HTC-Columbia’s training camp in Mallorca entered its third full day on Monday with the nineteen riders completing their training schedules despite the bad weather.  “We delayed the start by an hour because it was wet and cold but that was the only change to the day’s program,” said HTC-Columbia team manager Rolf Aldag.  “There was no point in risking them getting ill because of the weather.”  The main aim of the HTC-Columbia training camp, Aldag says, is “very straightforward.  We have a big day for our partners and the media on Tuesday and we’ll pay a lot of attention to that, but we're also here to get on with riding our bikes."

The team has already done a lot of the groundwork for the 2010 season with a training camp in Lanzarote in December. According to Aldag this second camp is more focussed on bringing the riders' race fitness up another level.  “Lanzarote was about everybody, old and new guys on the team, getting to know each other.  We had big apartments with six riders in each, instead of the usual double rooms. Now we want to get the riders in shape for the upcoming races and give them a strong base for the whole season.”

“Today we moved the start to training forward an hour, but we did a big work load yesterday [Sunday], riding for an hour longer yesterday because the weather forecast for Monday was so bad.  Even so, they all completed between four and five hours, one group working with the time trial bikes.  As it’s only the third full day of training, it was still all fairly straightforward.”

On Monday the HTC-Columbia women’s squad joined the training camp.  “This is one of the few chances we get to have the full team here together,” Aldag points out, “and that’s an advantage to the camp for both the riders and the staff.  It's also an ideal opportunity for our partners to collaborate with our staff before the start of the 2010 season."

The HTC-Columbia Mallorca training camp started on January 8th and finishes on January 20th.