Beñat Intxausti to leave Team Sky for Euskadi-Murias

Spaniard Beñat Intxausti will be leaving Team Sky to ride for Euskadi-Murias after battling with illness.

The 32-year-old had signed for the British WorldTour team from Movistar in 2016 but recent seasons have been hampered by illness.

Basque team Euskadi-Muris announced on social media on Tuesday that Intxausti will join the professional continental outfit from next season.

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He said: “I feel good and I look to the future, I believe in this project, it is our project, the leading Basque cycling project, and that facing the future prepares a good foundation. “

Intxausti has won two stages of the Giro d’Italia in his career and claimed general classification in the Tour of Beijing in 2013.

But he raced just three days in 2017 after contracting mononucleosis, and said he had considered quitting cycling due to illness.

The 2018 season has been a similar story, with Intxausti entering the Tour of Norway but not finishing the first stage.

He then rode the Hammer Series in Stavanger in May where he finished fifth overall.

His next race was the EuroEyes Cyclassics Hamburg in August, which he did not finish.

General manager of Euskadi-Murias, Jon Odriozola, said: "It's very important for us to have Beñat Intxausti next season, he's among the best Basque riders and, although he's had two bad years, we want to get him back and get nice things with him."

Sky signed a promising Intxausti from Movistar after he won stages in the 2013 and 2015 editions of the Giro d’Italia.

After the start of 2016, he immediately began to suffer with mononucleosis. He raced eight days in the spring of 2016, including third overall in the Volta a Valenciana, returning in the summer for only seven race days.