BMC’s Tejay van Garderen believes he and new signing Richie Porte can strike fear into the hearts of their opponents when they line up at the same races, providing a deadly dynamic duo.

“Certainly a lot of other teams will be nervous when they see a roster with both me and him on it,” van Garderen told the press at the team’s media day in Denia, Spain.

“I just remember racing against Richie and Geraint Thomas last year in Paris-Nice and it was almost impossible to race against them because Thomas would go up the road and Richie was on my wheel. When I tried to bridge across Richie would go. Now it’s going to be more fun to be part of that, where Richie and I can play a similar game.”

The American hopes that the presence of a second, strong GC rider can give the team a new offensive plan. For now, the two will co-exist by splitting the race calendar between the two, coming together for only the biggest events.

“It gives us another card to play. We’re going to split up the roster a bit in the first part of the year. He’s going to go to the Tour Down Under and I’m going to have a later start with some Spanish races. I’ll do Tirreno but then we’ll link up at Catalunya and Romandie. Then we’ll do the Tour together. We’ll have our chances to get our own results on our own and we’ll try to integrate that together.”