Team Announcement:
ICA continues to reshuffle its roster for next season. Adds another climbing Lieutenant to its GC leaders: Swiss climber Patrick Schelling to join the team.
Tel – Aviv. October 11, 2019
Israel Cycling Academy continues to reshuffle its roster for the 2020 season and signs the Swiss climber Patrick Schelling.
The move is to strengthen the team’s ability to support its best GC riders Dan Martin and Ben Hermans in the Hardest stage tours next season.
“Patrick is climbing all-rounder that can be a great help to Dan and Ben, but also take his chances in races, “ said ICA’s Pro Manager Kjell Carlstrom. “He has been consistently good in short climbing stage races like Tour of Austria and just outside the top ten also in Tour de Suisse” this season, so we are getting a proven climber”.
Schelling (29) was on course to have a promising career at the top level in the sport when signed with Pro Tour Swiss team “IAM Cycling”.
“That was six years ago when he was only 23 but the high expectations turned sour due to sickness and injuries. I just could not get out of the downward spiral”, he explains.
But in 2016 he signed with Team Voralberg Santic and slowly regained his confidence and improving racing results, amongst them: 11th in GC at Tour de Suisse (2019), 3rd and 4th in GC at Tour of Austria (2016, 2018), 2nd and 4th in GC at tour of Hainan, 4th in GC at the Tour Of Hungary 2018.
“After hitting back in recent years I always gave my best to return to a professional team. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been easy, but now I’m very happy that I have managed it after 4 long years of hard work“.
As for the possibility that ICA will turn WT next season, Schelling expressed his confidence that he will be able to cope well with the challenge: “I experienced this kind of high level for 3 years so I am not scared at all”.
