Team: Drapac Professional Cycling
Oceania Tour ranking: 2 (Same as 2014)
Win Count: 9
Top Riders: Wouter Wippert, Brenton Jones, Lachlan Norris, Will Clarke
The 2015 season kicked off with a bang for Drapac Pro Cycling when Wouter Wippert claimed the sprint victory on the final stage of the Tour Down Under, punching well above his weight in the WorldTour race. Understandably, the victory over such a class field put enormous pressure on the 24-year-old Dutchman for much of the season. He took four more wins - two in Tour de Taiwan and two in the Tour de Korea. Although he claimed two fine second places in Tour of California stages - behind Peter Sagan in Avila Beach and a frustratingly close miss in Los Angeles to Mark Cavendish - it was clear Wippert had the potential to do much, much more.
Unfortunately for Drapac, the Cannondale-Garmin team noticed, and snapped him up for the next two WorldTour seasons.
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The team continued to find success in February with Will Clarke taking out the prologue in the Herald Sun Tour and Jordan Kerby taking a silver medal in the Oceania Continental Championship road race in Toowoomba. In March, Wippert's pair of wins in Taiwan kept the momentum going.
The Australian team is still building toward its aim of joining the top tier in 2018, and spent much of its season racing overseas. The team did a big block of racing in North America, starting at the Tour of the Gila in May. Kerby finished third in the time trial, while Wippert again showed his speed with a photo-finish loss to Sebastian Haedo in Silver City. The race was good preparation for the Tour of California, and in addition to Wippert's strong showings in the sprint, the team was represented in several breakaways with Clarke taking out the most aggressive rider prize after his time off the front on the first stage.
While the other part of the team was in California, Brenton Jones got the first of his two wins of the season in the Tour of Japan prologue. He would go on to close out his season with a stage win at the Tour of Hainan. In June, Wippert took revenge on the Tour de Korea, turning his near misses from California into a pair of wins in the Tour de Korea.
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