Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling is delighted and proud to announce that Japanese Champion Mayuko Hagiwara has renewed her contract, and will spend a fourth straight year as part of the black and orange squad. The Japanese Champion has been part of the team since its inception in 2013, and is one of the most popular riders with her teammates and the staff. A tireless worker for others, Mayuko took her first professional victories in Europe for herself in 2015; after having retained her National Champion’s jersey with sprint victory over her biggest domestic rival, she delighted the entire women’s peloton by becoming the first ever rider from Japan to win a stage of the Giro d’Italia.
“I really appreciate, and I’m really excited, that I could continue with Wiggle Honda in 2016,” Hagiwara said. “For me it will be the fourth year with this team; I have been this team from the first year of the team, and that is so special.
“I love this team, and I appreciate that I can work in this team 2016 also,” she added. “Next year, the big riders will come. I looking forward to working with them, and I will keep trying to work hard and find my position in the team.
“Then we really would achieve big success as a team next year more than this year. I will work hard for it.”
Hagiwara’s incredible season was brought to a cruel and abrupt end, as she suffered a fractured collarbone in a crash during the Madrid Challenge by La Vuelta on the streets of the Spanish capital, but it has been her most successful to date. Not only was 2015 her best season, however, but it was also the best yet for Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling, which is due in no small part to the hard work of the quietly spoken Japanese Champion.
“The re-signing of Mayuko is very special to me and to our team,” Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling Owner and Manager Rochelle Gilmore said. “We’ve been working together now for three years and have achieved the impossible. Mayuko is an inspiration to so many people including myself. She is living proof that if you believe in The Dream, you can achieve The Dream.
“Our team has been powered by the Japanese car manufacturer, Honda, so it’s important that we’re represented by Japan’s most talented female cyclist, and we’re extremely fortunate that Mayuko is also a beautiful person and role model for all of our fans and followers.
“I’m delighted that Mayuko has chosen our team for another two years and I’m absolutely positive that we have not yet seen the best of Mayuko Hagiwara,” Gilmore added.
Hagiwara is the eighth rider to be confirmed as part of the Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling team in 2016. Alongside the Japanese Champion will be her current teammates, Olympic Champion Dani King, Italians Elisa Longo Borghini and Giorgia Bronzini, Belgian Champion Jolien D’hoore; along with new signings, Swedish Champion Emma Johansson, Dutch all-rounder Amy Pieters and British sprint prodigy Lucy Garner.
More members of the 2016 team will be announced in the coming weeks.
