Where will Canberra cyclists be riding in 2013?

The new Australian cycling season it about to commence with the Mitchelton Bay Cycling Classics starting tomorrow followed by the Jayco Sun Herald Tour, the National Cycling Championships and culminating with the Santos Tour Down Under in late January.

Cycling seems to have overtaken European football as the place where the transfer silly season takes precedence over racing. Team sponsors change and team managers look to bring in new riders to boost their UCI points to guarantee entry into the UCI World Tour. The biggest team change has been the Rabobank withdrawing support and management going alone under the name Blanco. The news affected several Australian riders. Liquigas sold the team to Brixia Sport and the team name changed to Cannondale Pro Cycling Team.

2013 also sees many Canberra riders swap team shirts and several young riders sign with UCI Continental teams.  The biggest change see Team Saxo Tinkoff bring in two Canberra cyclists in 2013 - Michael Rogers and Rory Sutherland - and Michael Matthews moving from Rabobank to Orica-GreenEdge. Matthews becomes the first male Canberra cyclist to move to the Australian Pro Cycling team. Let's hope he will not be the last.

No more Pinarellos for Rogers as he shifts to Team Saxo Tinkoff

Three Canberra riders commence their cycling careers on the world stage with moves to UCI Continental teams. One rider heads to Europe and two riders will move to the US in March. After solid 2012 seasons in the National Road Series, Joe Lewis and Ben Hill both move to BMC-Hincapie Sportswear Development Team.  It will see both riders compete on the US circuit both with opportunities to race in Europe if the team receives invitations to Euro races. BMC-Hincapie is the official development program for the BMC Racing Team, whose program is designed to develop young Under 23 professional cyclists. Lewis rode with BMC-Hincapie at the 2012 Tour of China and it was clear that his strong performance helped to convince the team managers to bring him into the team on a permanent basis in 2013. While Lewis and Hill travel to the US, Mitch Lovelock-Fay moves to Europe with Christina Watches-Onfone, the Danish UCI Continental Team.  Lovelock-Fay came to the attention of team principals with strong performances at the Tour of China and a overall win at the Tour of Thailand.

Lovelock-Fay at the 2012 Tour of Thailand

There were also some pretty significant changes amongst Canberra women cyclists.  After several years with Speacialized, Chloe Hosking leaves to join Norwegian team HiTec Products. Gracie Elvin leaves Italian team Team Faren Honda to hook up with Aussie Team GreenEgde-AIS.  Miffy Galloway leaves Team Faren to concentrate on recovering for a series of injuries. That means we will see more of Miffy around Canberra in 2013, but let's hope she returns to Europe in 2014.

A more comprehensive look at where Canberra cyclists will be riding in 2013 is below. I have only included a selection of national road series riders in my table.  As teams release rider rosters I will update my list.

Cyclist	From	To
Michael Rogers	Team Sky	Team Saxo-Tinkoff
Michael Matthews	Rabobank	Orica GreenEdge
Nathan Haas	Garmin Sharp	Garmin Sharp
Michael Hayman	Team Sky	Team Sky
Mitch Lovelock-Fay	Jayco-HoneyShotz	Christina Watches-Onfone
Fabio Calabria	Team Type 1-Sanofi	Team Novo Nordisk
Rory Sutherland	UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team	Team Saxo-Tinkoff
Chloe Hosking	Specialized–lululemon	Hitec Products
Gracie Elvin	Team Faren Honda	GreenEdge-AIS
Jess Maclean	GreenEdge-AIS	GreenEdge-AIS
Miffy Galloway	Team Faren Honda	Recovering from injuries
Joe Lewis	RBS Morgan (NRS)	BMC-Hincapie (GPM-Data 3 thru to February)
Ben Hill	RBS Morgan (NRS)	BMC-Hincapie
Adam Phelan	Drapac	Drapac/u23 National Team
Tom Palmer	Drapac	Drapac
Stuart Shaw	Drapac	Suzuki - Bontrager