Aqua Blue Sport are one of three teams awarded a wildcard spot for the Tour de Suisse, the organisers InfrontRingier announced today. The other two teams who will join the WorldTour squads at the Swiss race are French team Direct Energie and the Italian team Nippo-Vini Fantini Europa Ovini.
A total of 21 teams with seven riders each will compete at this year’s race. In 2017, two of the wild card teams made successful debuts at the race winning stages.
Irish team Aqua Blue Sport entered the Tour de Suisse last year during their maiden season, as one of the four wild card teams. The team gave an impressive performance, managing to claim a stage win as the current American champion, Larry Warbasse, claimed a solo victory in the mountain stage to Villars-sur-Ollon.
With the Austrian Stefan Denifl, the Irish team also has a gifted mountain specialist in its ranks. Denifl won the Tour de Suisse mountains classification in 2015, when he was still riding for IAM Cycling, and claimed a solo victory at the Vuelta 2017 with a mountain finish.
The nine-stage race runs from June 9th to June 17th and starts with a team time-trial in Frauenfeld.
