Dutch team missed out on WorldTour status by just four points but banking on potential of young riders
The Project 1t4i team is looking at the 2012 season with the same ambition that it took on 2011. The Dutch team, which was formerly known as Skil-Shimano, narrowly missed out on the number of ranking points necessary to make it into the International Cycling Union (UCI) WorldTour, but is still hoping that its senior status – and the talent of its young riders – will be enough to ensure invitations to the biggest races of the year.
“We were just four points short of a WorldTour license, where we would have been assured of participation in all the major races,” team manager Iwan Spekenbrink told Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf. “On a sporting level we were above Cofidis and Saur[-Sojasun] anyway.”
The two aforementioned French teams also missed out in the race for ProTeam status, and remain at Professional Continental status with 1t4i. The fact that FDJ-BigMat did enough in 2011 to make the step up though, removes one French rival from the race for a Toru de France wildcard, but the Dutch team will still be up against the big team from last year’s race.
“Another team that will hoping to qualify for a wildcard is of course Europcar,” Spekenbrink conceded. “We will be provisionally planning our programme on the assumption that there is a good chance that we will be riding the Tour.”
Skil-Shimano has not ridden the Tour since 2009, with the race tending to favour its local teams in the allocation of wildcard places in recent years. The team’s persistence was rewarded with an invitation to last year’s Vuelta a España though, where young German sprinter Marcel Kittel (pictured) took his maiden Grand Tour victory.
Kittel was one of the most successful riders of 2011, with a record eighteen victories in his debut professional season, and the team has also picked up fellow German sprinter John Degenkolb from the folding HTC-Highroad team. The presence of the two sprinters – particularly the former – is one of the things that Spekenbrink hopes will encourage race organisers to invite his team.
“Kittel will certainly be a rival to [Team Sky’s World champion] Mark Cavendish next year,” he said. “That’s surely something that the Tour should take into account.”
One thing to give the 1t4i team optimism for a Tour de France start is that the race organiser ASO has invited it to ride both the Tours of Qatar and Oman next month. While this is a good sign however, it should be remembered that Skil-Shimano was also invited last year.