Doug Ryder: MTN-Qhubeka is destined for greatness

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2015 MTN-Qhubeka p/b Samsung team kit(Image credit: MTN-Qhubeka/Jens Herrndorff )

MTN-Qhubeka are looking to make history in 2015 by becoming the first African team to make it into the Tour de France. The team, which began in 2007, has been growing quickly over the last few years. They took the step up to Pro Continental level in 2013 and took part in their first Grand Tour at last year’s Vuelta a España.

Doug Ryder: We’ve thrown the kitchen sink at this year. We’ve built so incredibly over the last two years and I can’t believe that we have continued to build at this rate and the staff and riders that now want to come to our team. We must be doing something right. We’re really in a sweet spot at the moment and if our stars align then I really believe that this team is destined for great things this year.

DR: When we signed all these guys, there was this perception that there were so many egos that there was no chance that they were going to work together. We had lots of discussions with the riders and we spoke about what this team is about and told them to leave their egos at the door. If someone’s going to come in and think, I’m going to win this is my race and I’m not going to work for someone else then I’ve told them guys this is what you impact [referring to the Qhubeka project]. Whenever that comes to the fore, think about this because then you’ll work together like glue and paper.

DR: We want to build and develop the general classification riders from the African continent and to bring in a GC rider, a good one, costs so much money and we don’t have that budget. We also didn’t want to be a team that focusses on one big objective and if that fails then there goes the whole season. We need to win races to grow the brand of the team and to grow the Qhubeka charity so that we can do more for others.

The international riders are there to help us win races but also to help the younger guys. I don’t want to be a team Colombia where they can’t attract the best Colombians to their team because they don’t have the depth. Rigoberto Urán and Nairo Quintana won’t ride for Claudio Corti’s team because he doesn’t have the depth and they won’t reach their big dreams. I don’t want that to happen for our best African riders.

With them mentoring the African riders they know that the African riders will give absolutely everything that they have, and inspire them with hardships that they’ve had in the past. Take Daniel Teklehaimanot. Daniel is one of 17 children and all of his brothers and sisters have defected and he’s the only one that can go back to Eritrea so he keeps the whole family together. I think that the Europeans are completely humbled by this and that will drive them onto bigger success.

DR: We started with this team as a 70 per cent African team and we were a bit over ambitious to start with such a high number of African riders who were very young and inexperienced. We’ve only dropped that a little bit to 60 per cent, that’s 13 out of the 22 riders. It is still a significant number. We will always sign young riders from the African continent first and foremost over a young European rider to develop their talent.

A really strong spring classics campaign is what we’re looking for and that will really help us to get out ticket into the Tour. Then, a stage win in the Tour de France would just be exceptional. I really hope that we will be able to get into the Tour of Spain as well. The perception is that the Pro Continental teams are not strong enough and don’t have the depth and talent to do two Grand Tours. We believe that with the depth that we have and with the talent and the race structure of the races we have the perfect balance to be able to do those races. If we went to the Vuelta then we would love to win a jersey.

DR: That’s our goal. If we can become a WorldTour team then we can give more African riders more opportunity and take them to the biggest races in the world. To have an African-registered WorldTour team where people know for sure that you’re going to be in the biggest races in the world, the fan support around the team and the confidence of our riders from that surety of knowing it isn’t a lottery will drive them to another level. That’s what we’re driving towards and let’s just hope that the first six months of 2015 are an indication that we’re ready to step up.

DR: It’s a bit iffy on whether it will happen or not. Do I think that teams should cut down their size? No, because that’s less riders with jobs. If there were more teams then I would say it is fine. I don’t think that you can reduce the number of riders without increasing the number of teams because then the pyramid just gets pointier. It just means that people move down a level and others fall off the bottom and off the bus completely. It’s so hard this sport and there’s so many riders that work so hard for others and they’re the ones that always get left off, and that’s sad.

DR: Look after yourself first I guess. We don’t worry about what other teams do, we care about ourselves and the sustainability of our project. We really look after our riders and give them the surety that we don’t just replace riders because we build for time and we want to be sustainable. We love the sustainability and we want to engage with the people for the long term. It’s going to be difficult to keep our best riders because people are going to be trying to poach them but we hope that we can create the environment that is safe and secure so that they want to stay with us.

Born in Ireland to a cycling family and later moved to the Isle of Man, so there was no surprise when I got into the sport. Studied sports journalism at university before going on to do a Masters in sports broadcast. After university I spent three months interning at Eurosport, where I covered the Tour de France. In 2012 I started at Procycling Magazine, before becoming the deputy editor of Procycling Week. I then joined Cyclingnews, in December 2013.