With just over a week to go until the start of the 2018 Tour de France, Team Dimension Data for Qhubeka has named the eight riders that will fly the African flag in France.
Sprint specialist Mark Cavendish will again anchor the team with his long time team mate Mark Renshaw, with two of South African’s most promising riders Reinardt Janse van Rensburg and Jay Thomson also in the mix.
The strategy for Team Dimension Data in 2018 edition of the Tour is simple.
Led by sprint legend Cavendish the team will naturally be targeting the flat stages to give the Briton the best chance for stage wins.
In his 12 tours, Cavendish has won 30 stages overall including four wins for Dimension Data in 2016 and he will be looking to surpass Eddy Merckx’s all-time record of 34 stage wins wins.
Two of South Africa’s best cyclists complete the eight man line-up with Janse van Rensburg making his fourth appearance and 2013 national road race champion Thompson making his debut.
Team Principal, Doug Ryder says:”Our dream is to win more stage in the Tour than any other rider Cavendish, we going to support him with incredible riders to try and achieve that goal; it’s going to be hectic three weeks.”
Not only is the goal to make Cavendish the greatest sprinter of all time in the Tour de France the team is also eyeing an African winner in Paris as soon as 2020.
Although not a member of the 2018team, Louis Meinjtes, is the man earmarked to record the African’s team’s maiden General Classification win.
He’s finished eighth overall in 2016 and 2017.
Team Dimension Data for Qhubeka also aims to have distributed a hundred thousand bikes to the needy by 2020.
