunday after returning to Dunkirk.

Artur Gajek (GER / Bergisch Gladbach), Dennis Haueisen (GER / Gera), Elia Rigotto (ITA / Creazzo), Niki Terpstra (NED / Haarlem), Brett Lancaster (AUS / Monsummano Terme, ITA), Dominik Roels (GER / Köln), Martin Müller (GER / Berlin), Volodymyr Diudia (UKR / Belaia Zerkov)