Team Giant-Alpecin continues its period of racing in Spain this week at the five day, six stage Ruta Del Sol in Andalucia. The race features a series of tough stages that overall favour the lighter climbers, but the race offers various different opportunities.

The opening day sees the riders take on two stages, first a 121km road stage that features an uphill rise to the finish, and this is followed by a short, 8.2km individual time trial in the afternoon.

The following stages feature two uphill finishes, a tough puncheur's stage, and finally another potential power-sprint stage to finish.

Simon Geschke and Koen De Kort return to racing after training periods following the Tour Down Under in January, while the other five riders come to the race from the Vuelta Ciclista a Murcia this past weekend.

"For Andalucia we continue with the objective of racing aggressively, but also to work on getting back into the mindset and rhythm of racing as a team," explained coach Christian Guiberteau.

"We will target stages here, and there are different opportunities for our team. The early time trial will be a good test for Tobias, while there should be some possible sprint opportunities with John and we will need to study the uphill stage finishes to make the best plan here.

"In the mountains I think that Daan can target a stage and test himself along with the support of the others. It is still early in the season though and so there's not any immediate pressure on results in a race like this one."

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John Degenkolb (GER)
Caleb Fairly (USA)
Johannes Fröhlinger (GER)
Simon Geschke (GER)
Koen De Kort (NED)
Tobias Ludvigsson (SWE)
Daan Olivier (NED)