Top teams prepare for Philly championship

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Dubbed 'the nation's biggest one-day race' and now in its 26th year, the TD Bank Philadelphia International Championship is back in 2010, with some of the world's best teams slated to ride the event on June 6.

Two ProTour squads will send several of the world's best riders to Philly for the event, with HTC-Columbia taking recent Giro d'Italia stage winner Matt Goss and local lad Craig Lewis to cover the team's bases on the testing parcours. The squad is the defending champion, having taken first and second with André Greipel and Greg Henderson in 2009.

After a successful Amgen Tour of California with Francesco Chicchi and Peter Sagan that included three stage wins, Liquigas-Doimo will send this duo to headline the Italian squad's effort. Sagan in particular is a good chance of prevailing on the tough course that includes the Manayunk Wall, given his success at this year's Paris-Nice and his victory on the Big Bear stage of this month's race in California.

Reigning US criterium national champion John Murphy, Chad Beyer and Jackson Stewart will headline BMC Racing's attack at the event, with an enhanced organisation in 2010 that has seen the team massively increase operations around the world. Nevertheless, the team will be aiming to maintain its record on US soil and grab what is arguably the most prestigious one-day crown in America.

Hot on the heels of the ProTour and Pro Continental teams is a host of US-based Continental squads that include Kelly Benefits Strategies (Andy Bajadali and Scott Zwizanski), United Healthcare-Maxxis (Rory Sutherland and Karl Menzies), Fly V Australia (Jonathan Cantwell and Charles Dionne), Bissell (Andy Jacques-Maynes and Kyle Wamsley), Jamis-Sutter Home-Colavita (Ivan Dominguez and Tyler Wren) and Jelly Belly-Kenda (Mike Friedman) plus Canada's own Spidertech-Planet Energy outfit.