Quick-Step Floors have announced their eight-man squad for the 2018 Vuelta a España, which starts in Malaga on August 25. The Belgian team`s star turn will be Italian sprinter Elia Viviani, who heads to Spain having missed the Tour de France, and should be firing on all cylinders if his Giro d`Italia performance in May is anything to go by. The 29-year-old won four stages and came away with the purple sprinter`s jersey at the Giro, and went on to win three stages at the Adriatica Ionica and then the Italian national championships road race.ADVERTISEMENT Denmark`s Michael Mørkøv and Italian Fabio Sabatini have been tasked as being Viviani`s principal lead-out men, but the entire team will be expected to lend a hand to ensure that the team continues its run of having won stages in the last eight Grand Tours. `Elia has had a tremendous season, and will be our card on the stages that could come down to a bunch sprint, where Michael and Fabio will make for a strong lead-out train, as they have done with success so many other times this year,` Quick-Step directeur sportif Rik van Slycke said. The team will count on the experience of 35-year-old Belgian Dries Devenyns and compatriot Pieter Serry, 29, while Spanish youngster Enric Mas returns to his second Grand Tour, and second Vuelta, after scoring his first pro win on the final stage of the Vuelta al Pais Vasco in April.
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