Sam Bennett (above) and Martyn Irvine will not be at the Giro this year after their teams failed to secured wild card invites; which as Pro Continental squads they were depending on to ride.
Martyn Irvine and Sam Bennett will not get to ride this year's Giro d'Italia in their home country after the race organisers today announced their three wildcard entries for the 2014 edition, with the riders’ Unitedhealthcare and NetApp-Endura squads not included.
The news will come as a bitter blow to both, with hopes raised before Christmas that they would be included in their teams’ line-up for the race if both squads made the cut.
If that had come to pass it would have brought the number of Irish riders in the race to five, with Dan Martin (Garmin-Sharp), Nicolas Roche (Tinkoff-Saxo) and Philip Deignan (Team Sky) all expected to ride.
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In November RCS Sport, which owns the Giro, announced a short list for the three wild cards available.
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As well as Net App Endura and Unitedhealthcare, also on the list were: Caja Rural-RGA; Team Colombia; Bardiani Valvole-CSF Inox; IAM Cycling; MTN-Qhubeka and Novo Nordisk.
However RCS has today revealed the wildcard entries are Bardiani-CSF and YellowFluo-Neri Sottoli from Italy and the Colombia squad. They will join Androni-Venezuela and 18 WorldTour teams for the race which starts in Belfast in May.
A statement from RCS Sport said the decision was in large part made to promote Italian cycling.
“The choices made… were dictated by the opportunity, at this historic moment, to sustain the Italian cycling movement, without ever losing sight of international development.
"All four teams with wildcards for the 2014 Giro d’Italia are members of the MPCC (Movement for Credible Cycling).”
However, Bennett's NetApp-Endura squad have been invited to race in a number of other events that RCS Sport own including Tirreno-Adriatico, Milan San-Remo and the Tour of Lombardy. Bennett will be hopeful of a start in at least one of those races.
Irvine’s UnitedHealthcare have some consolation from missing out on the Giro by securing an entry to Milan San Remo.
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