Katusha sends young riders to Tour of Beijing

Image 1 of 3

Katusha will give its young riders a chance in the Tour of Beijing. Alexey Tsatevich will lead a trio of  young sprinters, while Petr Ignatenko will look to do well in the mountains. The race runs October 11-15 and covers 836 kilometres in five stages.

Tsatevich rode the WorldTour race in 2012, his first WorldTour year, and finished 13th on the fist stage. He will look to take a stage win this year.

“I will be the leader of the sprints together with Marco Haller and Rudiger Selig," Tsatevich said in a team's press release.

"Every stage we will decide with the sport directors which is more suitable to Marco and me, and depending also on our shape and the development of each stage we will decide who's going to fight for the victory.”

Haller won the fourth stage of the Tour of Beijing last year.

The trio will be joined by first-year pro Anton Vorobev, who was U-23 world time trial champion in 2012.

"We will have a good roster in order to take a good result in this prestigious race," Konyshev said sport director Dmitriy Konyshev. "It's a WorldTour competition; we would like to take the last points in order to get the best possible position in the UCI WorldTour team ranking. I think the roster is very balanced.”

The Tour of Beijing also offers climbing, with the queen stage being the fourth stage. The peloton will have to face two category 1 climbs, including the mountaintop finish on Mentougou Miaofeng Mountain. Ignatenko will take his chances there, supported by veterans Vladimir Gusev and Dmitriy Kozonchuk.”

Gusev is the “old hand” on the squad, having been part of the top ranks of cycling since 2004. He, Kozonchuk and Timofey Kritiskiy round out the team for the race in China.