Ludewig and Gerdemann in altitude

T-Mobile's new Dream Team of former Domina Vacanze rider Jörg Ludewig and former Team CSC member Linus Gerdemann are training together again. After a 12-day training camp in Mallorca before Christmas, the pair spent New Year's Eve in a altitude training camp in Maso Corto, Italy, but Ludewig told the Neue Westfälische newspaper they had a low-key celebration.

"To be honest, I nearly slept through the New Year," he said. "I have such a strenuous program here, it's hard to stay up until midnight. And I have to be out again at 8 a.m." In the snow of the Italian Alps, the Germans cannot of course ride their bikes outside for training. "In the morning we ride for half an hour in the hotel on the roller, then we go cross-country skiing for two-and-a-half hours."

But that's only the morning program. "The best is yet to come," Ludewig continued. "In the afternoons we take the gondola from 3,200 meters down to 2,200 meters, and then we walk back up. With a pulse of 140... Right now it takes us two hours and 20 minutes. At -23° Celsius that's not particularly comfortable but it should bring us something. Afterwards we hit the rollers again in the fitness room. That makes six hours a day training."