Manuel Quinziato: BMC is the team to beat at the 2011 Flanders Classics
Italian rider Manuel Quinziato reckons his new outfit BMC Racing Team will form a potent threat in the Flanders Classics during 2011.
Quinziato, who joins BMC from Liquigas-Doimo after spending five seasons with the Italian team, hailed the strength of the US team's roster when speaking to
Cyclingnews.
"If you add us two [Greg Van Avermaet from Omega Pharma Lotto] to Marcus Burghardt, Karsten Kroon, George Hincapie and Alessandro Ballan, I think that, collectively, we're stronger than anyone."
Paolo Zani, CEO of Liquigas, has said he would have liked to keep Quinziato at the team, but that the offers from BMC and Kazakh team Astana for Quinziato were too lucrative for Liquigas to match.
"I think, at the moment, BMC is the fastest-growing team in professional cycling," said Quinziato, whose transfer was announced on 1 September. "I could see evidence of that in the little two-day training camp we had at the team headquarters in Switzerland
after the Tour of Lombardy."
Classics the priority for Quinziato
Quinziato added that several other teams were interested in signing him, but that BMC's focus on the Classics led him to sign for John Lelangue, directeur sportif at the team.
"I had offers from around five teams, but BMC were the best-equipped for the Classics. Lance [Armstrong] spoke to me about joining RadioShack, which was very flattering, but that's more of a stage-racing team. Quick Step, Katusha and a couple of others were
also interested."
The Italian came 13th in the Paris–Roubaix in 2008 and improved on the performance a year later, when he finished ninth overall. This year, however, Quinziato finished only 63rd, far behind winner Fabian Cancellara of Saxo Bank.
Quinziato added that Cancellara, who will race for Kim Andersen's Luxembourg PRO Cycling Project next year, will form less of a threat to his Classics ambitions next spring.
"He's in a new team and he won't be able to count on [former teammate] Matti Breschel any more. That said, if he's as strong as he was this year, he'll be very hard to beat. That's why our power in numbers could be crucial."
Tags: