Team: Cofidis
Win Count: 21 (Up from 10 in 2014)
Top Riders: Nacer Bouhanni (11 wins), Anthony Turgis (2 wins), Jonas Ahlstrand (2 wins)
The Cofidis management will look back on the 2015 season with a sense of satisfaction and frustration in equal measure. It was a season that saw a seismic shift in the team’s orientation and although it was very good, it might have been have been brilliant, but for repeated doses of ill fortune.
The team’s signing of Nacer Bouhanni was something of a game-changer, causing them to build things around a sprinter in a way they had never done before. The teething problems were clear as Bouhanni endured a barren start to the season, having to wait until April to take a first victory in his new red jersey.
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But then things began to click between Bouhanni and his support set-up led by Geoffrey Soupe, as the Frenchman took out two stages of the Circuit Sarthe and the GP de Denain Porte du Hainaut. Fast-forward to June, and two stage wins and the points jersey at the Critérium du Dauphiné made him one of the most in-form sprinters of the moment, and there was rising excitement ahead of the Tour de France.
But that’s where the ill fortune started in earnest. Shortly before the Tour he crashed at the French nationals, and Bouhanni would have to pick himself up off the ground on nine more occasions before the season was out. A bandaged Bouhanni was able to take to the start of the Tour, only to crash out on stage 5, before the sprint opportunities had really opened up. It was a similar tale at the Vuelta a Espana, where he suffered a string of tumbles, a mass pile-up on stage 8 forcing him out of the race. He has now abandoned all but one of the seven Grand Tours he has ridden.
Still, Bouhanni was able to clock up wins in some smaller races in between all the crashes, and even came out on top in the Coupe de France series. He managed to end the season on 11 victories – that’s more than half of the team’s entire haul.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
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