The starting line-up for the 2016 Tour de Pologne UCI World Tour is expanding and taking shape. The Lang Team organizing committee has announced the first 5 wild cards that have been assigned for the 2016 edition of the Polish stage race scheduled from July 12th to the 18th. The chosen teams will join the 18 World Tour formations who are participating in the race by right. There will be 4 professional continental teams, the Polish CCC Sprandi Polkowice and Verva ActiveJet Pro Cycling Team, the Italian Bardiani-CSF and American Team Novo Nordisk, plus the Reprezentacji Polski (the Polish national team).

“We’ve always assigned the wild cards trying to reward those teams which have shown themselves to be worthy through their commitment and the results they achieve, teams which we believe can bring added value to the level of the race,” explains general director for the Tour de Pologne Czeslaw Lang. 

“Team CCC Sprandi Polkowice is a fantastic enterprise in Polish cycling which by now has also made it to a world level and which has always figured significantly on the roads of the Tour de Pologne. The same goes for the National team, which donned the yellow jersey for one day last year and won the final time trial. On the other hand, the invitation to Verva ActiveJet Pro Cycling Team is new and aims to serve as a further step in the growth and improvement of the professional Polish cycling movement.

"Team Bardiani-CSF has always brought young talents into the spotlight, obtaining important results in all the major races to which it’s been invited; just consider the lovely stage victories scored in the last three Giro d’Italia races. As for Team Novo Nordisk, in addition to their results they should be rewarded for the generosity behind the sports and social projects that the team is involved in through the commitment of their athletes, who are all diabetics, to show how this illness no longer poses a limit and that it can be defeated.” 

“The 2015 Tour de Pologne was very successful for the Polish National Team, maybe the best one ever. It won’t be easy to repeat this success. There will also be two professional continental teams from Poland in the Tour de Pologne, which will increase the number of Polish riders in the peloton. We will try to do our best and to perform as well as we did in 2015,” says Waclaw Skarul, President of the Polish Cycling Federation.

"The Tour de Pologne is something special. Every year it is a major tour for our team. We always try to be 100 percent ready and fight for the best position. It is not easy, because there are a lot of top riders from all over the world fighting for victory in the Tour de Pologne. It is also something special for every Polish rider on our team, something very prestigious and challenging. So we always have a bit of rivalry inside the team, because everyone wants to start in the Tour de Pologne,” says Piotr Wadecki, Sports Director for CCC Sprandi Polkowice. 

“The Tour de Pologne will be our primary goal this season. The Polish national race is very important for our team. All our preparation will be focused on the Tour de Pologne. Personally I like this tour a lot because I’ve experienced the taste of a victory. Not as a rider, but as a sports director for Mróz Team. In 1999 we celebrated Tomasz Brozyna’s victory and in 2003 it was Cezary Zamana,” says Piotr Kosmala, Sports Director of Verva ActiveJet Pro Cycling Team. 

“We are very happy that the Tour de Pologne has decided to accept our candidacy for the 2016 edition. The race is starting to stand out as one of the best on the World Tour circuit, and we are completely honoured to be there for the start. It will be one of the most important events on our summer calendar and we will be taking it on with a formation that’s just as important,” says Bruno Reverberi, team manager for Bardiani-CSF. 

"Team Novo Nordisk is looking forward to racing at the Tour de Pologne for the first time in 2016. This race is especially meaningful as it will be our first appearance in a World Tour stage race. The Tour de Pologne has a long and respected history and garners tremendous visibility worldwide. We aim to use this amazing opportunity to promote our mission of inspiring, educating and empowering everyone affected by diabetes throughout Poland and around the globe,” says Team Novo Nordisk’s Senior Vice President of Athletics Vassili Davidenko. 

The organizing committee is also considering the possibility of assigning others wild cards.