Omega Pharma-Lotto closes transfer season
Team Omega Pharma-Lotto has announced the signing of Marcel Sieberg and declared their 2011 line-up to be complete.
The German rider is the latest of as many as 14 new signings for the Belgian team. The rider will move from US ProTour team HTC-Columbia, the fifth rider to make the same transfer after Andre Greipel, among the world’s best sprinters,
as well as Adam Hansen, Vincente Reynes and Gert Dockx.
Greipel took 21 victories in 2010, more than any other professional rider. His HTC-Columbia teammate Mark Cavendish was the runner-up with only 11 victories, despite being the favoured sprinter on the American team.
As a result, Greipel will finally have the opportunity to prove himself as a sprinter against his former teammate and to compete in the Grand Tours.
28-year-old Sieberg will race in support of the sprinter, but he is not short on individual results. He has four wins in his five-year pro career and helped his team to several stage-race victories this season at the Giro d’Italia
and the Tour of Poland.
The 2011 line-up for Omega Pharma-Lotto has been chosen to support Greipel as the team’s top sprinter and Philippe Gilbert as the classics specialist. With 14 new signings, the team will have more new riders than old ones.
The team’s top climber, Jurgen Van den Broeck, has been with the team since 2007. His contract lasts until the end of 2011, but after his top-five finish overall at the Tour de France, he will be looking to extend his contract with
the Belgian team for another two years (with an increase in pay). The 27-year-old rider has been linked to team Saxo Bank, despite his existing contract, and it is speculated that Bjarne Riis’ interest in him is one of his bargaining chips.
Riis, owner of team Saxo Bank, has said he has a ‘plan B’ if the Alberto Contador case goes south, and Van den Broeck might just be a part of that plan.
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