Ahead of the queen stage of the Tour de Langkawi, UnitedHealthcare are full of confidence. They have delivered John Murphy to a sprint win and have all three of their GC riders (Janez Brajkovic, Daniel Jaramillo and Johnny Clarke) sitting 22 seconds behind the sprinters.

“We have one of our best teams here. We sort of have a mix,” DS Hendrik Redant told Cyclingnews before Friday’s third stage. “We have the three guys who can play the game on the Cameron Highlands. That’s the plan. We are challenging the [Astana] guys. Our main goal is to win the overall and we have three of our best climbers in this team.”

Redant says that the climb is not as hard as Genting Highlands, which is once more missing this season. He says it is quite likely that a small group will contest the win unless someone is really strong.

“Here it must still be very good rider if he wants to go alone. If not, there will be a small group and it will be decided over the last five days of the race. But my plan is to be one of the protagonists in the race. It’s normal when you have three really good climbers with you.”