{"id":518563,"date":"2026-03-06T17:21:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T17:21:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/518563\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T17:21:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T17:21:11","slug":"red-bull-bora-hansgrohe-football-inspires-classics-push","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/518563\/","title":{"rendered":"Red Bull \u2013 BORA \u2013 hansgrohe: Football inspires Classics push"},"content":{"rendered":"

Red\u00a0Bull \u2013 BORA \u2013 hansgrohe<\/a> are off to their best Classics start since the era of Peter Sagan, and the secret behind the surge isn\u2019t just in the legs, it\u2019s also in the “locker room”.<\/p>\n

After a dominant opening weekend that saw the team take more UCI points than any other squad, Dempster revealed in an interview released by the team that a cultural change inspired by professional football has turned a group of “individual riders” into a real tactical unit.<\/p>\n

The power of togetherness <\/p>\n

\"Tim<\/a><\/p>\n

Tim van Dijke scored third place at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Twila Federica Muzzi\/Red\u00a0Bull Content Pool<\/p>\n

The shift began with the arrival of two new Sports Directors, Sven Vanthourenhout and Shane Archbold, who have focused more on shared team spaces instead of everyone doing things alone. Dempster pointed to “small changes inspired by football,” like adding a shared physio room.<\/p>\n

“Riders recover together, watch race replays, laugh and hang out,” Dempster explained. “That creates a different vibe compared to last year. It builds togetherness. That environment matters a lot.”<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

Far stronger as a team<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Twila Federica Muzzi\/Red\u00a0Bull Content Pool<\/p>\n

The team’s results on the road, including Tim van Dijke\u2019s podium at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Jordi Meeus\u2019s win at Le Samyn, can be viewed as direct results of a new mental shift within the team, according to Dempster.<\/p>\n

He says the Classics are especially tough, both technically and emotionally, which makes team chemistry something you really need, not just a nice extra. “The biggest change is the mindset,” he said. “You\u2019re stronger as part of a solid team than alone.”<\/p>\n

Moving past the “same jersey” era <\/p>\n

\"Laurence<\/a><\/p>\n

All the riders are benefitting from the team’s ‘locker room’ culture<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Maximilian Fries\/Red\u00a0Bull Content Pool<\/p>\n

The transformation also marks a clear move away from 2025, Dempster says. Referring to an assessment from rider Laurence Pithie, he admitted that the team previously worked more like “a group of guys in the same jersey racing the same race.”<\/p>\n

By building a “locker room” culture where riders review races and relax together, Red\u00a0Bull \u2013 BORA \u2013 hansgrohe are trying to replace individual ambition with a united team. And right now, they\u2019re shaping up as the team to beat as the peloton heads toward the white roads of Tuscany and beyond to the tough cobbles of Flanders and Roubaix<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red\u00a0Bull \u2013 BORA \u2013 hansgrohe are off to their best Classics start since the era of Peter Sagan,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518564,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,635,82],"class_list":["post-518563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518563\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}