Tour de France: Hugo Houle’s team will attempt to repeat this feat

Cycling. It was just a formality: Hugo Houle has been officially selected among the eight riders from the Israel – Premier Tech team that will compete in the upcoming Tour de France.

For the Sainte-Perpétue cyclist, this will be his fifth participation in the legendary ring. Quebecers Guillaume Boivin, Antarian Michael Woods, Belgium’s Dylan Tones, Latvian Christis Nylands, New Zealand’s Corbin Strong as well as Australians Simon Clarke and Nick Schultz complete the formation.

Author of last year’s two stage victories, victories by Hugo Holly and Simon Clarke, the Israel – Premier Tech team will attempt to repeat the feat this year.

“We have a strong team that is ready to race hard with the main goal of winning the stages,” said the team’s sporting director Rick Verbrugge in a press release. We all know it’s hard to win a stage in the Tour, but I think each of the eight riders selected has what it takes to win this race. I would like to see the team race with the same attitude and enthusiasm as in this year’s Giro d’Italia. If we can continue like this, being opportunists, I think we’ll have a great race.”

It consists of 21 stages, 110^H The Tour de France edition will take place from Saturday 1^any July to Sunday 23 July. The start will take place in the Basque Country.

We line up @thecycle With a versatile team aiming for stage victories!

🎙️ “I think each of our eight riders selected has what it takes to win this race.” – Director of Sport, Rick Verbrugge.

Read all about our TDF lineup here: https://t.co/8kDSwuBHVO
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– Israel – Premier Tech (IsraelPremTech) June 23, 2023

“Last year we won two great Tour de France stages, so the threshold is high for us to top that score,” said Israeli team partner Sylvain Adams. But the team we’re fielding this year is strong and can certainly compete for stage wins. Our eight riders, including three Canadians, make up a tight-knit group that trained and raced together. I believe our talented IPT team will surprise the spectators this year. We are ready for an exciting tour.”

After many good performances in recent months, including 21^H Hugo Holly’s position in the general classification during the last Tour de Suisse, general manager Kjell Carlström also believes the team will do well in the Tour de France.

“The decision to select our team for the Tour de France this year was difficult to make, but we believe we selected the top eight riders to meet our performance targets. The fact that we had such a difficult decision to consider our long list shows the strength and depth of our group of riders. Unfortunately, we were unable to Everyone’s choice.We have carefully considered the necessary roles to be filled when it comes to chasing stage wins and selected our 8 riders accordingly.The team is versatile and balanced and the riders can influence the race at almost every stage of the race.After the good results of the last few months we are keen to Seeing what we can do in this race which will certainly be very competitive.

Recall that the Israel – Premier Tech team received an invitation from the Tour de France organizers after losing its World Tour license. (JH)