There's never been greater pressure in youth and junior categories to perform to secure that dream contract as early as possible. As witnessed on multiple recent examples, young talents coming out of junior category are often more than ready to immediately race for the prizes at the highest level.
When a team finally finds a rider that could become a new Tadej Pogacar or Jonas Vingegaard, the next step usually follows to offer said rider to join your structure. But your roster size is limited to 30 names and you don't have spots to spare. What now? The answer seems simple - let's offer them to join a reserve (or under-23) team and if they prove quality, they can move up.
Nowadays, development teams have tremendous advantages which can easily outweigh the extra cost that comes with them; filling in riders from DT for .Pro (or lower) level races to start with the main team and viceversa, keeping a close eye on rider's progress without the added pressure of racing at the highest level, etc.
Yet some teams still haven't set up their own development teams for various reasons. Let's dig into the reasons why and whether they're really missing out.
Once a dominant force of Grand Tours, winning seven Tour de France titles in 2010s with stultifying precision. However since then, many teams managed to catch up and INEOS currently lacks a leader strong enough to have a realistic shot at another Tour de France victory.
One would think the British team would return to basics and try to build a new team from scratch, purpose a development team would serve perfectly. Instead, Ineos adopted a rather debatable strategy of signing riders coming straight out of junior category - something that has paid off with time trial phenomenon Joshua Tarling in short run, as well as with Carlos Rodríguez in the long run. Yet despite being the only professional team based on the British Isles it's almost criminal how Ineos keeps letting many talented young Brits (Oscar Onley, Max Poole or most recently Joe Blackmore) slip through into their competition's hands.
The situation of Movistar is quite comparable to the Ineos'. The traditional Spanish team has been, for a long time, able to get their hands on most promising domestic riders simply by being able to add extra digits on a payroll compared to non-Spanish teams. However with the rise of super-teams like UAE Team Emirates, who can afford to pay the same while bringing far more advanced structure into the place, this ace is no longer up Movistar's sleeve.
Conveniently for Movistar, there are no less than four Spanish ProTeams brimming over with young Spanish riders who have always dreamt to wear the colours of their childhood heroes. Enric Mas is currently Movistar's only competitive GC leader, but who's next? Talent seems to be flowing out rather into the Spanish team.
Cofidis seems in a tight spot. While there isn't an imminent threat of relegation, there aren't many good things to say about their future views, with the team's signings giving the vibe of picking up leftovers after other French WT formations.
Unlike other teams on this list Jonathan Vaughters was running a development team until this year. However this was more of NIPPO's initiative (their Japanese sponsor) and only three riders moved up to pro ranks in its short history.
The American team currently doesn't need to fear for lack of talent in their roster after a significant refresh of its ranks ahead of 2024. It remains to be seen whether the harvest will be as good as promised.
The official entrance of Red Bull into the cycling world will come with big structural changes for the German team. One of those will be introduction of an official U23 formation under the supervision of the re-named team.
For Bora the youth development won't be a brand new experience, after all they're the force behind the most successful junior team of recent years; Auto Eder. Bora also has tight ties to two continental teams with focus on youth - German Lotto Kern-Haus and Austrian Tirol KTM.
Team Jayco AlUla & Bahrain - Victorious
The Australian team hasn't gotten an official development team at this moment, but their partnership with top U23 team Hagens Berman - Jayco will offer them with an exclusive access to the product of a team where stars like Jasper Philipsen, João Almeida and many others took their first steps in pro cycling.
The Bahraini team is in an even closer relationship to Italian CT team CTF Victorious, which fulfills the role of Bahrain's academy, however the two formations still need to take an extra step before they can enjoy the full benefit of combined lineups for smaller races.
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