Gregor Mühlberger will ride this year's Ras with the Austrian Tirol Cycling Team. He won the prologue in last week’s 2.2-ranked Istrian Spring Trophy and is clearly in good form at the moment.
Two more international teams, one each from Austria and Germany, have been confirmed as talking part in this year’s An Post Ras, which begins in Dunboyne on May 18th.
Tirol Cycling is the former team of current Austrian professionals Marco Haller (Katusha), Matthias Krizek (Cannondale) and Georg Preidler (Argos Shimano). And it will contain the best U23 riders in Austria when it comes to Ireland in two months, according to team boss Norbert Dürauer.
Winner of the 2012 Tour de l’Avenir and former Austrian national champion, Lukas Pöstlberger will definitely be one to watch and should have no problem handling anything the Rás throws at him, while team mate Alexander Wachter won European Junior Road Race Championship in the same year.
Advertisement
A stage winner in the 2012 Tour de l’Avenir, Lukas Pöstlberger also won the overall and now riders the Rás in Ireland in May as part of a very significant line-up from Austria.
The team will have two road captains including Josef Benetseder, a multiple national championship medallist and two-time Tour de Suisse rider.
Benetseder won the king of the mountains classification in the Tour Austria four years ago and could prove to be one of the best climbers in this year’s Rás.
Related News
Another experienced rider, Clemens Fankhauser is a former Pro Continental rider and has taken a top five stage finish in the 2.HC Presidential Tour of Turkey and victory in the 1.2 Tour of Vojvodina in the past.
Gregor Mühlberger, however is the man on form, winning the prologue in last week’s 2.2-ranked Istrian Spring Trophy and finishing fourth overall.
“An Post Rás is very important for us and we are very ambitious,” states Dürauer.
“We will send our top riders to Ireland for that reason.”
.
.
.
The German Kuota Pro Team will be led by Joachim Tolles, who finished second, fourth, sixth and seventh on stages in the 2009 edition and knows what to expect from the race.
.
Tolles will be joined by Philipp Becker, who competed in the race last year as part of Team Bike Aid, Andre Benoit, Jan Deutschmann and Micha Glowatzki, who team manager Marius Tolles believes will be both strong team riders and also aggressive in breakaways.
.
“Our team-goal is to get a stage win in a bunch sprint and a good performance during the race,” he said.
“With a little bit of luck we hope to play the cards of Micha Glowatzki and Jan Deutschmann in escape moves.”
Race director, Tony Campbell anticipates strong performances from both squads.
“The line-ups for Tirol Cycling and the Kuota Pro Team look very promising and the riders involved will be very capable of taking on the many other international teams we will have in the race,” he said.
Tirol Cycling and Kuota join the Belgian and New Zealand national track squads announced last week.
Added Campbell: “We’ve announced four good teams. More will follow in the weeks ahead, and we believe it sets things up for a really great edition.”
The An Post Rás will begin in Dunboyne on Sunday May 18th and will feature stage end finishes in Roscommon, Lisdoonvarna, Charleville, Cahirciveen, Clonakilty, Carrick on Suir, Baltinglass and Skerries.
.
.
.
Topics
