Ganna and Mirza in the line-up for the Hammer Series

UAE Team Emirates is in Limburg for participating in the first edition of the Hammer Series. The new professional road cycling series will take place between 2 – 4 June in Sportzone Limburg, in the Netherlands.

The Hammer Series consists of three high-intensity race days, testing teams across multiple cycling disciplines. The race’s unique format means teams will go head to head against each other and only a team, not an individual, can win.
This is the program of the Hammer Series:
1- Hammer Climb – points race taking place over 11 laps of a 7 km course containing two climbs.
2- Hammer Sprint – points race taking place over 8 laps of a flat, 12,4 km circuit.
3- Hammer Chase – 44,7 km team time trial. Teams will start in the same order as the leaderboard after the first two days, with the leading team going off first, chased by the other teams with time gaps based on fixed time gaps per position and bonus gained during day 1 and day 2.
Whichever team crosses the line first secures the Hammer Race victory.

UAE Team Emirates’ line-up: Filippo Ganna (Italy), Andrea Guardini (Italy), Marko Kump (Slovenia), Yousif Mirza (UAE), Oliviero Troia (Italy). Sports director: Bruno Vicino (Italy).

Looking ahead to the race, 28 year old Mirza said: “I am excited to take part in a new race format and concept – every ability will be tested in the Hammer Series. It’s a good test of skill and an opportunity to showcase the different aspects of cycling to fans.”

Sports director Vicino introduced the new race: «The Hammer Series event in Limburg is something really new in the cycling world. First of all, it will be very interesting to set the best possible tactic to exploit in the best way the rules of the race, then we’ll try to evaluate which of our riders will be able to be competitive for collecting points for the team.
Our line-up will be pretty young, I hope this could be a good opportunity for our young talented riders to exploit their qualities.
I feel it will be exciting for everybody to test this new formula and it will be a great show for the fans».

Filippo Ganna is ready for the Dutch event. «When Hammer Series was launched, I immediately thought it was a good news for cycling. I’m happy to participate in the debut of this event, it will be an important moment for cycling and I hope everybody could appreciate the new formula.
It’s also interesting that it will be the team to obtain the result and not only the single rider».