Caja Rural have had an amazing season, with 17 wins and over 100 top tens. Its almost laughable to think that they hadn’t won a race until April this year, when Pello Bilbao won a stage of the Vuelta a Castilla y Leon.

“It’s partly due to a group of younger riders coming through like Carlos Barbero [winner of five races this year] and Pello Bilbao [winner of three]. They're stepping up a level, maturing with the team, and one victory has led to another,” sports director Eugenio Goikoetxea told Cyclingnews.

But the team never lost faith after the opening months of the season, using statistics such as the team’s usually slow start to the season to keep the riders and sponsors calm.

“If you look back at the history of the team, that tends to happen. In February and March, we’re racing against WorldTour teams that are building towards the April Classics, they’ve come from San Luis or Australia and they’re already in form. We’re starting a lot more steadily, in Andalucia, a little more slowly, and so every year the first victories have tended to come in April or May.”

The team says that they are keeping their feet on the ground, first of all as they failed to meet their big goal of the year, taking a Vuelta win, something they now haven’t done since 2012. Secondly, they are on a small budget and know just how hard it may be to repeat 2015’s success. This is shown by their results in previous years: 16 pro wins from 2012-2014.

“It’s been a very good year for us. Had we got a stage win in the Vuelta a España, it would have made it absolutely exceptional. But the thing is we can’t simply sit back and say we’re happy. A small squad like ours, it’s always got to be out there trying to keep the organiser satisfied, trying to show ourselves on the front. And we haven’t got the kind of budget to be signing big name riders who would guarantee those victories. To repeat these 17 again? It’d be very hard, although we’d like to do that. You always aim for the maximum possible.”

Despite wanting to race more in the WorldTour, Goikoetxea says the team is comfortable doing the majority of their season at home in Spain.

“We’re a Spanish team with a Spanish sponsor, and so we’re not too bothered that we’re not doing all the WorldTour races, if we’re still doing the Spanish ones - Volta a Catalunya, Vuelta a España, Clasica San Sebastian and Vuelta al País Vasco. That said if they invite us to other WorldTour races, we’d be delighted to go.” 

A move up to become Spain’s second WorldTour team, taking over the spot vacated by Euskaltel-Euskadi at the end of 2013, is also off the cards for 2016 and the next few years too.

“It’s a question of money. We’d need four or five million euros to do that. Maybe Caja Rural and Seguros RGA could provide a bit more money, but we’d need a big sponsor for that.” The team, in any case, has its future guaranteed until at least the end of 2016, and some riders are signed for 2017, too. “The team doesn’t have a sell-by date,” Goikoetxea says.