Cycling Transfers 2012-2013

With the new transfer season having opened and rider making their moves for next season, the 2012 transfers will be archived in this post.

Marko Kump Adri Mobil à Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
Martin Elmiger Ag2r à IAM Cycling source
Kristof Goddaert Ag2r à IAM Cyclingsource
Sébastien Hinault Ag2r à IAM Cycling source
Romain Lemarchand Ag2r à Cofidis
Nicholas Roche Ag2r à Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
Jonathan Fumeaux Atlas Personal - Jakroo à I AM Cycling
Johann Tschopp BMC à I AM Cycling source
Romain Hardy Bretagne-Schuller à Cofidis
Laurent Pichon Bretagne-Schuller à FDJ-BigMat
Samuel Dumoulin Cofidis à Ag2r source
Andrea Guardini Farnese-Vini à Astana source
Steve Chainel FDJ-BigMat à Ag2r source
Yauheni Hutarovich FDJ-BigMat à Ag2r source
Gabriel Rasch FDJ-BigMat à I AM Cycling
Clément Koretzky La Pomme Marseille à Bretagne-Schuller
Luc-Pierre Perichon  La Pomme Marseille à Bretagne-Schuller
Valerio Agnolio Liquigas-Cannondale à Astana
Eros Capecchi Liquigas-Cannondale à Movistar source
Dominique Nerz Liquigas-Cannondale à BMC source
Vincenzo Nibali Liquigas-Cannondale à Astana source
Sylvester Szmyd Liquigas-Cannondale à Movistar source
Alessandro Vanotti Liquigas-Cannondale à Astana source 
Daniel Oss Liquigas-Cannondale à BMC source 
Branislau Samoilau Movistar à Astana
Omar Fraile Matarranz Orbea Continental à Euskaltel Euskadi
Michael Matthews Rabobank à Orica-GreenEdge source
Jakob Fuglsang Radioshack-Nissan à Astana source
Cyril Bessy Saur-Sojasun à Cofidis
Jerome Coppel Saur-Sojasun à Cofidis
Stephané Poulhies Saur-Sojasun à Cofidis
Rohan Dennis Team Jayco-AIS à Garmin-Sharp source
Davide Appollonio Team Sky à Ag2r source
Lars Petter Nordhaug Team Sky à Rabobank
Fabio Aru Unattached à Astana source
Enrico Barbin Unattached à Colnago-CSF Inox
Warren Barguil Unattached à Shimano-Argos
Nicola Boem Unattached à Colnago-CSF Inox
Natnael Berhane Unattached à Europcar
Niccolo Bonifazio Unattached à Lampre-ISD
Bryan Coquad Unattached à Europcar
Matthias Krizek Unattached à Liquigas-Cannondale
Gert Joeaar Unattached à Cofidis
Morgan Lamoisson Unattached à Europcar
Luca Wackermann Unattached à Lampre-ISD
17th Aug: Daniel Garcia Navarro Team Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank à Cofidis source
17th Aug: Timothy Duggan Liquigas-Cannondale à Spidertech C10 source
18th Aug: Vasil Kiryienka Movistar à Team Sky source
20th Aug: Domenico Pozzovivo Colnago-CSF Bardiani à Ag2r source
20th Aug: Juan Antonio Flecha Team Sky à Vacansoleil-DCM source
21st Aug: Murilo Fischer Garmin-Sharp à FDJ-BigMat source
21st Aug: Robert Kiserlovski Astana à RadioShack-Nissan source
30th Aug: Cameron Wurf Champion System à Brixia Sport source
11th September: David Lopez Movistar à Team Sky source
13th September: David Tanner Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank à Rabobank source
13th September: Robert Wagner  RadioShack-Nissan à Rabobank source
14th September: Domenico Pozzovivo Colnago-CSF Inox à Ag2r-La Mondiale source
14th September: Stijn Devolder Vacansoleil-DCM à RadioShack-Nissan source
14th September: Daniele Bennati RadioShack-Nissan à Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
15th September: Miguel Ubeto Androni-Giocattoli à Lampre-ISD source
15th September: Gerald Ciolek Omega Pharma-Quick Step à MTN-Qhubeka source
17th September: Matti Breschel Rabobank à Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
18th September: Roman Kreuziger Astana à Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
18th September: Jack Bobridge Orica-GreenEdge à Rabobank source
18th September: Grega Bole Lampre-ISD à Vacansoleil-DCM source
20th September: Heinrich Haussler Garmin-Sharp à IAM Cycling source
20th September: Gustav Larsson Vacansoleil-DCM à IAM Cycling source
20th September: Thomas Löfkvist Team Sky à IAM Cycling source
27th September: Sebatian Lander Glud & Marstrand-LRØ à BMC source
4th October: Jonathan Tiernan-Locke Endura à Team Sky source
12th October: Filippo Pozzato Farnese-Vini à Lampre-ISD Source
18th October: Mark Cavendish Team Sky à Omega Pharma-Quick Step source
20th October: Alex Dowsett Team Sky à Movistar Source
24th October: Mauro Santambrogio BMC à Farnese Selle-Italia source
28th October: Davide Rebellin Meridiana - Kamen Team à CCC Polsat-Polkowice source
30th October: Roberto Ferrari Androni-Giocattoli à Lampre-ISD source
6th November: David Boily SpiderTech à Cannondale (Brixia Sport) source
6th November: Guillaume Boivin SpiderTech à Cannondale (Brixia Sport) source
14th November: Timothy Duggan Liquigas-Cannondale à Saxo-Bank-Tinkoff Bank source
7th December: Michael Rogers Sky à Saxo-Bank-Tinkoff Bank Source
14th December: JJ Heado Saxo-Bank-Tinkoff Bank à Jamis-Hagens Berman source

2012 Race Results

With the 2013 Season now beggining in earnest the 2012 race results tab has been moved into a blog post. Results from 14th August below...

Team Sky 2012 Season in Review

When Team Sky announced its five year goals the aim to have a British rider on the podium in France wearing yellow sounded fanciful. Forget five, Sky and Bradley Wiggins had a dream year in which they completely dominated the Tour de France and racked up stage win after stage win. Mark Cavendish joined the team to once again team up with Wiggins after they rode Madison together. His season on the team started well but tensions came to fore with Cav unhappy over his lack of support and a dedicated lead-out train. He still snared three Tour stages but in 2013 Sky will be GC focused not only in July but have the squad to challenge for GC wins in every race they enter.

Vacansoleil-DCM 2012 Season in Review

In 2012 the Dutch team rode the celeste Bianchi’s so it was fitting that the biggest win of the season came in Italy. That win was Stage 20 of the Giro d’Italia on the grand Stelvio as Thomas de Gendt stayed away for one of the rides of the season and in doing so ensured a podium placing in Milan. Paris-Nice was a team highlight and gave the team important World Tour points but they still finished a rather low 16th. Gendt and Westra were the best performing riders of 2012 but there numerous riders who added flourishes to their team leader’s achievements. 

Radio-Shack Nissan 2012 Season in Review

During the 2011 Vuelta de España what had previously been rumour and private became public knowledge. There was to be a merger between two new but big teams. RadioShack which had been created to accommodate Lance Armstrong’s return to racing and the Luxembourg backed Leopard team joined forces for the 2012 hoping their union will bring about Grand Tour success and a successful classics and one day onslaught. Instead this was an annus horribilis with injuries and doping scandals engulfing the team with the future of ex-director and star Fränk Schleck to be decided in coming weeks. Andy Schleck was retroactively awarded the 2010 Tour de France and in 2012 was focused on winning the race on the road. Swiss maestro Fabian Cancellara was looking to recapture his form of 2010 and had looked good early in the season till he crashed out of Ronde van Vlaanderen. Despite the dysfunction of team management and underperforming rides, surprisingly there were ten team classification victories which were more than any individual rider. 

Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank 2012 Season in Review

The season for Saxo Bank begun in Argentina at the Tour de San Luis with Alberto Contador winning two stages. These stage wins would later be annulled as the CAS ruling was handed down in February which stripped Contador of his 2010 Tour de France and 2011 Giro d’Italia. He also lost his contract with the team and was given a further six month suspension leaving him unable to race until August. With Richie Porte leaving for Sky at the end of 2011 there was no direct internal replacement for Contador as a GC rider and as a result the approach for the season was one day races and stage wins. 

Rabobank 2012 Season in Review

Rabobank have consistently been one of the most recognisable teams in the peloton not only because of their orange kit but there regular appearance on winners podiums. The team began the year with two challenges for Grand Tour podiums in Robert Gesink and Bauke Mollema and several sprinters who could mix it with the fastest men in the world. The team had successes across the season and continents but ended the season with a new name and without their orange kit with the Armstrong affair the final doping scandal storm the Dutch Rabobank could weather. 

Omega Pharma-Quick Step 2012 Season in Review

In recent years Tom Boonen has had indifferent seasons on the road with limited successes. Several positive tests for Cocaine at the end of last decade raised questions of whether the Flemish star was still interested in competing. Podium places at Flanders and Roubaix in 2010 suggested the fire was still burning but 2011 yielded just two wins in the whole season. The collapse of the HTC-Highroad team and signing of several riders from the American team alongside and the new sponsor Omega Pharma joining the team 2012 was a chance to start a fresh not just for Boonen but for the entire team. 2011 was also a very lean year for the team who had just as many national championships’ wins as trade race wins. The star rider of the season was Boonen but the team had 15 different winners suggesting the changes over the off season had a positive effect for the Belgian team. 

Movistar 2012 Season in review

In 2011 the team which first entered the peloton under the name of Reynolds begun the next chapter in its long existence with a new title sponsor. Movistar replaced the Spanish bank Caisse d'Epargne which had sponsored the team since 2005. One of the team’s stars under the Caisse name and most successful Spanish riders of his generation was Alejandro Valverde. Valverde was implicated in Operación Puerto and after a protected legal battle with various courts and cycling bodies he received a two year doping ban backdated from January 1st 2010. Due to the successes of the Spaniard his team had promised a place on the team once his suspension had been served. With the ban ending in 2012 Valverde rejoined the team and rode the first World Tour race of the year as the team leader. Although the team name is different, with El Bala back in the fold in 2012 the changes in structure where to a degree made redundant by the return of the prodigal son. 

2012: Another Tumultuous & Exciting Edition

The 2012 season will be defined by pictures of cyclists on the road as much as cyclists off the road. Bradley Wiggins became the first British rider to win the Tour de France, Alberto Contador made a winning return after his doping suspension, Philippe Gilbert won his maiden worlds rainbow jersey and Tom Boonen owned the cobbles. Yet for all the excitement and dominance of Team Sky plus individual and collective feats of the peloton, it was the USADA investigation into US Postal which lifted the lid on Lance Armstrong and Johan Bruyneel as the masterminds behind the most organised doping practise the sport has ever seen. As the season comes to a close there are trails that seem only destined to be endlessly consumed with chasing the murky past down rabbit hole after rabbit hole. There has been no admission by Armstrong and the 1990s culture of Omerta has lessened but still exists among the peloton and with two major Italian investigations now looking like handing down their findings in 2013, this is certainly a tumultuous time for the sport. However there were brilliant rides full of bravery, panache and courage across the season. Looking back to the seasoning races in January of this year, it becomes apparent several of those rides will become timeless images of the sport, as well as part of cycling’s folklore for the years to come. 

Lotto-Belisol 2012 Season in Review

With one of the most prolific sprinter on its books over the last few seasons, Lotto-Belisol weren’t going to struggle for wins in 2012. André Greipel has been one the most consistent sprinters in the peloton since 2008 and since leaving the Highroad team to join Lotto has continued his winning ways as the number one sprinter on the team. At Highroad there was a two way tussle between Mark Cavendish and Greipel with the Isle of Man rider the star sprinter. In his debut Tour de France last year Greipel took one stage win on Stage 10 showcasing his talent and skill as a sprinter as if it wasn’t known already due to his prolific winning ways. Knowing Greipel was a known quantity on the world’s biggest stage, the expectations upon the German would be even higher in 2012. Besides the German gorilla, Jürgen Roelandts chipped in with several wins as did Lars Bak in a season where the Tour was the highlight. Besides Greipel winning three stages, Jurgen Van Den Broeck finished fourth overall.

Liquigas-Cannondale 2012 Season in Review

The 2012 Liquigas-Cannondale season saw Peter Sagan, the terminator, come to the fore as superstar of the sport while Vincenzo Nibali finished third in the Tour with Moreno Moser and Elia Viviani highlighted the depth of the Italian squad in a year of great success. Nibali moves onto Astana in 2013 and his loss will be felt but with Sagan remaining on the team’s books, there will be no lack of wins in 2013. Nibali has moved on as wanted a team which could guarantee total support in a tilt for Grand Tour success. Although Nibali finished third at the Tour this season the team had split loyalties with Sagan taking three stages and the points classification as well as team resources away from Nibali. Ivan Basso’s season objective was another Giro d’Italia win and would ride in support of Nibali at the Tour where he finished 25th riding as a super domestique but his season was largely disappointing with only one win. Besides the Nibali and Sagan show, Liquigas notched up wins with Viviani and Moser impressively winning stage races overall for the first time. 

Katusha 2012 Season in Review

Grand Tour classification jerseys and stage wins, one day classics and the UCI World Tour win would be more than enough to suggest that Katusha had a standout 2012. However 2012 was close to Grand Tour dominance for the Russian team as Joaquim Rodriguez lost the Giro d’Italia on the final day and was in a commanding position until Stage 17 of the Vuelta de España when Alberto Contador pulled off an escape ride to snatch the win from his compatriot. Rodriguez was once again the UCI rider of the season as he repeated his 2010 antics as the highest ranked rider due to his best Grand Tour result and his first Ardennes classic win. For Katusha their suburb season may have been overshadowed by Sky’s dominance but 2012 will be a season the team can look back fondly upon. 

Orica-GreenEdge 2012 Season in Review

In 2012 the Australian dream of having a national team compete in the Grand Tours and One day classics of Europe was realised. Since Phil Anderson brought to attention the glory of the Tour de France by winning the white jersey in 1982, Australian cycling has growth as a cycling powerhouse has justified calls for a nation trade team. Until 2012 there was no national team, Australian’s instead were riding for the mostly European teams of the peloton besides a few exceptions, with clusters found of them across the peloton. For riders who had first made a name for themselves in the 1990s the opportunity to finish their career at an Australian team was too good an opportunity to turn down. One off the doyens of Australian cycling, Stuart O’Grady had ridden on Tour de France winning teams and enjoyed both personal and team success riding for Bjarne Riis’s CSC and Saxo Bank teams before a final year with the Leopard team. He has recently announced he has no plans for retirement and is a blessing for the younger riders to have a rider who has experienced Olympic Gold medal success and has 15 plus years of experience in the peloton to guide them and offer advice. Robbie McEwen rode the early season before pulling up stumps and relocating to the comfort of the car.

Lampre-ISD 2012 Season in Review

Lampre-ISD’s 2012 season was largely underwhelming with not a single World Tour win and will end the season with a cloud of uncertainty engulfing the team. With only three riders winning races in 2012 this was a poor season for a team that regularly wins Grand Tour stages and is noticed in the peloton for more than just their pink jerseys. Michele Scarponi who finished second on the road in the 2011 Giro d’Italia inherited the maglia rosa after Alberto Contador was stripped of his results from the 2010 Tour de France but ends 2012 winless and suspended by his team for his meetings with the disgraced Italian doctor Michele Ferrari. Compatriot Filippo Pozzato was recently given a six month suspension for meeting with doctor and Scarponi looks likely to receive at least the same sentence. A new sponsor and team name in 2013 could see a rejuvenated Lampre team who will also be riding Merida bikes but two investigations into doping practices could derail the team’s preparation or season next year. 

Garmin-Sharp 2012 Season in Review

Season 2012 would again welcome a new season, a new sponsor for the American Garmin team. Initially Barracuda came on board as a new co-sponsor with Cervélo as last season’s co-sponsor downgraded their sponsorship to supplying team bikes. Before the Tour de France Sharp was announced as a new co sponsor and the team jersey for the rest of the season had Garmin, Sharp and Barracuda as sponsors. The change of sponsors and departure of almost all the Australian riders on the team to GreenEdge as well as the departure of Thor Hushovd to BMC had relatively little impact as Ryder Hesjedal became the first Canadian and Garmin rider to win a Grand Tour. With several distraction across the season Hesjedal's Giro win was confirmations of Garmin's place as one of the top Pro Tour team.

Orica-GreenEdge Sever Ties with Matt White

Matt White has been sacked by the Australian cycling team GreenEdge after his admission of doping when riding on the US Postal team. He had previously been sacked from his Cycling Australia role after his admission. 

FDJ-BigMat 2012 Season in Review

The season begun for FDJ in a rather complicated manner as BigMat had all but signed on as a co sponsor for Garmin only to withdraw and pledge their allegiance and dollars to the French lottery team but this was no gamble. Two stage wins at the Tour de France and the emergence of Thibaut Pinot as the next French cycling star was the tip of the iceberg in 2012. Nacer Bouhanni won his first French road race title to add an extra layer of French pride to the team who won 21 races in 2012, asserting themselves as the premier French team of the year. Bouhanni and Arnaud Démare were the two biggest winners of the season but there was plenty of other riders with one or two wins such as a rejuvenated Perrick Fédrigo, Kenny Elissonde in a breakout year and the departing Yauheni Hutarovich. 

Euskaltel-Euskadi 2012 Season in Review

Euskaltel-Euskadi in 2013 will be a team whose value set will have drastically changed from its previous incarnations from 1994 till the present. Funding will be cut by the Basque government although the team was already operating on a budget of €1 Million less than last year. Besides the reduced funding that has forced changes structurally the team will for the first time have riders with no Basque connection. When previously only Basque riders or those who are familiar with the culture have been offered contracts, in 2013 the team will have a continental feel to it as riders with no Basque connection will be welcomed into the team. Whether or not these changes had affected the riders in 2012 is unclear as season 2012 was largely devoid of any significant results in comparison to previous seasons. 

BMC 2012 in Review

BMC had an ambitious recruitment policy at the end of the 2011 season in which they snared several big name riders, making headlines for the expensive outlay in acquiring Thor Hushovd and Philippe Gilbert. Along with the two big riders the collapse of HTC-Highroad allowed for the capture of up and coming American Tejay Van Garderen as well as the Italian veteran Marco Pinotti. The team had stage wins at the Giro and Vuelta and several other stage races across the season but it was again the Tour de France that was the focus of the teams GC ambition in 2012. The two big name recruits were to deliver the early season classics but it would take until May at the Giro when the team had its first significant wins in 2012.