The Lampre-ISD team will be led by the double-header of Damiano Cunego and Alessandro Petacchi at this Saturday’s Trofeo Laigueglia. The race, around the Ligurian coast between Genova and Sanremo, will mark the beginning of the 2011 season for Ale-Jet, who has been forced to sit out a number of races suffering with bronchitis.
Cunego, who has given up all aspirations at repeating his 2004 Giro d’Italia victory in favour of concentrating on one-day races, has made a solid start to the season at the GP Costa degli Etruschi and the Giro della Provincia di Reggio Calabria. Petacchi though will be an unknown quantity, having missed so many races in the last few weeks; this time last year he had already won two stages of Reggio Calabria and the Costa degli Etruschi.
The rider who will probably be most likely to perform is Daniele Pietropolli, who won in Reggio Calabria, having taken the first stage and holding the lead to the end of the three-day race.
“We'll be one of the protagonist teams and this is due to the fact that all of our riders could aim to win,” said Piovani. “Pietropolli and [Leonardo] Bertangolli rode an outstanding Giro della Provincia di Reggio Calabria and they improved their fitness training on Etna.
“Cunego, thanks to his quality will be a protagonist,” he added, “also because he'll race with a battling mode. [Diego] Ulissi, [Francesco] Gavazzi and [Przemyslaw] Niemiec like the course of the race, it fits their characteristics well. There will be also [Daniele] Righi with his usual experience and Petacchi, at his seasonal debut after the stop caused by bronchial asthma".
Lampre-ISD team for Trofeo Laigueglia:
Leonardo Bertagnolli, Damiano Cunego, Francesco Gavazzi, Przemyslaw Niemiec, Alessandro Petacchi, Daniele Pietropolli, Daniele Righi and Diego Ulissi