UAE Group Emirates rider Jhonatan Narvaez wil be again to defend his UCI Tour Down Below title. Picture: AFP
ADELAIDE:
Tour Down Below champions Jhonatan Narvaez and Noemi Ruegg shall be again to defend their titles on the season-opening UCI World Tour race, officers stated Friday, heading a stellar area that additionally boasts Tour de France queen stage winner Ben O’Connor.
Ecuador’s Narvaez (UAE Group Emirates) gained a heart-pumping climb up Willunga Hill to assist declare the Ochre Jersey in Adelaide in 2025 forward of Spain’s Javier Romo (Movistar Group).
Switzerland’s Ruegg took out the ladies’s race from Dutch rider Silke Smulders.
UAE Group Emirates are boosted by 2023 winner Jay Vine, with the Australian coming off a stellar season that noticed him clinch the mountains classification on the Vuelta a Espana for the second yr in a row.
They’re joined by British star Adam Yates, who’s a Grand Tour stage winner and champion on the Tour de Suisse, Tour of Romandie and Volta a Catalunya.
The boys’s area for the five-stage race from January 21 to 25 will characteristic 140 riders from all 18 UCI WorldTeams in addition to Swiss ProSeries crew Tudor Professional Biking — owned by retired nice Fabian Cancellara.
Group Jayco AlUla’s hopes for the Ochre Jersey relaxation with O’Connor, who produced a world-class climb at stage 18 of the Tour de France final yr over three Alpine mountains.
He’s joined by street captain Luke Durbridge, Grand Tour stage winner Luke Plapp and Paris Olympic crew pursuit gold medallist Kelland O’Brien.
Australian dash star Sam Welsford, who has gained six Tour Down Below phases previously two years, will make his debut with new crew INEOS Grenadiers.
The strongest-ever ladies’s area consists of 90 riders who for the primary time characterize all 14 UCI WorldTeams.
Ruegg is returning alongside newly topped world champion and EF Schooling-Oatly teammate Magdeleine Vallieres, whereas Lidl Trek’s roster consists of three-time Tour Down Below winner Amanda Spratt.
The three-stage ladies’s race runs January 17-19.
“We’re thrilled with the standard of the sphere for each males’s and girls’s races at this yr’s Tour Down Below,” stated race director Stuart O’Grady.
“The power of this yr’s area displays the elevated degree of problem of the programs with longer phases and extra climbs.”
