Uno-X Pro Cycling Team

[RedheadDane]

Dragging this up again because I need some help.
Apparently we need to watch out for this guy.

Who is this guy?
J. Kulset?

 

[Squire]

Who is this guy?
J. Kulset?

Yes.

 

[RedheadDane]

Thor Hushovd becomes General Manager of Uno-X Mobility Cycling — Uno-X Mobility

We have just received a Tour de France wildcard for the second year in a row. We are grateful and happy, but a wildcard is not our ultimate goal. Ever since we started our modest continental cycling team by signing Kurt Asle Arvesen as head of sports in 2016, we have systematically taken step by s

www.unoxteam.com

 

[ingsve]

I'm a bit confused about Hushovds role. Jens Haugland is the general manager and the article still refers to him like that and implies he will continue with that role so, will Hushovd be an additional General Manager working next to Haugland or beneath Haugland or what? What will his responsibilities be?
I'm guessing the role of General Manager does not mean he'll be working day to day on the road or anything so I'm guessing it's working on getting the team invites and sponsors and other such tasks or what?

 

[ingsve]

With the invitations being announced from RCS I took a look at how Uno-X has actually done in WT-races in the past. I was very surprised to see that despite all the invites to all sorts of classics, stage races plus the Tour, the only top 3 results so far in any WT race was a 2nd and 3rd place in stages of Dauphine, one in 2022 and one in 2023. Surely they would need to do a lot better if they have ambitions of actually becoming a WT team one day.

 

[RedheadDane]

I was very surprised to see that despite all the invites to all sorts of classics, stage races plus the Tour, the only top 3 results so far in any WT race was a 2nd and 3rd place in stages of Dauphine, one in 2022 and one in 2023.

Are you absolutely sure about that?

Tour de France 2023 Stage 6 results

Tadej PogaÄar is the winner of Tour de France 2023 Stage 6, before Jonas Vingegaard and Tobias Halland Johannessen. Jonas Vingegaard was leader in GC.

www.procyclingstats.com

1	POGAČAR Tadej	UAE Team Emirates	210	100	10″	3:54:27
2	VINGEGAARD Jonas	Jumbo-Visma	150	70	6″	0:24
3	JOHANNESSEN Tobias Halland	Uno-X Pro Cycling Team	110	50	4″	1:22

 

[Samu Cuenca]

I'm a bit confused about Hushovds role. Jens Haugland is the general manager and the article still refers to him like that and implies he will continue with that role so, will Hushovd be an additional General Manager working next to Haugland or beneath Haugland or what? What will his responsibilities be?
I'm guessing the role of General Manager does not mean he'll be working day to day on the road or anything so I'm guessing it's working on getting the team invites and sponsors and other such tasks or what?

Jens Haugland will keep his job in Uno-X Mobility (the energy company, not the cycling team), but will now only be a board member of Uno-X Mobility Cycling. It's Kulset's decision to bring in Hushovd and have Haugland focus on his main job.

Hushovd blir Uno-X-sjef: - Dette har vært en drøm for meg

ENSJØ (TV 2): Thor Hushovd tar over for Jens Haugland som øverste sjef for Uno-X Mobility-laget. Stjernerytter Alexander Kristoff er overrasket.

www.tv2.no

 

[tobydawq]

Are you absolutely sure about that?

Tour de France 2023 Stage 6 results

Tadej PogaÄar is the winner of Tour de France 2023 Stage 6, before Jonas Vingegaard and Tobias Halland Johannessen. Jonas Vingegaard was leader in GC.

www.procyclingstats.com

1	POGAČAR Tadej	UAE Team Emirates	210	100	10″	3:54:27
2	VINGEGAARD Jonas	Jumbo-Visma	150	70	6″	0:24
3	JOHANNESSEN Tobias Halland	Uno-X Pro Cycling Team	110	50	4″	1:22

Abrahamsen was also 3rd on stage 18.

 

[ingsve]

Are you absolutely sure about that?

Tour de France 2023 Stage 6 results

Tadej PogaÄar is the winner of Tour de France 2023 Stage 6, before Jonas Vingegaard and Tobias Halland Johannessen. Jonas Vingegaard was leader in GC.

www.procyclingstats.com

1	POGAČAR Tadej	UAE Team Emirates	210	100	10″	3:54:27
2	VINGEGAARD Jonas	Jumbo-Visma	150	70	6″	0:24
3	JOHANNESSEN Tobias Halland	Uno-X Pro Cycling Team	110	50	4″	1:22

Ah, must have missed those. Was looking at races with the WT tag and missed the GT tag. Still, not a lot.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

Jens Haugland will keep his job in Uno-X Mobility (the energy company, not the cycling team), but will now only be a board member of Uno-X Mobility Cycling. It's Kulset's decision to bring in Hushovd and have Haugland focus on his main job.

The decision probably comes from even higher up than Kulset, likely from the inner core of the Reitans that owns Uno-X and the other companies in the Reitan group. The company is going through a big change and the Reitans wants their best guy (Haugland is seen as a massive talent / upandcomer in the business world) at the real job and not the side project that is the cycling team.
Thor Hushovd has been connected to Reitan Group since 2014 or so.

 

[ingsve]

I didn't know this about Uno-X that the company actually owns the cycling team rather than being a title sponsor for it. Are there any other teams that are actually owned by the main sponsor of sorts? I guess something like Astana is perhaps?

 

[Netserk]

I didn't know this about Uno-X that the company actually owns the cycling team rather than being a title sponsor for it. Are there any other teams that are actually owned by the main sponsor of sorts? I guess something like Astana is perhaps?

Ineos & UAE. I assume Bahrain as well.

 

[Samamba]

Ineos & UAE. I assume Bahrain as well.

Lotto too.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

EF also owns their teams, and I think Trek does as well.

Euskaltel - Euskadi is of course owned by the Fundación Euskadi, but that foundation was obviously only set up to generate funds for and managing a cycling team, and its logo doesn't even feature as heavily on the kit as it used to.

In women's cycling, the Roland team is owned by the El Salvadorian/Swiss Ruben Contreras, possibly directly through his company Cogeas which used to be the main sponsor of the team and its logo still appears on the jersey. That's also why the team has always had CGS as its initials, even while Israel was involved.

 

[ingsve]

EF also owns their teams, and I think Trek does as well.

Doesn't Jonathan Vaughters own the team behind EF? He was the founder of the team back in the day at least.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

Doesn't Jonathan Vaughters own the team behind EF? He was the founder of the team back in the day at least.

It was sold to EF to keep the team alive. JV is now just an employee (maybe he still owns some shares).

 

[ingsve]

It was sold to EF to keep the team alive. JV is now just an employee.

Oh, see what I miss by not following the sport as closely.

 

[yaco]

Jayco of course is owned by Gerry Ryan.

 

[ingsve]

Tobias Halland Johannesen confirmed with a broken collarbone after crashing in
Tour des Alpes-Maritimes.

 

[ingsve]

Uno-X reigns in the rain.

Very well ridden today in Fleche Wallone by the whole team and a good finish for THJ to finish 6th. I think this is likely their best finish in a classic of this stature so far depending on what status one gives to Dwars door Vlaanderen.

 

[Squire]

Uno-X reigns in the rain.

Very well ridden today in Fleche Wallone by the whole team and a good finish for THJ to finish 6th. I think this is likely their best finish in a classic of this stature so far depending on what status one gives to Dwars door Vlaanderen.

Agree.

You're probably going to have some expert armchair sports directors criticizing them for riding when they knew others were going to be stronger on the Muur, but I'd much rather see them doing this than coasting around in anonymity in the middle of the pack with their full team. They also tried getting THJ away in an attack on the last lap, but that was clearly not possible with enough teams interested in a sprint. Don't think Uno-X could've done anything better today.

 

[Netserk]

They were second best in the end of the riders in the peloton behind the attackers, only beaten by Cosnefroy.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

You're probably going to have some expert armchair sports directors criticizing them for riding when they knew others were going to be stronger on the Muur

The same armchair experts were first criticizing them for not riding and “gifting Kragh Andersen the win” just before that…

 

[ingsve]

Agree.

You're probably going to have some expert armchair sports directors criticizing them for riding when they knew others were going to be stronger on the Muur, but I'd much rather see them doing this than coasting around in anonymity in the middle of the pack with their full team. They also tried getting THJ away in an attack on the last lap, but that was clearly not possible with enough teams interested in a sprint. Don't think Uno-X could've done anything better today.

There were constantly groups dropping and coming back up to the peloton on the laps before so it was probably in their interest either way to try and keep the group small for there to be less chaos and competition at the end.

Riding the way they did at least ensured that all 7 of their riders finished in the positions that give UCI points and that is important to them since they are fighting both to stay 3rd in the PT rankings to get the one day races wild cards next season as well and also to try and compete for the WT spots in the 2023-25 rankings.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

Some news about the future of the team:
- The budget was last year around 18 million Euros.
- Reitan Group (owners of Uno-X and Rema1000) want to cut their costs to around 15millon a year.
- Dropping the Development team saves around 1M a year.
- If (when) they fail to win promotion to World Tour in this cycle the team will continue on without any change, with the same goal about reaching WT status as soon as possible.

And the maybe most interesting part:
- They are now talking to sponsors outside of Norway/Denmark and it's being reported that it might be happening something soon!

If it's a foreign co-sponsor there are two possibilities:
1. It's a bike brand or something similar that doesn't necessarily have a connection to any given nation. Hushovd might have some old connections? Uno-X BMC or Uno-X Cervelo?

2. It's a brand that wants to bring in a couple of riders from a new country. Ideally it would be a Swedish or Finnish brand, but I don't really think that's realistic. I guess the "only Norwegian/Danish riders" philosophy might be dropped.