The management of Tinkoff - La Datcha Team had to make some tough decisions during the transfer period: Artem Samolenkov had crazy demands during the renewals and also during the transfer season he didn't back down, but obviously in the end we had to (re)sign him. Same with Evgenii Tikhonin, but he was more willing to sign a "normal" contract. Lev Gonov became a full team member after being a stagiaire last year.
4 riders didn't get a new contract, luckily for them they all found new teams during the transfer season; Andrea Dal Col (Grieg-Maersk), Viktor Manakov (Tafjord Kraft), German Anibal Orue (SEE Turtles) and Anton Vorobev (Minions).
Sergey Chernetskiy was the only rider who didn't get a new contract and didn't find a new team, so he was forced to watch this cycling season on the tv.
With Vorobev and Dal Col leaving we had to get some new time trialers in our team and we were very happy that Nikita Razumov was willing to join us for a whopping transfer fee of € 775,000 (Lidl Cycling). We were also able to buy Russian time trial talent Aleksandr Bereznyak for a transfer fee of € 79,000 (DK Žalgiris).
Gleb Syritsa, a talented Russian cobbler, didn't get a new contract from his former team (JEWA TIROL) so we were happy to pick him up as a free agent. Ivanov Viacheslav, a talented Russian climber joins our team as well, but he will be riding for Newton Foundation p/b Zwift this year (loan deal) to gain eXPerience.
At the end of the transfer season we managed to sign a Russian stagiaire by the name of Egor Igoshev, he might be a decent sprinter some day.
So what do you guys think? Good enough to stay another year in the PT?
Knockout believes that we will finish 17th as a team this year: "If you are looking for a team that i constantly underrate, it's this one. Every year, i look at this roster and think they aren't that good because i see too many flaws with their leaders. Somehow they finished 7th last year and i probably should put them a bit closer to that but also Skujins and Kamyshev could suffer a fair bit from their first declines."
-Croatia14-
Croatia14 also predicts we will relegate after this season -> Tinkoff's part starts at 1h12m47s
hillis, I guess I'll need another redesign - there are too many red/orange jerseys
At least mine is the most "flashy" of the red ones, hopefully still recognizable enough - and hopefully not just seen whenever one of my riders gets dropped
Great job to compile the jerseys (and doing the wheels) though, makes me look forward to the season even more
