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CYCLING – Team Bahrain Victorious announced yesterday their lineup for the Clasica San Sebastian, which takes place today in Spain.
The squad features Yukia Arashiro, Damiano Caruso, Jack Haig, Finlay Pickering, Jasha Sutterlin, and Torstein Traen, with the team leader being Colombian Santiago Buitrago.
This year, the route has changed due to road disruptions and safety concerns, and is more reminiscent of the 2022 edition than last year’s. Riders will cover 236km, six km more than 2023, to clinch the traditional Basque Country ‘txapela’ hat in Zurriola. The race will include seven classified mountain passes. Pilotegi is a new climb that will debut at the Clasica, replacing Murgil. It has slopes of up to 27 per cent, making it even more demanding than Murgil or Bordako Tontorra.
This edition will also include two intermediate sprints: one at the first finish line checkpoint, and the other at the reverse finish line checkpoint after 219.5km.
Another new feature involves the start and finish areas moving to Zurriola Avenue, opposite the Kursaal Conference Centre.
Buitrago is looking forward to leading the team again after impressing at the Tour de France last month. “The Clasica San Sebastian is one of my favourite races on the calendar and coming as leader excites me quite a bit,” he said. “It has been a race in which the team has always been in contention and this year we come with the same objective.
“Personally, I am very motivated and eager to fight to obtain a good result in the end.”
Bahrain Victorious sports director Neil Stephens said: “Santiago did a great job to finish tenth in The Tour de France; since then, he has been off in The Olympic Games, fighting for Colombia, where he performed well and now he has got full focus on Classica San Sebastian. It’s a race that is really suited to his abilities. It’s a very mountainous race, it’s really up and down all day, with some fairly serious climbs.
“Motivation is high and the quality of the team we are taking is high and we think that we will do well.”
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