Can Blanco be the next HTC?

[Dazed and Confused]

Blanco and Euskaltel, clearly the two strongest teams in the world

BTW if Argos can't even pick up a single WT point in a race like TDU, I fear for their survival in the WorldTour.

Argos.
Agree, very poor performance by Kittel. Degenkolb better be strong in the spring classics.

 

[Ferminal]

They need to stop sending Kittel to WT races.

 

[Leendert82]

Give the guy some time to get into form.
Kittel has the sprint speed to beat Cav and Greipel, which not many sprinters have.
Proven that many times ago. Yes he will need to improve.

 

[El Pistolero]

Blanco and Euskaltel, clearly the two strongest teams in the world

BTW if Argos can't even pick up a single WT point in a race like TDU, I fear for their survival in the WorldTour.

Sprinters don't earn a lot of WT points either way. It's way a team like Lotto struggled to get into the WT this year, despite the fact they have a very good train. It's not like they just win a flat sprint of 200 meters, they need to control the entire stage(alone or with help) and still do a good lead-out. I don't know how many WT points a WT stage gives, but probably not much.

 

[TheEnoculator]

Is this a joke?

Rank Prev. Team (Code) Country Points
1 - BLANCO PRO CYCLING TEAM (BLA) NED 157
2 - EUSKALTEL EUSKADI (EUS) ESP 91
3 - MOVISTAR TEAM (MOV) ESP 87
4 - SKY PROCYCLING (SKY) GBR 79
5 - RADIOSHACK LEOPARD (RLT) LUX 63
6 - LAMPRE-MERIDA (LAM) ITA 24
7 - LOTTO BELISOL (LTB) BEL 19
8 - ORICA GREENEDGE (OGE) AUS 11
9 - FDJ (FDJ) FRA 8
10 - BMC RACING TEAM (BMC) USA 2
11 - TEAM SAXO-TINKOFF (TST) DEN 2
12 - GARMIN SHARP (GRS) USA 2
13 - ASTANA PRO TEAM (AST) KAZ 1
14 - OMEGA PHARMA - QUICK-STEP CYCLING TEAM (OPQ) BEL 1
15 - VACANSOLEIL-DCM PRO CYCLING TEAM (VCD) NED 1

Maybe Blanco could be the next HTC after all. Wasn't HTC the number 1 ranked WT team at some point?

 

[Der Effe]

At least currently they're 157 times better than the other 2 Dutch teams together!

 

[Pricey_sky]

Is this a joke?

Rank Prev. Team (Code) Country Points
1 - BLANCO PRO CYCLING TEAM (BLA) NED 157
2 - EUSKALTEL EUSKADI (EUS) ESP 91
3 - MOVISTAR TEAM (MOV) ESP 87
4 - SKY PROCYCLING (SKY) GBR 79
5 - RADIOSHACK LEOPARD (RLT) LUX 63
6 - LAMPRE-MERIDA (LAM) ITA 24
7 - LOTTO BELISOL (LTB) BEL 19
8 - ORICA GREENEDGE (OGE) AUS 11
9 - FDJ (FDJ) FRA 8
10 - BMC RACING TEAM (BMC) USA 2
11 - TEAM SAXO-TINKOFF (TST) DEN 2
12 - GARMIN SHARP (GRS) USA 2
13 - ASTANA PRO TEAM (AST) KAZ 1
14 - OMEGA PHARMA - QUICK-STEP CYCLING TEAM (OPQ) BEL 1
15 - VACANSOLEIL-DCM PRO CYCLING TEAM (VCD) NED 1

This just shows how ridiculous the points scoring is. Lotto won half of the stages of the TDU yet have barely more than 10% of the points Blanco picked up.

 

[Ferminal]

Blanco had a first and two seconds and a third and were first and sixth overall?

Dunno about Euskaltel though.

 

[ElChingon]

This just shows how ridiculous the points scoring is. Lotto won half of the stages of the TDU yet have barely more than 10% of the points Blanco picked up.

What's more ridiculous is people looking at Month 1 results and starting to extrapolate to the end of year results. Yes, the points system is jacked but come post Vuelta the standing will be more on par to the quality of the teams.

 

[pastronef]

any news os some possible new sponsor deal?

AGR is in 3 days, they hoped to have a sponsor before the end of spring classics. hopefully after Vanmarcke great podium at roubaix, they will perform well in the ardennes.

 

[Gloin22]

any news os some possible new sponsor deal?

AGR is in 3 days, they hoped to have a sponsor before the end of spring classics. hopefully after Vanmarcke great podium at roubaix, they will perform well in the ardennes.

Does winning matter ?

I mean HTC in example won ****loads and still ceased to exist.

 

[pastronef]

Does winning matter ?

I mean HTC in example won ****loads and still ceased to exist.

actually i was looking for the Team Blanco 2013 thread but I could not find it
so I used this thread to ask about it's sponsor search

ok ok. just joking its

 

[Caruut]

Does winning matter ?

I mean HTC in example won ****loads and still ceased to exist.

Just because one team won a lot and couldn't find a sponsor doesn't mean winning is irrelevant, just that in HTC's case there were other issues. The team were probably also looking at a much higher wage bill or less beastly squad. A lot of stars on less money than they probably are now, so a sponsor is either looking at paying much more or getting much less than HTC did out of their sponsorship.

Their style of racing - racking up the numbers in sprint stages - made them very much a team to appeal to the casual fan. The casual fan, however, is generally most interested in "home" success. Despite the international squad, however, there was only one big winner: Cavendish. As such, they were probably best placed to appeal to the British fan. Unluckily for them, the British cycling market had recently been pretty much saturated by the SkyBorg.

Even if they had found a British sponsor, they would have struggled to finance any British leaders other than Cavendish. With Sky desperate for Brits to lead their squad, talented British riders to get the fans interested when Cav isn't riding would cost an absolute fortune. So a "British" identity was pretty much out of the question because of Sky, but any other would have been difficult because of Cav.

For those reasons they couldn't attract medium-sized domestic companies like Lotto or Omega Pharma, as they would have lacked sufficient penetration in any individual market to justify the sponsorship. As such, only transnational companies are going to be valid sponsors, which restricts the choice of sponsors. Those big companies don't want to risk cycling sponsorship and the potential fallout.

Winning might not guarantee you a sponsor, but it's certainly better than not winning.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

It's no secret that Blanco wants to be the next HTC. Blanco can pose threats in all aspects in the WT, and the fact that they are so desperate for a sponsor should take their competitive spirits up a notch. But the question is: can they deliver the results necessary to be a Cinderella team like HTC, assuming they will exist beyond this season?

No, they have too much respect for cycling to become that.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Does winning matter ?

I mean HTC in example won ****loads and still ceased to exist.

Blanco at least have one thing in their favour: a clear identity. Blanco are a Dutch team, first and foremost. They may need to downsize, they may need to drop a level, or whatever, but the team bosses can try to target Dutch sponsors who would see the benefit in having the team. That's quite a large part of why Eusebio Unzué was able to get a new sponsor when Caisse d'Epargne pulled out, while B*b S*******n wasn't able to find one for High Road; Unzué and his guys were able to appeal to target Spanish companies for sponsorships with a bit of a patriotism card to play, despite that they were going to be a weaker team that year (after all, they'd lost Valverde, LL Sánchez and some useful prospects like Urán). HTC didn't have that. They were de facto an American team, but without a very strong American identity (there was no clear core of American riders like there is a clear Dutch core at Blanco). They had formerly been a German team (they were coasting on the T-Mobile payout) but trying to sell a major German company on cycling at that point was going to be tough. Also, they had the problem that they were perhaps too successful for their own good. A team like Caisse actually had a pretty small budget for the amount of success they had. HTC's budget wasn't as big as many, but a lot of that was due to the coasting on the T-Mobile payout and that quite a few riders were still on contracts from earlier days and could rightfully demand much better salaries further along the line. Therefore, the cost of buying out HTC to the sponsor would likely be much higher, at least if they wanted the team complete with the likes of Cavendish and Martin.

 

[pastronef]

Blanco at least have one thing in their favour: a clear identity. Blanco are a Dutch team, first and foremost. They may need to downsize, they may need to drop a level, or whatever, but the team bosses can try to target Dutch sponsors who would see the benefit in having the team. That's quite a large part of why Eusebio Unzué was able to get a new sponsor when Caisse d'Epargne pulled out, while B*b S*******n wasn't able to find one for High Road; Unzué and his guys were able to appeal to target Spanish companies for sponsorships with a bit of a patriotism card to play, despite that they were going to be a weaker team that year (after all, they'd lost Valverde, LL Sánchez and some useful prospects like Urán). HTC didn't have that. They were de facto an American team, but without a very strong American identity (there was no clear core of American riders like there is a clear Dutch core at Blanco). They had formerly been a German team (they were coasting on the T-Mobile payout) but trying to sell a major German company on cycling at that point was going to be tough. Also, they had the problem that they were perhaps too successful for their own good. A team like Caisse actually had a pretty small budget for the amount of success they had. HTC's budget wasn't as big as many, but a lot of that was due to the coasting on the T-Mobile payout and that quite a few riders were still on contracts from earlier days and could rightfully demand much better salaries further along the line. Therefore, the cost of buying out HTC to the sponsor would likely be much higher, at least if they wanted the team complete with the likes of Cavendish and Martin.

that's a good explaination. they really do have a strong Dutch identity.
it's a double sided point of view. right now, the Dutch medias are as scared as the German ones after 2008 (schumacher, t.mobile problems etc...)

so hopefully they will find someone who trust them, and ensure their future.
anyway I thought GIANT could step up (just like Cannondale) but it does not seem to happen