Joining Sagan on the Tinkoff-Saxo TTT roster will be three-time individual time trial world champion Michael Rogers, Maciej Bodnar, Michael Valgren, Christopher Juul-Jensen and Manuele Boaro.
“It’s a complicated task to select the squad for the Worlds TTT, as it’s late in the season and it’s critical that the riders aren’t fatigued before an all-out effort like this,” said team director Sean Yates.
“It’s obvious that these six riders, together with the likes of Bennati and Contador, are the strongest time trialists on our team and we felt that they were the best at this point.”
Yates said the team are targeting a podium finish this week in Richmond, although he acknowledged the competition will be stiff.
“Setting a goal is tricky, but it’s undoubtedly to do the fastest possible ride,” he said. “There are no clear favorites, and if we stick to the strategy, we got a chance. BMC, Orica and Etixx are surely some of the teams that will prove hard to beat, but we want to muster in there.”
The roster for the Richmond TTT has been long in the making but has changed throughout the season as injuries and changing rider schedules forced the team to rethink the line up, according to a statement provided by Tinkoff-Saxo.
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“Originally, we wanted them to do the Canadian races together, so it hasn’t been the optimum preparation that we were looking for,” Yates said. “However, the boys are acclimatizing well and they have the qualities to do a blazing TTT.”
The squad has been in Virginia since the beginning of the week in order to “reset” their body clocks and prepare for Sunday’s race.
“This effort requires careful planning – the guys have to train at the right intensity, not rest too much and we have to test and select the right equipment in order to use the power we develop to the largest and most efficient extent,” Yates said.
“It’s going to be a classic World Championships TTT with 38.8 mostly flat kilometers, a real out-and-back race where we will see an intense speed. We want the guys to ramp up the intensity during the next days and then hope that they all have a great feeling come Sunday.”
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