Krists Neilands is with
Israel - Premier Tech since it's early years, 2017 to be more precise, and he will continue to race with the Israeli squad until the end of 2026 as after yesterday's Tour de France near miss, he's been revealed to have signed a new three-year deal with the team.
Brilliant form saw him on the attack yesterday on stage 10 of the Tour, attacking in the final ascent and riding alone all the way into the final kilometer, coming ever so close to a career changing win. “I have no regrets, because we rode great with the team. Everything went well today," he had said in a post-race interview. "My plan worked and I heard on the radio that riders had to release in the chasing group. I managed to make a gap, but unfortunately it wasn't enough."
Neilands likely had already signed the new contract, or it was in the making, but yesterday's was the trigger for both team and rider to publicly reveal the signing. A new three-year deal sees the Latvian inking with the team all the way into 2026, as is the case with Giro d'Italia breakthrough Derek Gee.
“Krists has spent his entire professional career with us, and we truly are his cycling family," team manager Sylvan Adams wrote in a press release. "The announcement of Krists’ contract renewal comes on the heels of his brilliant ride at the Tour, where we were really, really close to winning our second consecutive stage."
A specialist on the hilly races, besides a few national titles Neilands is also the winner of races such as the Tour de Hongrie, Dwars door het Hageland and GP de Wallonie. Notably in 2018 he also triggered the decisive attack at Milano-Sanremo where Vincenzo Nibali then profited of to take the win. The 28-year old doesn't often show his best form however when he does he comes close to big wins as was the case yesterday.
“It was an easy decision to sign another contract. I feel really good in this team. I don’t know how it is in other teams but how I feel here, I feel like it is one big family so there is no reason to change anything," Neilands said it himself. "I just want to continue this journey with the team, having been here since almost the beginning. We have already achieved many things but we still have a lot of things to achieve together so I just want to continue growing up with IPT and continue chasing our dreams."
