Conor Dunne of #NoGoTour fame joins the Israel Cycling Academy
The Irish champion and tallest professional cyclist's search for a new team after Aqua Blue Sport folded mid-season has concluded
Irish national road champion and the tallest rider in the professional peloton, Conor Dunne has signed with the Israel Cycling Academy team for 2019. Dunne was a member of Aqua Blue Sport when the team folded in August. Without a race program for the rest of the season, Dunne and American Larry Warbasse rode there bikes around the Alps for a week in a bike-packing adventure they called the #NoGoTour that gained traction on social media. Warbasse has since signed for Ag2R-La Mondial and now the other half of the #NoGoTour has found a team for 2019.
After not racing the second half of the season, Dunne who stands at 6’8″ rode in the breakaway at the UCI Road World Championships in Innsbruck on a course that did not suit his attributes as a rider after vowing to do so to the media in the days leading up to the race.
Dunne joins the ICA which is a project co-owned by Canadian Sylvain Adams which counted Guillaume Boivin and Ben Perry on its 2018Â roster. Adams was largely recognized as the moving force behind bringing the Giro d’Italia start to Israel.
The team is vying for a place at the Tour de France in the coming years so has broadened their recruiting bringing on former hour record holder Matthias Brändle and Tom Van Asbroeck amoung others to strengthen the roster in a wildcard invitation attempt.
“We need intelligent, smart and capable riders to support our sprinters and climbers. That is exactly why we could not miss on Conor,” said ICA sports director Kjell Carlstrom. “He has race smarts; he knows when and how to move in the peloton as you can see from his quite successful breakaway attempts rate.”
ICA also recently signed Mohamad Sab who is the first professional Arab-Israeli cyclist.
