Youth and experience to combine for Mitchelton-Scott at BinckBank Tour
12 August 2019 03:39
Mitchelton-Scott will take a squad that contains a mixture of youth and experience to WorldTour stage race the BinckBank Tour, which gets under way in Beveren, Belgium, on Monday. Veteran riders Michael Albasini, Jack Bauer and Cameron Meyer will line up alongside neo-pros Edoardo Affini and Callum Scotson, and second-year pro Rob Stannard, while 26-year-old New Zealander Dion Smith splits the difference, age-wise, to complete the seven-man squad. Smith's compatriot Bauer knows the Belgo-Dutch race well, and appears to be putting his hand up for a leadership role for this year's BinckBank Tour by taking aim at the importance of the short 8.4km individual time trial that takes place around The Hague, in the Netherlands, on Saturday.ADVERTISEMENT "If you want to have a good overall, or be up there for any of the stages, you've got to be on your toes in this race," Bauer said on the team's website. "First and foremost, there are often splits because of the layout of the stages – wind can cut the bunch, crashes can cut the bunch and there's a lot of road furniture up in that part of the world. "Last year, Matej Mohoric [Bahrain-Merida] won overall, and he set that win up through a select breakaway, and I'd expect something similar to happen this year. The key is to be part of the move on the day the breakaway goes to the line, and then pull out a decent time trial," he said. Of Saturday's time trial, Bauer continued: "It's almost prologue length – less than nine kilometres – so there won't be big gaps in the time trial, but it can still be important.
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