The Ministry of Sport confirmed this Wednesday, March 30, that the Colombia Tierra under-23 cycling team of Athletes-GW Shimano, received the official invitation from the organization of the Giro d'Italia, to compete in the race of the category that will be held between June 8 and 18. Following in this way, the footsteps of the women's squad that will be in the same event from June 30 to July 10.
For this year's edition, 35 teams from around the world will seek to win the “Baby Giro”, of which 17 will be foreign and 18 will be local. For this version, more than 70 invitations were submitted to be part of the race squad.
“It is a great joy for us that the U-23 cyclists of our team, can be in the Giro d'Italia of the category, it fills us with excitement to be able to participate. We have done a very hard training session between January, February, March and the next month of April, to look for our first victories and to be able to compete in the general,” said Luis Alfonso Cely, technical director of the team.
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This Colombian cycling team is economically driven by the Ministry of Sport. Figures provided by the national government indicate that for this year there is a budget of 5.5 billion pesos, for the operation of the men's and women's teams.
Although the official course of the competition is not yet known, on June 8, 14 teams will leave from Austria, Belgium, Colombia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Norway, Poland, Spain, the United States and Switzerland.” Youth and later we will finalize details of this invitation that has come to us,” said Cely in a statement from the sports portfolio.
The great card of the Colombian team to fight the general classification is Germán Darío Gómez, current national champion of the Under - 23 category. In his last competition on European roads, which took place on March 27, he became the first beetle to climb the podium of the Città San Vendemiano Trophy, an Italian race created in 1947, reserved for U-23 cyclists and which has been part of the UCI Europa Tour since 2008. He was third in the competition.
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Tyrol KTM Cycling Team - Austria
Lotto Soudal Development Team - Belgium
Team Elevate p/b Home Solution Soenens - Bélgica
Bingoal Pauwels Sauces WB Development Team - Belgium
Team Colombia Land of Athletes GW Bicycles - Shimano - India
Continentale Cycliste Team Groupama-Fdj - France
DSM Development Team - Germany
Lotto Kern-Haus Team - Germany
Zappi Racing Team - Gran Bretaña
Israel Cycling Academy - Israel
Astana Qazaqstan Development Team - Kazakhstan
Uno-X DARE Development Team - Norway
HRE Mazowsze Heart of Poland - Poland
Laboral Kutxa Sub23 Basque Country Foundation - Spain
Eolo-Kometa U23 Cycling Team - Spain
Hagens Berman Axeon Cycling Team - USA UU.
Swiss Racing Academy - Suiza
The Giro d'Italia U23 is organized by the leaders of Italian cycling, Marco Selleri and Marco Pavarini. In 2021, the winner was Spaniard Juan Ayuso, of the UAE Team Emirates team. The current champion is considered to be the great pearl of Spanish and European cycling.
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