José Luis de Santos to lead the U19 team of the Alberto Contador Foundation
The Alberto Contador Foundation will set up a junior U19 cycling team next season under the direction of José Luis de Santos, former professional rider and last national road cycling coach.
The team, whose budget has not yet been finalised, will be called Specialized-Fundación Alberto Contador. The American manufacturer will be the supplier of the bicycles and other materials, as well as being responsible for the budget together with the Foundation. In addition to Specialized, most of the suppliers of the Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank team will also support the project, as well as other new partners, who have enthusiastically embraced the idea.
José Luis de Santos will lead a group of no more than 15 young riders, of which the following have already been confirmed: Óscar Linares, Pablo Noriega, Juanjo Pazos, Francisco Pérez, and Sergio Fernández (Cantabria), Cristian Torres (Albacete), Enric Mas (Balearic Islands), Álvaro Cuadros (Andalusia), Miguel Ángel Ballesteros (Murcia), Miguel Ángel Alcaide (Castilla La Mancha), Diego Pablo Sevilla and Víctor Aguado (Madrid) and Fernando Barceló (Aragón).
“It’s a very exciting and exciting project. Being alongside Alberto and Fran Contador is a great opportunity and I didn’t hesitate when they offered it to me”, says José Luis de Santos. “To work again with the base is very nice and I think we can contribute many things to the formation of the riders. Besides, the project will continue to grow and this Foundation can be very important for the future of Spanish cycling”.
The idea of the Foundation has materialised thanks to the personal determination of Alberto Contador, who in this way wants to offer the new generations of riders the possibility of becoming cyclists with the best means available, without ever forgetting their academic training, which is key for young people in this category, between 17 and 18 years of age. “We are very excited about this project,” says Alberto Contador, “because we are working for the future of our sport, which is something we are passionate about. We want to support young cyclists at a particularly difficult time, when the crisis is causing many teams and races to disappear”.
Fran Contador, manager of the team, assures that, above and beyond “a good sporting curriculum, in the selection of the riders we have taken into account the human quality and the enthusiasm for the project shown by the boys, something fundamental in this category”. This team is just the beginning of an ambitious project. “This must be something that lasts over time, a long-term project that guarantees the training of the boys until they can reach the top category,” says Fran Contador.
“The first season we will start with the U19 team, but for the following season we want to expand it with an under 23 team and probably another women’s team, in order to complete the cycle prior to the jump to professionalism, without this meaning that we will renounce the top category, but for the moment the idea is to become a reference in the cycling quarry”.
