Lidl-Trek name leaders for 2024 Classics and Grand Tours
Geoghegan Hart and Pedersen lead at the Tour de France as Deignan, Longo Borghini and Realini target all three women's Grand Tours
Lidl-Trek have unveiled their men's and women's Grand Tour and Classics leaders for 2024 as they begin a combined training camp in Spain.
The US-registered WorldTour team will give new signing Tao Geoghegan Hart and Mads Pedersen leadership roles for next July's Tour de France.
The Briton, who is awaiting a return to racing following a long recovery from a fractured hip sustained at the Giro d'Italia, will make his debut in Lidl-Trek colours at the Volta ao Algarve (February 15-19), a race he's competed at twice before.
The 28-year-old will make his second Tour de France start next summer, with the US team confirming that Danish Classics rider and sprinter Pedersen will return to the Tour after taking a stage win in 2023. Pedersen will start his season at the Etoile de Bessèges (February 1-5).
Italian sprinter Jonathan Milan, another of Lidl-Trek's ten new signing for their men's WorldTour team will begin his season at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana (February 1-5) before taking on an "extensive cobbled Classics campaign" alongside Classics leaders Pedersen and Jasper Stuyven, starting with Opening Weekend.
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He'll also head up the team's Giro d'Italia selection as he seeks a second maglia ciclamino having won the points classification this May.
Giulio Ciccone will lead the squad's GC charge in Italy, while Jasper Stuyven and new signing Andrea Bagioli will also head to the Giro.
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Skjelmose won the 2023 Tour de Suisse and was one of the breakout riders of the 2023 season. He will take up a GC leadership role for the team at the Vuelta a España, with his compatriot Pedersen also on the team as he returns to the race where he won the points jersey in 2022.
While the men's team kick off their campaign at the Tour Down Under next month, the Lidl-Trek Women's WorldTour squad begin at the UAE Tour Women (February 9-12), where Elisa Longo Borghini and Gaia Realini will seek to recreate their one-two finish from earlier this year.
Longo Borghini will be joined at the spring Classics by former world champions Elisa Balsamo and Lizzie Deignan, as well as Ellen van Dijk, who returns from time out due to her pregnancy.
The Italian, who can count the Tour of Flanders and Strade Bianche on her career palmarès, will race all three women's Grand Tours of the Giro Donne, Tour de France Femmes and La Vuelta Femenina next season.
Deignan and Realini also tackle the big three, while Balsamo is set to race both Giro and Tour, the team confirmed.
Both Lidl-Trek squads welcome an influx of new riders this winter as they begin their first pre-season training camp ahead of their first full season under the lead sponsorship of the German supermarket.
Geoghegan Hart, Milan and Bagioli are joined by domestique extraordinaire Tim Declercq, lead-out men Simone Consonni and Ryan Gibbons, Fabio Felline, Carlos Verona, and climbers Sam Oomen and Patrick Konrad among new faces in the men's squad.
The women's team welcomes Clara Copponi and Felicity Wilson-Haffenden on board, as well as a quartet of promising neo-pros in junior European champion Fleur Moors, Canadian twins Ava and Isabella Holmgren, and junior Gent-Wevelgem winner Izzy Sharp.
Dani Ostanek is Senior News Writer at Cyclingnews, having joined in 2017 as a freelance contributor and later being hired full-time. Before joining the team, she had written for numerous major publications in the cycling world, including CyclingWeekly and Rouleur. She writes and edits at Cyclingnews as well as running newsletter, social media, and how to watch campaigns.