Alex Dowsett says signing a three-year contract extension with Movistar was an “easy decision”, after the Spanish team confirmed the deal this morning.
The 25-year-old Essex rider joined the long-running outfit in 2013, and won a stage of that year’s Giro d’Italia as well as his third-consecutive British time trial title in their colours.
And Dowsett, who recently impressed with his combative riding in the Tour of Britain, admitted that he had no intention of leaving.
“The talks have been going on for a while,” he told CW. “I knew I wanted to stay, I had my heart set on it.
“I think the package stood out the most – I’m happy within the team, and with the Canyon bikes and Endura clothing.
“It can be quite demoralising knowing that there are people out there with better equipment as you sit on the start ramp of a time trial – but luckily that’s not the case at the team.”
With two-year contracts the vogue among WorldTour teams these days, Dowsett’s new 36-month deal should aid his development as he approaches the prime years of his career, and provide much needed job security.
“Look at the year Ian Stannard’s had [a back, then hand injury, resulting in just 34 racing days] – every rider has a season like that at some point, so having a three-year deal offers a safety net of sorts,” added Dowsett.
“It also seems like every year it gets harder for those riders without teams to be on the market. And because of the planned changes from the UCI [a reduction in team size, possibly from 2016], I wanted a three-year deal as much as possible.”
Dowsett spoke to CW from Spain, where he is for the World Championships.
Yesterday he competed in the team time trial event, in which his Movistar team placed sixth, 52 seconds behind winners BMC.
“I’ve struggled to recover from the Tour of Britain – it was such a hard race this year,” he said. “Look at Quick Step; Michal Kwiatkowski was the first rider dropped on their ride, which says a lot about the difficulty of the race.
“I had to look after myself; if I did two, 500-watt turns, I’d then be fighting my bike for five to 10 minutes.
“It was a shame for me – Adriano Malori did a lot of work, and it’s not nice when you can’t help as much.”
He will represent Great Britain in Wednesday afternoon’s time trial – before then, he said, “I’ll basically have two days in bed.”
