BMC Development Team Riders Headed To Tour de l’Avenir
Eight riders from the BMC Development Team will take the start Saturday at the Tour de l’Avenir, a race long considered to be a miniature version of the Tour de France for promising young riders.
Competing With National Teams
The eight riders – Tom Bohli (SUI), Taylor “TJ” Eisenhart (USA), Stefan Küng (SUI), Lukas Spengler (SUI), Dylan Teuns (BEL), Alexey Vermeulen (USA), Loïc Vliegen (BEL), Tyler Williams (USA) – will compete for their respective national teams.
BMC Development Team General Manager Rik Verbrugghe said he is proud to see so many riders selected by their national federations. “It is a nation’s cup with the best riders there,” he said. “The area where they will be racing is the Alps, so it will be an especially hard race for the climbers.” Verbrugghe said any one of the eight could win a stage, with several of them – Bohli, Küng and Eisenhart – targeting the 4.5-kilometer prologue that leads off the eight-day race. Two of the eight – Küng and Vliegen – have already signed with the BMC Racing Team for 2015, while Vliegen and Teuns have competed in races for the BMC Racing Team as stagiaires. Küng is the Under 23 European road race and time trial champion and was runner-up to Fabian Cancellara in the Swiss national time trial championship in June. “Stefan’s main goal is the prologue and then to try to have a stage win,” Verbrugghe said.
“Loic’s goal is to do well at the world championships, so this suits him perfectly. He will also be there to help Dylan, who is someone who can also go for the overall, as we saw how well he was riding in Utah.” Eisenhart, the United States national Under 23 time trial champion, has performed reconnaissance of key stages and will receive good support from teammates Vermeulen and Williams, who was runner-up in the Under 23 edition of Paris-Roubaix, Verbrugghe said.
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