Lampre-Merida have continued their tradition of giving young Italian talents the chance to turn professional in their blue-fuchsia-green colours. Niccolo Bonifazio and Valerio Conte showed enough while riding as stagiares in the second half of the season to earn contracts for 2014 with the Italian team.

Lampre-Merida has a long tradition of assisting young Italian talents in their future development, with current stars Diego Ulissi and Adriano Malori just some of the riders who have started their professional career at the Italian team. Today the team has announced that they have taken another two young talents onboard for the 2014 season.

Niccolo Bonifazio and Valerio Conte both raced a stagiaries for the team in the second half of 2013 and got the chance to ride against the world stars in major events on the UCI calendar. While working as domestiques, they did enough to convince the management that they have what it takes to ride in the professional ranks in the future.

Bonifazio is a strong rouleur who obtained 14 victories in two seasons in the U23 category: 7 in 2012 and 7 in 2013.
He broke his collarbone in July but came back to ride as a stagiaire in the final part of the season, racing for the team in the Coppa Agostoni, Tre Valli Varesine, Bruxelles Cycling Classic and Gp Costa degli Etruschi.

After very strong performances in the junior category, Valerio Conti obtained 5 victories in his only year as a U23 rider.
He had the chance to show his qualities in pro cycling by doing races like GP Costa degli Etruschi, Coppa Sabatini and Japan Cup with Lampre-Merida.

In addition to Bonifazio and Conte, Lampre-Merida have signed world champion Rui Costa, Sacha Modolo, Nelson Oliveira, Rafal Valls Ferri and Gang Xu for the coming season while Adriano Malori (Movistar), Michele Scarponi (Astana) and Davide Vigano (Caja Rural) will leave the team.