The news that Mitchelton-Scott have decided to leave sprinter Caleb Ewan at home for the Tour de France has raised eyebrows, but one look at the Australian squad's line-up shows that team management have decided to throw everything behind a crack at the overall title with a coming-into-form Adam Yates, rather than try to split their resources between the GC and helping Ewan to notch stage wins.
Here, we analyse each selected rider's skills and aspirations as part of an outfit that now has very real intentions of deposing Chris Froome and Team Sky from the top of the Tour de France tree.
“The primary focus is for GC,” Mitchelton-Scott’s Matt White told Cyclingnews after the squad was announced on Thursday morning.
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“But if you look at the roster, even if there’s a worst-case scenario in the first week, and something happens to Adam, then we still have options across the board to win stages. That said, I think we’ve got a super team to look after him, with Hayman, Hepburn, Durbridge and Bauer for the first nine days.
“I think that we’ve also got a great chance for the TTT and with this team we could be looking at putting a minute plus change into some of the other GC contenders. Of course, BMC and Sky are the teams to beat but we will definitely be in the mix.”
Yates has come back from injury to perform admirably in the last few months. He was in contention at Tirreno-Adriatico, despite a fall, and picked up a stage win. He returned at the Tour of California, and although he was short of his best form, he picked up another solid placing in the GC. At the Dauphiné he ran Team Sky and eventual winner Geraint Thomas close but was forced to settle for second place overall and a stage win.
The Caleb question
Mitchelton-Scott's Tour de France team
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest Interviews and Features http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/all-for-adam-yates-analysing-mitchelton-scotts-tour-de-france-selection
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