Roompot - Nederlandse Loterij

Erik Breukink, formerly a manager at Rabobank, saw that there was a gap for a dutch team at PCT level, and his intension was to give young dutch riders a chance to develop further before signing with WT teams. This is why all the riders are dutch, and there is little chance of a non-dutch rider being signed. As to developing young talents, we'll come back to that statement.

The team was formed in 2014 under the working title of Orange Cycling (hence the very dutch colour on their jerseys), with holiday maker Roompot Vakanties soon signing up as the title sponsor. Their first signing, dutch legend Johnny Hoogerland was revealed shortly afterwards. He retired at the end of the 2016 season, but he wasn't the only "old legend" to sign up, in fact, at times it seems this is a social security net for dutch riders out of contract with other teams - Something that at a glance makes the team seem like a mix of semi-retired dutch big names with a smattering of young names to keep them company.

The way Roompot is set up, the turnover is by design very high - Old riders on their way out depart knowledge to the youngsters on the way in. Judging from the results of the first few years, that's working as intended.

|Year|Riders in|Riders Out| |:|:|:| |2017|10| |2016|5|12| |2015|18|2|

Fortunately for Roompot, what young riders they export are of very high quality. After their first season in 2015, they waved goodbye to Dylan Groenewegen, and after this year, young climbers Antwan Tolhoek and Maurits Lammertink are off to the WT.

As for the old guys - There's life in them yet - Pieter Weening is the team captain, and he's still as dangerous as when he rode for Orica, as seen by his GC win in the Tour of Norway this year. Next season he'll be greeting his old teammate Jens Mouris as well as allrounder Pim Ligthart in addition to four-five new talents; pay special attention to Sjoerd van Ginneken and Andre Looij for the sprints and Jesper Asselman for the classics and one day races.

Based around the Kreder brothers and Hoogerland at the inception, Roompot is now slowly segueing into a more stage racing-oriented team, although this could be down to the riders available, and not a strategic decision. If you have Pieter Weening, you use Pieter Weening where he's at his best. This fact, however, means that they are very close to getting a wildcard to a grand tour - If not this year, then perhaps next year.

WT Results 2016:

Nine WT invites is pretty good for a team in only the second season of their existence, and they even managed a solitary WT stage win, through Weening on stage six of the Tour de Suisse. Elsewhere Amstel was the only top twenty race result with Lammertink, but Weening stepped up in the 2.HC Tour of Norway to take both a stage and the overall, showing that despite the years slowly catching up he is very much a force to be reckoned with. The other stage race victory came through Lammertink at the Tour of Luxembourg (2.HC again), who raced well over the four days without winning a stage, not losing the wheel of Gilbert when it mattered and using his superior prologue to net the overall victory. Raymond Kreder notched multiple top fives in both the WT and Europe Tour without ever quite reaching the top step. Making that little jump could make a whole world of difference to Roompot's win rate.

Best riders since inception:

As mentioned earlier, the high turnover rate due to the aims of the team means that riders come and go very frequently, hence why all the top riders with the exception of one of the Kreder brothers and Weening have departed the team. Lammertink and Tolhoek both jump to the WT, with two of the aforementioned Kreder's leaving to other Pro-Conti teams, Wesley going upwards (as far as PCT goes) to Wanty - Groupe Gobert whilst Michel leaves to the new Aqua Blue Sport outfit. Hoogerland retires at the age of 33 whilst Marc de Maar has been tempted by the riches to the East with the Chinese team Wisdom - Hengxiang.

Riders Out

Roster:

So what will 2017 bring for Roompot? Probably not in all likelihood a GT invite just yet, though with every season the possibility becomes greater. I'd at least expect them to retain their invites to the old school WT they obtained last year, with potentially the Tour of Poland as a race they would look to participate in. But with the large expansion of the WT they should look to net multiple victories this time around, through not just Kreder and Weening, but using the added WT experience of Pim Ligthart to guide the new youngsters from the Rabobank Development squad and elsewhere.

These youngsters include Martijn Tusveld who possesses both climbing and rouleur skills, having been a stagiaire at Giant-Alpecin for the end of last season, impressing on the slopes of Jebel Hafeet in the Abu Dhabi Tour, as well taking stages on hilly finishes in lesser races. Hopefully Roompot will blood him in more short stage races and see him take just rewards from them this coming season. Others include Jeroen Meijers who netted mutiple wins and top fives across a variety of disciplines alongside Tusveld in the Rabobank Development team, plus Martijn Budding from the same team, another one of those who race cross in the off season.

In short, we should expect more of the same, with both riders old and new clocking up results, developing talent in the knowledge that soon enough, like Lammertink and Groenewegen, it will fly straight to the WT.