Former World Champion Philippe Gilbert is heading to Amstel Gold Race as captain of a strong BMC Racing Team line-up. Gilbert is coming fresh from the Brabantse Pijl with a victory in the sprint after a failed attack. He will be supported by Greg Van Avermaet, who was runner-up in Ronde van Vlaanderen.

Philippe Gilbert has won the race two times before in 2010 and in 2011, where he also won the two other Ardennes Classics. Gilbert has had a good start to the classics seasons after he won the Brabantse Pijl. Last time he won that race was in 2011, where he as formerly written took all the Ardennes Classics.

Gilbert will be supported by a strong team including Ronde van Vlaanderen runner-up Greg Van Avermaet and former Olympic Champion Samuel Sanchez. The latter has been on the podiums in the Classics several times and is known to be strong in the hilly classics.

Also Slovakian Peter Velits is a part of the Amstel Gold Race roster. He has two 9th placements from this season in Paris-Nice and Dubai Tour.

BMC Racing Team Amstel Gold Race Roster:

Marcus Burghardt, Philippe Gilbert, Ben Hermans, Dominik Nerz, Samuel Sánchez, Michael Schär, Greg Van Avermaet and Peter Velits.