Neither Lotte Kopecky or Demi Vollering were prioritized - "We wanted to keep them both" SD Worx manager assures
Cycling
Team SD Worx - Protime have been dominating the women's field in recent years but this may be cut short ever so slightly in 2025. Although they no longer have to battle against Annemiek van Vleuten, they will have to against Demi Vollering who is confirmed to be leaving the team at the end f the season.
"We want to keep Demi in our team. She’s the best rider in the world and we’re very happy with her. We have the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4 in our team and that’s pretty difficult but the goal was to keep Lotte and Demi together," Erwin Janssen, the team's general manager, told Cyclingnews. "We saw last year how good they are together and how strong. We did it at the same time, and gave them both an offer. It was the priority to keep them both. It wasn’t that we wanted Lotte or Demi. We wanted to keep them both."
The team seemingly continues to have the financial resources to keep it's four star riders at the time being, even if the budget demands increase. This week the team revealed that the offer for Demi Vollering was not accepted and the pressure to keep it's leaders did not ultimately work. "We were negotiating for around eight or nine months with Demi and her management. We are in the season and we need to look forward to the future and which future riders are staying with us, so then we made an ultimatum last offer and, in our opinion, it was a really good offer but we now know how the market is," Janssen continued.
An offer of reportedly €1 million a season has been made to Vollering from UAE Team ADQ, which would - if confirmed - be the first millionaire contract in women's cycling history. "Sometimes it’s really crazy but the offer we made was pretty good and then we said it was an ultimatum because we needed to go on. Her management didn’t give the go for that and that meant for us that they didn’t want to go on with the team."
It sparked quite a lot of interest, specially as the team itself shared a message on social media confirming the departure, instead of keeping the topic private. A lot can still be achieved, but the Tour de France Femmes champion is set to depart the Dutch team at the end of 2024. However until then she will continue to have the team's confidence and leadership opportunities.
"It’s a little bit difficult, like yesterday in the media but if we look back at last year, and the last years together with Demi in the team, we were happy with her and she was happy with us. We trust her and they all want to win and stay as the number one in the world. I’m fully convinced that we’re going to do that again."
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- So?Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- The UCI do have their favorites.
Front24208-11-2026 - On a positive note, you maybe notice turning this topic into a discussion has the benefit of eliminating certain participants who do not see how they can turn it back to their sole interest ;-)Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- People see what they want to. I am actually the opposite of your accusation, probably more of a rebel than most of you who don’t get the big picture. The difference is, I don’t go moaning publicly about the consequences of my transgressions, I understand the need for rules and I take my OWN responsibility when deciding to ignore or break them or doing so involuntarily. I will also not hesitate to state my case or argue vehemently when relevant, sometimes it works, sometimes it makes things worse but that’s the price to pay for principles and having character.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- That may be but that was unknown to others and nothing says that’s the whole truth. Again, don’t try to misinterpret, it is a call and technically it is correct. Besides, even if there is a valid reason, that does not disqualify the ruling or punishment as far as the rules have been developed. I don’t think they’re as far as in football where for handball there is a distinction (in some ways and specific cases) between intentional or not. And football can be just as harsh and people live with it, eg the offside rule, also judged to within tiny fractions but often wrong or ignored. It’s the nature of every collective organisation and sometimes I wonder if our rebellion against it isn’t seated in the feelings we carry from the injustices we’ve felt personally, like being flashed driving 1km/h too fast when we are explained limits are just a security measure but we are absolutely certain not to have endangered anyone with our transgression. The problem is, nobody has better solutions and no 2 people have the same interpretation of where a limit should be.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- Because for you deviated implies the other rider MUST have been made to fall and fail to finish ??? I don’t know if you ride a bike but next time someone carves you up or drives dangerously close, just hold back from those feelings of changing something, reporting or filming or even complaining. Everyone will just say, hey you’re still here undamaged, doesn’t seem like anyone did anything.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- And we, what are we doing?Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- And yet, it attracts people, even you. What’s more, it attracts the rival fanboys to fill cyberspace with endless pointless my hero is better than your hero blabla that’s all been heard before and only helps sell the site as an advertising platform. You know what the solution is but most can’t resist. No different than women who follow and discuss celebs through gossip magazines.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- he is doing 460 watts for 35 min to achieve 7 w/kg with VO2 at 96 , just unreal numbers.abstractengineer08-11-2026
- Just do it, and put up with the consequencesJumpyjohn08-11-2026
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Statement team manager Erwin Janssen of Team SD Worx - Protime on Demi Vollering: "We made Demi Vollering a generous offer and indicated that this should be responded to before a certain date. Vollering's management did not respond to this. Therefore, we assume that Vollering
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