Giant Alpecin Confirm Vuelta a España Team

Team Giant-Alpecin is pleased to announce its final nine-rider line-up for the third Grand Tour of the 2016 season, the Vuelta a España, which starts on August 20.

Following successful campaigns at the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France, winning two stages at each, the team heads to this year’s Vuelta with confidence. Team Giant-Alpecin returns to Spain after being close to the overall podium with Tom Dumoulin (NED) last year and after having won three stages. For this year the team will once again focus on stage success in the sprints and in the breakaways when the opportunities arise.

Like last year, the race gets underway with a team time trial of 29.4km, in the province of Ourense. The first mountain stage comes on stage three with a summit finish in Mirador de Ézaro. The rest of the race presents a plethora of different opportunities and should give the team with chances for more than one rider to compete for a stage result.

Team Giant-Alpecin will be targeting the sprints with Nikias Arndt (GER), and he will be looking to win his second Grand Tour stage victory after his success at the Giro d'Italia. The team has strong lead-out capabilities to support Arndt with experienced Koen de Kort (NED), Tom Stamsnijder (NED), Tobias Ludvigsson (SWE) and fast Zico Waeytens (BEL). The 23-year-old Norwegian Sindre Skjøstad Lunke is set to make his Grand Tour debut in Spain, while Warren Barguil (FRA) will focus on stage results in his third Vuelta appearance. The opportunists in the line-up include Chad Haga (USA) and Ludvigsson who are capable of proving their strength against the clock, and German road captain Johannes Fröhlinger will be using his experience to lead the team through the 21 stages, as he starts his 13th Grand Tour. 

Speaking about the line-up for the Vuelta, coach Luke Roberts (AUS) said: "Our objective will be on stage results. Firstly in the sprints where there should be plenty of opportunities for a fast finish during the three weeks. In parallel, we will apply an offensive strategy when the stages become more difficult to target results from the breakaways. Finally with Warren, we will see how the race evolves to give him the best chances for stage success."