German T-Mobile team has announced its long-awaited roster for next year, as well as the details of its anti-doping measures, with which the squad hopes to regain its credibility in Germany. As regards the development of the new squad after Operation Puerto decimated both its roster and management eight weeks ago, the new general manager Bob Stapleton said, "We packed eight months worth of work into just two," calling the task "somewhat of a challenge."
Stapleton and former rider Rolf Aldag, now head of sport management, will be supported a largely new international team of sport directors, including Brian Holm (Denmark), Allan Peiper (Australia), Tristan Hoffman (Netherlands), and Valerio Piva (Italy). Completing the management team are Luuc Eisenga (Netherlands), who will be the technical director and team liaison and Bruce Carmedelle (USA), business manager.
In building the foundation of a "team for the future", Aldag stressed the importance of the riders’ strength of character as well as their athletic potential. "We need riders with a good heart, a good head and good legs who will work well together as a team", said Aldag, announcing the addition of eleven new riders to the team:
Joining the squad for 2007 are Michael Barry (30/Canada), Mark Cavendish (21/Great Britain), Gerald Ciolek (20/Germany), Bernhard Eisel (25/Austria), Bert Grabsch (30/Germany), Roger Hammond (31/Great Britain), Servais Knaven (35/Netherlands), Axel Merckx (34/Belgium), Aaron Olsen (28/USA), Jacob Piil (33/Denmark) and Marco Pinotti (30/Italy).
Alongside Australian Michael Rogers, who will be the team's future captain and GC rider, the team management is keeping the following riders: Eric Baumann (26/Germany), Lorenzo Bernucci (27/Italy), Scott Davis (27/Australia), Linus Gerdemann (24/Germany), André Greipel (24/Germany), Giuseppe Guerini (36/Italy), Serguei Gonchar (36/Ukraine), Kim Kirchen (28/Luxembourg), Andreas Klier (30), André Korff (33/Germany), Frantisek Rabon, (23/Czech Republic) Stephan Schreck (28/Germany), Patrik Sinkewitz (25/Germany) and Thomas Ziegler (25/Germany).
A full report on the new T-Mobile roster will follow.
