Froome, Yates, Pogacar, Bennett, Van der Poel confirmed for UAE Tour
The UAE Tour marks the get started of the 2021 WorldTour, with the week-prolonged Middle Eastern stage race attracting some of the most important names in the peloton.
Tadej Pogačar and new signing Masrc Hirschi guide UAE Staff Emirates in their household race, even though 2020 winner Adam Yates would make his debut at Ineos Grenadiers alongside environment time demo champion Filippo Ganna.
In the meantime, Chris Froome races with Israel Start-Up Nation for the initial time, although Caleb Ewan (Lotto Soudal), Sam Bennett (Deceuninck-QuickStep), Fernando Gaviria (UAE Staff Emirates) and Pascal Ackermann (Bora-Hansgrohe) and other individuals will clash in the dash phases.
The loss of other early-period stage races to COVID-19 has only bolstered the UAE Tour start off checklist, with Vincenzo Nibali (Trek-Segafredo), Giro d’Italia revelation João Almeida (Deceuninck-QuickStep), Rigoberto Urán (EF Training-Nippo), Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), and Sepp Kuss (Jumbo-Visma) also taking component.
The official entry listing also involves Clásica de Almería winner Giacomo Nizzolo (Group Qhubeka Assos), fellow Italian Elia Viviani (Cofidis), who returns to racing right after a modern heart intervention, and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix), who will get started his 2021 street season at the UAE Tour immediately after successful a fourth cyclo-cross globe title at the stop of January.
A overall of 20 groups of seven riders will be in motion from Sunday February 21 right until Saturday February 27, with the stage 2 time demo and the mountain finishes at Jebel Hafeet on stage 3 and then to Jebel Jais on stage 5 envisioned to make a decision the in general winner.
Four of the 7 phases are predicted to culminate in bunch sprints as the race moves around the UAE peninsula amongst Dubai, Abu Dhabi and the other emirates.
It will be the 3rd version of the race, which was included to the WorldTour calendar in 2019 subsequent the merger of the Dubai Tour and the Abu Dhabi Tour. Primož Roglič received in 2019 when Adam Yates won previous year’s event just after defeating Pogačar on the next ascent of Jebel Hafeet.
Three COVID-19 checks and stringent medical protocol
The 2020 version of the UAE Tour was halted after 5 days because of to confirmed instances of COVID-19 on the race and the full race caravan was positioned in lockdown in their hotel in Abu Dhabi. Quite a few riders, which includes Fernando Gaviria, tested beneficial and 4 teams expended extended periods in quarantine in advance of getting authorized to go away the state.
To check out to limit the threat of further conditions in 2021, the race organisers have put together the UCI COVID-19 health care protocol and neighborhood UAE regulations to make a particular race protocol. A considerable portion of the UAE inhabitants has been vaccinated but circumstance numbers have been mounting soon after vacationers were welcomed in the UAE for the duration of the holiday seasons.
The race caravan will held to a minimum amount, with the 450 riders and race workers flying to the UAE on special constitution flights from Paris and Milan on Wednesday. No international media will journey to the race and riders will stay in a lodge within the Yas Marina motor racing circuit, while staff will continue to be somewhere else.
All people in the race caravan will undertake a amount of COVID-19 PCR exams to try out to detect any cases and produce a protecting bubble all-around the race. They all underwent a initially PCR on Monday, with a 2nd check planned for when they get there in Abu Dhabi on Thursday.
A third round of checks will be carried out on Sunday morning prior to the to start with phase. Checks will also be carried out on Thursday February 25, so they can return to their dwelling right after the race.
Cyclingnews will have whole coverage of the UAE Tour with reside updates from the 7 days of racing as nicely as stage stories, interviews, and a information on how to look at the race dwell by means of Television set and reside stream.
