The first race of the men’s UCI WorldTour gets underway next week at the Tour Down Under and Team Sunweb have a strong team lined up to make the official road racing debut of the team.
Taking place from 17th-22nd January, the 19th edition of the race sees riders cover a total of 828.km over 6 stages. The first stage takes the same route as 2016 and will be a day for the sprinters whilst stage 2 is one for the climbers, with a challenging climb likely to create some time gaps.
Both stages 3 and 4 host sprint finishes but the real GC contenders are likely to be decided during the queen stage up Willunga Hill. The 2017 edition finishes with a circuit race finish in Adelaide, a final day for the sprinters.
“Next week we will start the WorldTour season for Team Sunweb in my home town of Adelaide at the Tour Down Under, all seven riders have had a good build up to the race and I expect the four riders starting new on the team here will be out to impress,” said coach Luke Roberts.
“With the new guys in the team we’ve been working on sprint preparation routines over the last couple of months, and we hope for some nice results in the sprint stages. For those stages Niklas [Arndt] is in good shape and will be a contender for a stage podium finish. On top of that with Wilco we’ll be aiming for a nice GC result. He finished 6th in 2013 here and we’ll see what he can do this year.”
LINE-UP
Niklas Arndt (GER)
Phil Bauhaus (GER)
Johannes Fröhlinger (GER)
Simon Geschke (GER)
Chris Hamilton (AUS)
Lennard Hofstede (NED)
Wilco Kelderman (NED)
