COPENHAGEN, Sept 20, 2011 (AFP) – Allan Davis, the Commonwealth Games road
race champion and former Tour Down Under winner, has become the latest
Australian to sign for the nascent GreenEdge team, it was announced Tuesday.

Although he won bronze on a tough world road championships course in
Geelong, Australia last year, the Queensland sprinter failed to make the cut
for the road world championships being held in Copenhagen this week.

Davis, however, has the 2012 Olympic Games within his sights and aims to
work his way back into the team ahead of London.

“The style of race that we should have at the Olympics suits me,” Davis
said in a GreenEdge statement.

“I was third at the World Championships last year, fifth in 2004, despite
getting tangled up with another rider a few hundred meters from the finish
line, and twelfth in my second year as a professional in 2003.

“So I’d be silly not to try and get a good result in these sorts of races.”

He added: “It’s a privilege to ride for your country, so the first step in
achieving my goals at the Olympics and World Championships is to get the
results needed to be selected for the team.”

Currently in his second year with Astana, which did not fulfill a pledge to
allow him to race the Tour de France in July, Davis is set to sit down with
GreenEdge at the end of the season to plan his 2012 campaign.

GreenEdge are set to become the first Australian-registered team in the
elite peloton and hope to acquire a UCI ProTour licence in order to compete in
the 2012 season — which should be helped by the signing of top names so far.

Matthew Goss, who won Milan-Sanremo in March while riding for HTC-Highroad,
has signed for the team joining fellow Australians Jack Bobridge, Simon
Gerrans, Cameron Meyer, Travis Meyer, Stuart O’Grady, Robbie McEwen, Baden
Cooke, Matt Wilson, Simon Clarke and Leigh Howard.

The team has also signed up and coming Belgian Jens Keukeleire, Lithuanian
Tomas Vaitkus, veteran Canadian champion Svein Tuft, Dutch trio Jens Mouris,
Pieter Weening and Sebastian Langeveld, multiple African champion Daniel
Teklehaymanot of Eritrea and Swiss Michael Albasini.

The championships end with the blue riband event of the men’s elite road
race on Sunday, a 266 km epic in which Goss is one of the main contenders.