Juan Ayuso's last few months at UAE Team Emirates-XRG may have been a tumultuous time for rider and team, but the 23-year-old Spaniard is heading to Lidl-Trek with a clean slate. As team boss Luca Guercilena told Escape Collective, his organization was not put off by Ayuso's knack for generating headlines that hinted at intra-team drama at UAE.
Jonny Long
"I'm used to judging people for what they do with me in person or with my team and my staff," Guercilena said last week in a conversation with Escape. "I look the most for the results, and the possibilities that we can have hiring riders like him, and then we take it from there. I have to say that there was not any hesitation."
Ayuso went from being under contract with UAE through 2028 to the hottest commodity on the transfer market when that team announced during the Vuelta a España that rider and team would be parting ways at the end of this season. Rumors had already connected Ayuso to a potential Lidl-Trek transfer and those only intensified in the aftermath of the September 1 announcement that he was suddenly a free agent.
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