Cycling manager Ralph Denk from the German Bora-Hansgrohe racing team is concerned about the increasing budgets of the teams and does not want to rule out a reorientation for the future.
Grand Tours cost the most money
"The direction is clear until 2024. We want to concentrate on the one- and three-week tours. But you have to be realistic about the fact that this supreme discipline is also the most expensive," said Denk on the sidelines of the 106th Giro d'Italia. "If the team budgets of our competitors increase again, then it will probably be a bit difficult for us. Then we might have to reorient ourselves to give more weight to the sprint."
The Bora team is currently represented by riders such as Giro winner Jai Hindley (Australia), the Tour fifth Aleksandr Vlasov (Russia) and the top German riders Lennard Kämna and Emanuel Buchmann are fully focussed on the tours. However, the gap in cycling is widening. "We're not one of the smallest, but we're also far away from the big budgets," said Denk, who has just extended his contract with main sponsor Bora until 2027. It is estimated that the team has around 20 million euros per year at its disposal.
Top professional cyclists with long-term contracts
To make matters worse, the current top stars are all tied to their teams for a long time, such as Tour champion Jonas Vingegaard (Denmark) at Jumbo-Visma, Young star Tadej Pogacar (Slovenia) at the UAE team or world champion Remco Evenepoel (Belgium) at Soudal - Quick Step. "Everyone is looking for the needle in the haystack, the next young star," said Denk.
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