Round 2022: Emirates unveils roster about Tadej Pogacar, not Marc Hirschi
Mon Jun 27 2022 at 09:06
Emirates Airlines has announced its riders who will take part in the start of the 109th Tour de France in Copenhagen on Friday. The leader in the team is of course Tadej Bojjar. The Slovenian won the last two editions of the Tour.
Pogačar may be trying to defend his titles from the past two years. This season, the Slovenian GC rider has been in really good shape, winning the UAE Tour, Strade Bianche and Tirreno-Adriatico. After that he finished fifth in Milan-San Remo and fourth in the Tour of Flanders. After the classics, he took a break to set i’s on the tour at the Tour of Slovenia with a two-stage win and an overall victory.
The Slovenian is surrounded by a group of strong climbers. Rafai Majka is going to the seventh Tour de France. He recently showed his good form with second place on the Tour of Slovenia. For Brandon McNulty it will be his second round. In 2022 he won the Faun-Ardèche Classic and Trofeo Calvia and was second on the Algarve Tour. With Marc Soler and George Bennett, the UAE has more hits in the mountains.
For flat and hilly stages, Pogačar can count on Matteo Trentin, Vegard Stake Laengen and Mikkel Bjerg. With Italy’s Trentin, the UAE may also have a racing finalist on the team.
Charm
“We have worked hard as a team all year to prepare and hope to show everyone three weeks of exciting racing,” Bogar said in a press release. “It’s been a positive year for the team so far and we hope to continue that here in the Tour. We know it won’t be easy and we will have a lot of challenges, but that’s part of the magic of the Tour.”
Mark Hershey is the notable absentee from the team. The Swiss has been at the start of the Tour for the past two years and won stage 12 to Saran in 2020, after a 28km solo run. This season, he has already won the Italian one-day Per Semper Alfredo and the Grosser Prie de Canton Aargau in Switzerland. Recently, Hershey had to end the Tour of Switzerland early after testing positive for COVID-19.
The Tour de France is scheduled for July 1-24.
