February 18/15 8:57 am - Team SmartStop Starts 2015 on Top

Posted by Editoress on 02/18/15
 

Team SmartStop Officially Launched, Starts Season on top of the UCI America’s Tour

Team SmartStop was officially launched on Friday night at Pedalers Fork in Calabasas, California following the conclusion of a highly successful 14-day training camp. With the launch comes the news that as of the end of January, Team SmartStop are already leading the charge in the UCI America’s Tour Team Classification.

From the UCI’s provisional rankings on January 30th of the UCI Continental Teams, Team SmartStop is starting the season with the UCI’s acknowledgement as the strongest team in the America’s Tour with the number one provisional ranking of 599 points, 218.33 points ahead of the teams nearest rivals.

It has been no big secret that it is one of Premier Sports Group and Michael Creed’s major goals in 2015 to once again win the UCI America’s Tour and earn selection into the Team Time Trial (TTT) World Championships in Richmond Virginia later this year.

In 2014, Team SmartStop had five riders in the top 25 of the UCI America’s Tour individual classification, with Jure Kocjan holding the top spot at the end of the season, and wearing the white leaders jersey at the Tour of Alberta.

With the World Championships being held in the United States of America this September, gaining selection to the Team Time Trial event is going to be high on the agenda for many domestic continental teams and there are plenty of opportunities to gain points over the coming season.

Team SmartStop has two opportunities to pick up points, the Vuelta Independencia Nacional and the Vuelta Mexico, over the next three weeks. In 2014, the team started their campaign with wins in the Dominican Republic and they hope to do so again when the competition starts next weekend.

Note:  No announcement of which riders will compete at the Vuelta Independencia Nacional was provided

Of the Vuelta Independencia Nacional, Sport Director Michael Creed said: “This is a chance to solidify our chance at starting the World TTT, this is a important marker of where the new guys on the team are at and how hard we'll have to chase UCI points for the rest of the year.”

Through the signing of 2014 Vuelta Mexico champion, Juan Pablo Villegas, Team SmartStop has increased their chances of gaining more points at the UCI 2.2 race held over the first week of March. Villegas won three stages in 2014, riding away solo in the final kilometers of stage four, beating our own Jure Kocjan who finished in second.

Team Owner James Bennett said on behalf of Premier Sports Group: " it was a major goal of the team to keep its champions and UCI points leaders intact for 2015. We wanted to show the cycling community that we intend to grow on our success from last year and start this year where we left off, leading the rankings."

Team SmartStop press release

2015 Team
Zach Bell
Chris Butler
Rob Britton
Evan Huffman
Kristofer Dahl
Flavio de Luna
Shane Kline
Jure Kocjan
Julian Kyer
Travis Livermon
Eric Marcotte
Travis McCabe
Bobby Sweeting
Juan Pablo Villegas