Belarusian champion adds sprint power to French team as chances become limited at FDJ-BigMat
AG2R La Mondiale has announced the signature of Belarusian champion Yauheni Hutarovich on a two-year contract. The 28-year-old sprinter has spent his entire professional career to date at FDJ-BigMat – having joined Marc Madiot’s outfit in 2008 – and enjoyed considerable success. With the emergence of young French riders in the team however, particularly under-23 World champion Arnaud Démare, ‘Huta’ is moving on.
The Belarusian is one of several new names heading to the “earth and sky” team, who include Davide Appollonio from Team Sky, Carlos Betancur from AG2R La Mondiale, Samuel Dumoulin from Cofidis, and Steve Chainel, also from FDJ-BigMat. While Betancur’s arrival can be seen as a direct replacement for the departing Nicolas Roche, Hutarovich – and Appollonio – are more or less replacements for the departing Sébastien Hinault, who is linked to new Swiss team IAM.
Since joining what was Française des Jeux five years ago, ‘Huta’ has enjoyed consistent success, taking 23 professional victories to date. Aside from his three national titles, his biggest victory is arguably his stage win in the 2010 Vuelta a España; he also performs particularly well in the northern Classics however, having finished second in both of the previous two editions of Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne, and second and third in last year’s Paris-Brussels and Scheldeprijs respectively.
Hutarovich ended last year with victory in the Flemish season-ending Nationale Sluitingsprijs; he had to wait until the Belarusian championships for a victory in 2012 however, but won the first two stages of last week’s Tour de l’Ain.
With FDJ-BigMat turning more towards its young French stars, the Belarusian will search for further opportunities at the traditionally more international AG2R La Mondiale.