Team Sky have announced their squads for February, with Mark Cavendish making his debut for the team at the Tour of Qatar.
World champ starts his season in Middle East
Team Sky have announced their squads for February, with Mark Cavendish making his debut for the team at the Tour of Qatar.
The world champion and Tour de France green jersey holder, winner of two stages in Qatar when beginning his 2009 season there, will be joined in the eight-man squad by Bernhard Eisel who rode with such distinction alongside him at HTC-Highroad.
The line-up for Qatar, which takes place between February 5-10, also comprises Davide Appollonio, Michael Barry, Juan Antonio Flecha, Jeremy Hunt, Christian Knees and Ian Stannard.
Aussie duo Mathew Hayman and Chris Sutton, both in action at the season-opening Tour Down Under, will then come into the squad for the Tour of Oman between February 14-19, taking the places of Flecha and Knees.
Euro start
Team Sky have held a training camp in Mallorca for much of December and January and they will kick off their European season this time around with five one-day races on the Balearic island through February 5-9.
The remainder of the team's new signings for 2012 will get their first run out at those events, with Sergio Henao, Richie Porte, Kanstantsin Siutsou and neo-pros Salvatore Puccio and Luke Rowe the riders in question.
Also getting his first race kilometres of the year will be last year's Vuelta a España runner up Chris Froome.
Bradley Wiggins, Team Sky's rider of 2011 after a season which saw him win the Critérium du Dauphiné, come third in the Vuelta and collect a silver medal in the World Championship time trial in Copenhagen before helping Cavendish to victory in the road race, gets his new campaign under way at the Volta ao Algarve (February 15-19). Also taking part in Portugal is two-time Tour de France stage winner Edvald Boasson Hagen.
That race is followed by the Giro di Sardegna (February 21-25) which will feature British trio Peter Kennaugh, Ben Swift and Geraint Thomas and the Classics season then gets under way at the end of the month with Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Bruxelles-Kuurne.
Flecha, winner of Het Nieuwsblad in 2010 and inches away from defending his crown in 2011, will bid for glory again on February 25, alongside Barry, Boasson Hagen, Eisel, Hunt, Paris-Bourges hero Hayman, Knees and Stannard.
And the following day Sutton returns to Kuurne-Bruxelles-Kuurne, where he claimed a memorable victory last year, with the Aussie sprinter coming into the line-up along with Cavendish and Dowsett.
The full squads for all February's races can be found by
clicking here.
