"Volta ao Algarve": Rui Costa leads UAE-Emirates and Deceuninck-QuickStep brings three 'top-50'

The Portuguese Rui Costa will have the number one back of the Volta ao Algarve, leading UAE Emirates, with Deceuninck-QuickStep, between Wednesday and May 9th.
According to the provisional list of subscribers, the Belgian team brings three top-50 cyclists to the Algarve, with emphasis on the Irish sprinter Sam Bennett (17th), who has already won five this season and won the 2019 Tour de France points classification, and for the Danish Kasper Asgreen (23rd), recent winner of the Tour of Flanders.
Deceuninck-QuickStep will also bring to the 'Algarvia' the Italian Davide Ballerini (47th), as well as the Dutch 'sprinter' Fabio Jakobsen, already recovered from the violent fall in the Tour of Poland in 2020, which took him several months out of the competition.
In addition to Rui Costa, UAE Emirates will bring two more Portuguese to Volta ao Algarve, the brothers Ivo and Rui Oliveira, with South African Ryan Gibbons (86th) being the best placed in the world hierarchy.
The German Pascal Ackermann is the other cyclist in the world 'top-50' among those pre-registered in the Volta ao Algarve, currently occupying the 38th place in the 'ranking', with Bora-hansgrohe still presenting the Germanic Lennard Kamna (89th).
INEOS, one of the most dominant teams this season, presents itself with a team of second lines, with Briton Ethan Hayter (87th) being the only one among the first 100 in the 'ranking'. Among the WorldTour teams present, there are only two more top-100 cyclists, Dutchman Danny van Poppel (74th), from Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert, and Belgian Oliver Naesen (94th), from AG2R.
In addition to the seven teams on the World Tour, the highlight is the presence of the 'talent factory' Hagens Berman Axeon, the gateway to international cycling for many of the Portuguese who today evolve in WorldTour, such as João Almeida, Ruben Guerreiro and the twins Ivo and Rui Oliveira.
At 'Algarvia', the team lead by Axel Merckx presents itself with the two Portuguese players in the 2021 squad, Diogo Barbosa and Pedro Andrade. Burgos-BH, Caja Rural, Kern Pharma, Euskaltel-Euskadi, Delko, Arkéa-Samsic, Bingoal Pauwels Sauces WB and Rally Cycling are the teams of the ProTeam group, the second division of world cycling, present.
The squad of teams is complete with the nine national continental blocks (Antarte-Feirense, Tuna General-Tavira-Maria Nova Hotel, Efapel, Kelly-Simoldes-UDO, LA Alumínios-LA Sport, Louletano-Loulé Concelho, Rádio Popular-Boavista, Tavfer-Measindot-Mortágua and W52-FC Porto).