Once the complete roster for the Vuelta a España was finalized, Huang Chong took another look at all the participating teams.
In addition to the eighteen World Tour Teams, just like at the Tour de France, there were four wild card teams. However, their selection differed from the Tour, which only allows participation from the top four Pro Level teams based on UCI points.
Among the four wild card teams at the Vuelta, Israel-Premier Tech and the Lotto Team were participating again. The other two spots for Professional Teams went to local Spanish teams.
They were the Euskaltel-Euskadi Team (Euskaltel-Euskadi) and the Kern Pharma Team (Equipo Kern Pharma).
Huang Chong was somewhat familiar with the former, but he really didn't know much about the latter.
All he knew was that the Kern Pharma Team, like the World Tour's Jieke Team, had their road bikes—the Propel ADV SL—sponsored by Giant.
'But not being familiar with the team doesn't matter anyway.'
