The 2015 Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling team will be presented to the World on Thursday, the 26th of February, in the city of Ghent, the capital of Flemish cycling. The black and orange team is currently spending one week training in the area, with team building activities and specific preparation for the upcoming Omloop Het Nieuwsblad very much on the agenda.
The team’s media launch on Thursday will be the biggest event of the year – off the bike for the Wiggle Honda athletes and staff. It’s a major event for all the team’s members, valued and prestigious sponsors, partners and of course for their dedicated media associates from around the world.
As well as numerous members of the international press and media, other very important guests will include Marc Coucke, the CEO of Omega Pharma, who sponsors and invests in many sports including men’s cycling at WorldTour level. Coucke is keen to discover the professionalism in women’s cycling for himself, firsthand with a view to possibly invest at the highest level in the sport of women’s cycling in the near future.
Multiple Olympic and World Champion, and first ever British winner of the Tour de France, Bradley Wiggins, who has generously supported the team from the moment of it’s creation, is also keen to catch up with the Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling team athletes in Ghent this week.
Several of the team’s 2014 roster return, including former two-time road World Champion Giorgia Bronzini, newly-crowned Australian Road Race Champion Peta Mullens, and ten-time Japanese Champion Mayuko Hagiwara, however, a number of new stars will join the team in 2015 to compliment this already stellar line up.
New arrivals include Australian Nettie Edmondson, who recently dominated women’s endurance cycling at the UCI Track World Championships in Paris, taking rainbow jerseys in both the Team Pursuit and the Omnium. Also new to the team is Belgian Road and Omnium Champion Jolien D’hoore, who hails from Ghent, and is one of the most exciting riders ever produced by the cycling-mad Flemish region.
The team welcomes Elisa Longo Borghini, the prodigious Italian, who can excel on all terrains and in all conditions. The 23-year-old from Verbania in northern Piemonte already has a World Cup victory to her name, as well as two podiums in la Flèche Wallonne and a World Championship bronze medal, and is surely destined for even greater things this year. Mara Abbott, one of the greatest climbers of all time in the women’s peloton, also joins for 2015. The 29-year-old American has two Giro d’Italia victories to her name, in 2010 and 2013, with a third title at the top of her list of goals for 2015.
Despite its international roster, which boasts riders from nine different nations on four continents, Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling remains true to its British roots. The 2015 team not only retains Olympic Champion Dani King, and World Cup winner Amy Roberts, but has also signed British Criterium Champion Eileen Roe, and the young exciting Isle of Man talent, Anna Christian.
Anna Sanchis of Spain and Emilia Fahlin of Sweden remain in the team whilst new signings Audrey Cordon of France and Chloe Hosking of Australia both moved to Wiggle Honda in 2015 from the same team last year. Chloe Hosking took Wiggle Honda’s first victory of the season at the Bay Cycling Classic in Australia on January 2nd.
Activities at the week-long Belgian training camp have been focused on fun, but challenging team-building sessions, particularly incorporating the newest members of the Wiggle Honda team. The camp will bring the team together and prepare them mentally and physically for battle on the road during the coming months.
The team will be performing specific reconnaissance training on the Omloop and Flanders courses throughout the week, as preparation for the opening classic races ahead of the European season, and to build on the success that Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling riders have already enjoyed in both Australia and Qatar.
Thursday’s multi-media launch and presentation will be hosted by UK’s Ian Stafford, the famous British Sports Journalist, Author, Broadcaster & Speaker.
Journalists will have the opportunity to meet the riders of Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling, with many of the athletes available & scheduled for one-to-one interviews throughout the event.
Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling rider line up 2015
Mara Abbott (United States), Giorgia Bronzini (Italy), Anna Christian (Great Britain), Audrey Cordon-Ragot (France), Jolien D’hoore (Belgium), Annette Edmondson (Australia), Emilia Fahlin (Sweden), Mayuko Hagiwara (Japan), Chloe Hosking (Australia), Dani King (Great Britain), Elisa Longo Borghini (Italy), Peta Mullens (Australia), Amy Roberts (Great Britain), Eileen Roe (Great Britain), Anna Sanchis (Spain)
