Teams & Riders EF Pro Cycling

[Zinoviev Letter]

What’s the plan for EF then? Hope Carthy, Powless etc improve?

their plan appears to be to survive and not go under and everything else is secondary

 

[Anderis]

What’s the plan for EF then? Hope Carthy, Powless etc improve?

Re-sign Uran and rely on Higuita's consistency + Bettiol in classics, I guess. That's still not the worst we've seen in WT. And then survive above all.

It appears that they can't be too picky for financial reasons, which is really awful, as for 2020 they've already had a rather tiny budget apparently:

Tour de France 2020. Jakimi budżetami dysponują zespoły? - Rowery.org

„Het Nieuwsblad” opublikował zestawienie budżetów zespołów startujących w Tour de France, na podstawie danych zebranych przez firmę „Sporttune”.

rowery.org

(article in Polish but the table should be understandable ) so there's not really anything to go down from if they want to retain a healthy level of performance.

Tell what you want about Vaughters but his team has often overperformed its budget and FFS I would love to see the team having a stable mid-level WT budget for once so that they can finally have a few years without big compromises regarding salary budget, performance budget etc. Not for 2021, it seems.

 

[dusty red roads]

He should do another crowdfunder.

 

[roundabout]

What’s the plan for EF then? Hope Carthy, Powless etc improve?

find another team to merge with?

 

[Leinster]

find another team to merge with?

NTT would be rip for the plucking. It would be not-unlike Vaughters to finally get a monument win out of EBH.

 

[Oldermanish]

Re-sign Uran and rely on Higuita's consistency + Bettiol in classics, I guess. That's still not the worst we've seen in WT. And then survive above all.

It appears that they can't be too picky for financial reasons, which is really awful, as for 2020 they've already had a rather tiny budget apparently:

Tour de France 2020. Jakimi budżetami dysponują zespoły? - Rowery.org

„Het Nieuwsblad” opublikował zestawienie budżetów zespołów startujących w Tour de France, na podstawie danych zebranych przez firmę „Sporttune”.

rowery.org

(article in Polish but the table should be understandable ) so there's not really anything to go down from if they want to retain a healthy level of performance.

Tell what you want about Vaughters but his team has often overperformed its budget and FFS I would love to see the team having a stable mid-level WT budget for once so that they can finally have a few years without big compromises regarding salary budget, performance budget etc. Not for 2021, it seems.

Lobbying now for Sagan to EF. He could bring some Specialized power to the team, help the Classics profile and help promote the gravel sector for sponsors. He'd probably love being on a US team and not following climbers around 2 GTs a year. Just a Westcoaster's dream, since he hangs out here to train sometimes.

 

[Anderis]

I think around 2017 Sagan alone was earning around the same money as the entire 30-men squad of Vaughters' team. Could still be the same story today. The team would basically need to almost double the budget to make it happen.

 

[Oldermanish]

I think around 2017 Sagan alone was earning around the same money as the entire 30-men squad of Vaughters' team. Could still be the same story today. The team would basically need to almost double the budget to make it happen.

How much of that was Specialized money, does anyone know? Having him land in the US market with little to nothing going on may attract some dough. He's also a little down the road from that salary range these days.

Any possibility of sponsorship for EF or his future wages assumes some projected normalcy to racing schedules again, which is no sure thing next year.

 

[Leinster]

Sagan is under contract to Bora for 2021, so if/when he does move to a different team, the global pandemic business should all be settling down.

 

[Oldermanish]

Sagan is under contract to Bora for 2021, so if/when he does move to a different team, the global pandemic business should all be settling down.

True and thanks for that update. Let's hope there will be a season and events next year or the issue of rider employment will be shared by everyone.

 

[Anderis]

12 riders from EF will start tomorrow in WC.

Any other team with more riders in the race?

 

[RedheadDane]

12 riders from EF will start tomorrow in WC.

Any other team with more riders in the race?

Astana equals that number.
Half of which are - of course - from Kazakhstan...

 

[Leinster]

Per PCS, Astana actually have 13, and Sunweb have 12 also.

Bora only have Schachmann, which must be a shock.

 

[RedheadDane]

Per PCS, Astana actually have 13, and Sunweb have 12 also.

I counted on PCS, and completely missed Kudus... However, according to Astana's own social media updates, there's only five Kazakh riders from the team in the race...

 

[tobydawq]

True and thanks for that update. Let's hope there will be a season and events next year or the issue of rider employment will be shared by everyone.

Why on earth wouldn't there be a season?

 

[tobydawq]

I counted on PCS, and completely missed Kudus... However, according to Astana's own social media updates, there's only five Kazakh riders from the team in the race...

Yes, no Lutsenko. Quite odd.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

A really huge number of high quality riders just choosing not to ride this year. Edited to add: in Lutsenk’s case it’s Covid though

 

[janraaskalt]

Anyone else hoping Magnus Sheffield going from juniors straight to the pros "here" with EF? In the VeloNews podcast he said he has pro offers and with Axeon's future in doubt, it seems realistic.

 

[Anderis]

Is he WT-ready, really? His u-18 results don't seem to be anywhere near as good as Evenepoel's or Simmons'. And if EF continues their policy of not racing a lot of small races next year, it will make even less sense.

 

[janraaskalt]

He was really good as first year junior, but cannot show it this year due to a certain virus. I don't think Simmons is much better than Sheffield. I'd say, compare Simmons' 2018 results with Sheffield's 2019 ones.

 

[Anderis]

The point is not if Sheffield has enough talent to make it to WT eventually but if he's already good enough to jump into WT at 18. Not quite sure if Sheffield to EF for 2021 makes sense for anyone involved.

 

[Anderis]

Around a month ago, EF had 15 riders with confirmed contracts for 2021. Now they have 13.

And we're almost in October now.

 

[janraaskalt]

Sep Vanmarcke received an offer from EF and is considering that offer and other ones he received.

EF Education First doet Sep Vanmarcke nieuw voorstel

Sep Vanmarcke heeft nog altijd geen contract voor volgend seizoen op zak. Niet dat de 32-jarige Anzegemnaar zich daar zorgen over maakt.

www.nieuwsblad.be

 

[Anderis]

Hmmm, so at least EF is making offers now.

Anyone knows what's going on with Halvorsen? No races since lockdown and not on the startlist of any upcoming races.

 

[janraaskalt]

Anyone knows what's going on with Halvorsen? No races since lockdown and not on the startlist of any upcoming races.

There were rumours about a corona related depression (maybe not clinical)