Ineos Grenadiers have sent an exceptionally strong team to the Tour de Romandie 2021 as their riders build towards the Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France.
Geraint Thomas is set to be the leader as he continues to focus on another push at Tour de France glory after missing out on the team selection last year. Thomas has shown some very good early season form with solid performances at Tirreno-Adriatico as well as a podium behind team-mate Adam Yates at Volta a Catalunya.
But Thomas isn't the only possible overall focus for the British super-team as third place at the 2020 Tour de France, Richie Porte is back on the bike and racing as he too looks towards the Tour but in more of a support role for Thomas and Richard Carapaz.
>>> Five things to look out for at the Tour of Romandie 2021
The race should suit Thomas and Porte with plenty of climbing and two time trials that book-end the race. The time trials are likely to suit superstar time trialists too and Ineos have a couple of pretty decent ones.
World time trial champion Filippo Ganna returns for the first time since his undefeated streak in time trials was ended by both Wout van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) and Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ) at Tirreno. With two hilly time trials on the menu, will Ganna get his winning feeling back?
Another rider who is likely to be right up in the top places against the clock is former world champion Rohan Dennis who comes into the race after winning the time trial at the Volta a Catalunya before the team went on to completely dominate the overall standings.
Dennis will hope he can break his duck against his main rival as well as good friend, Ganna but they will have Küng as well as Paris-Nice time trial winner Stefan Bissegger (EF-Nippo) to go up against.
The main support for the team's leaders is likely to come from Irishman Eddie Dunbar, who comes into the race after a solid display in the Ardennes Classics as well as trusty duper-domestique Andrey Amador.
Completing the line-up is Welsh rider Owain Doull. He is likely going to be helping his leaders with positioning but could potentially have a go in the sprints. He would come up against very tough opposition though with Elia Viviani (Cofidis), Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe and Matteo Moschetti (Trek-Segafredo) being on the start line.
The Tour de Romandie starts later today (April 27) with a four-kilometre prologue around the town of Oron that finishes up an 800-metre climb that averages at around eight per cent gradient.
Ineos Grenadiers line-up for Tour de Romandie 2021
Geraint Thomas (GBr)
Richie Porte (Aus)
Filippo Ganna (Ita)
Rohan Dennis (Aus)
Andrey Amador (CRi)
Eddie Dunbar (Irl)
Owain Doull (GBr)
Tim Bonville-Ginn is one of Cycling Weekly's content writers for the web team responsible for writing stories on racing, tech, updating evergreen pages as well as the weekly email newsletter.
Bonville-Ginn started working in cycling journalism while still at school and university for a voluntary site based on Twitter before also doing slots for Eurosport's online web team and has been on location at the Tour de Yorkshire, Tour of Britain, UCI World Championships and various track events. He then joined the Cycling Weekly team in late February of 2020.
When not writing stories for the site, Bonville-Ginn doesn't really switch off his cycling side as he watches every race that is televised as well as being a rider himself and a regular user of the game Pro Cycling Manager.
He rides a Specialized Tarmac SL4 when out on his local roads back in West Yorkshire as well as in northern Hampshire with the hills and mountains being his preferred terrain.
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