It’s a long, long way from here to the final races of the 2023 road calendar, but in the earliest battles of the year one conclusion is clear: Intermarché-Circus-Wanty are certainly making themselves noticed.
It has to be said that the Belgian squad hardly had a bad start to 2022, either, as in February alone Biniam Girmay picked up a win in the Mallorca Challenge, Alexander Kristoff won the Clásica Almeria and Jan Hirt clinched a stage and the overall in the Tour of Oman. But this year the Belgian squad have so far set the bar even higher.
Even before Oman and Almeria, Intermarché-Circus-Wanty have already clinched four wins to date: three out of a possible five in the Mallorca Challenge series thanks to Kobe Goossens and Rui Costa and one in the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana courtesy of Girmay.
Add in a second place in the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race with France’s Hugo Page, a string of top 10 places in the Santos Tour Down Under and it’s no surprise that Intermarché-Circus-Wanty are currently topping the UCI Teams rankings, nearly 200 points clear of previous leaders UAE Team Emirates.
“We wanted to start the season well and we had a couple of riders who were really motivated, as well as some new riders in the team like Rui Costa and Lilian Calmejane [fourth in one Mallorca race-Ed.],” Aike Visbeek, performance manager at the Belgian squad, told Cyclingnews at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana.
“With Kobe Goossens, it was the plan [to start well] and with Bini’ we wanted to build up towards the Classics and this was an important period where we wanted to race hard with him.
“So you see several things came together, but the main goal was to start well with a couple of good results but also get some good teamwork. But we’ve had both, and I’m really happy with that.”
Given its hilly second half, planning a strategy for stage 1 of Valenciana was in no way straightforward. But Visbeek says simply that “that’s the business we are in.
“Bini’ is very suitable for these kinds of courses, and we didn’t go to Mallorca and here with riders like Costa, Calmejane and Georg Zimmerman just to ride around. Because this is also our Tour de France squad.
“We are already working on the details now that we are going to use in the Tour. It’s about these situations. The more you can do it together, the better feelings you’ll have and that’s what we’re practising.”
Intermarché-Circus-Wanty have had a fairly hefty turnover of riders this winter,…
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