Movistar confirm Tour de France team

The Spanish Movistar team is the final squad to name its nine riders for this year’s Tour de France, meaning all the 198 riders for this year’s race have been confirmed.

2010 winner Alberto Contador is listed as number one in the provisional start list. The final start list will be confirmed on Friday. Teams have until then to make any last minute replacements needed due to injury or illness.

Some teams, including Leopard Trek, Liquigas-Cannondale and Omega Pharma-Lotto arrived in the Vendée region on Tuesday to study the route of Sunday’s team time trial stage. Most other teams will arrive today. The Grand Depart kicks off with the official team presentation on Thursday afternoon at the Puy du Fou theme park near Les Herbiers.

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Arroyo leads Movistar team

The Movistar Tour de France team was presented in the telephone company’s flagship store in Madrid on Wednesday morning before the riders flew from Spain to the Vendée region of France for the start of the Tour de France.

Movistar will be lead by David Arroyo and include Andrey Amador, Rui Costa, Imanol Erviti, Iván Gutiérrez, Beñat Intxausti, Vasil Kiryienka, Fran Ventoso and new Spanish national champion José Joaquín Rojas.

"We have a squad that hopes to win on every terrain, with the same goal of every squad: taking at least a stage victory,” team manager Eusebio Unzué said.

“Ventoso has already shown he might do well against the top sprinters in big races. Rojas is also a fast finisher and showed his form in the Spanish championships on Sunday. We also have all rounders like Amador, Erviti, Iván (Gutiérrez) or Rui Costa, who are capable giving us some success on any kind of stage. For the mountains, Intxausti, Arroyo and Kiryienka have the qualities needed to ride up front.”