Enrico Battaglin is ready for a new adventure. After four seasons at Bardiani - CSF, the Italian has joined the WorldTour team LottoNL – Jumbo.

The move marks a big chance in Battaglin’s career and he aims to grab the opportunity with both hands. He has started his preparation for 2016.

“I am all right,” he tells Cyclingpro.net. “I have been back on the bike for a while and am now in Spain for a training camp with my new team, LottoNL-Jumbo. 

”The first impression was very good. We have the best equipment and all the staff members are very professional and work carefully.

“It was my agent Moreno Nicoletti who put me in touch with team manager Richard Plugge. He and the staff gave me this great chance.”

Battaglin has spent the first four years of his career at Bardiani-CSF.

“They have definitely been four important years,” he says. “I must say thanks to the Reverberi family for giving me the chance to turn pro. I have good memories, especially with regard to my two victories in the Giro d’Italia. But I realized that I needed to change the air a bit and so I decided to change teams.”

In 2013 and 2014 Battaglin won stages in the Giro but he failed to achieve any significant results in 2015.

“2015 definitely was not a good year,” he says. “I started with completely different expectations and therefore I cannot say that I am satisfied.

”I cannot find a particular reason. Surely I also have my faults but as I said earlier I realized that I needed to change environment. After the Giro, by choice of the team, I only did two races and it was not easy to sit at home watching my teammates ride.

“Certainly the chance to finally join a WorldTour team gives me great moral and peace of mind, knowing that I can participate in the best races on the calendar without having to wait for an invitation. In a Professional Continental team, you never know anything. This allows you to plan the schedule in advance and to prepare with specific training for the races that you’ll do.”

Battaglin is the only Italian in his new team.

”I am not scared,” he says about the new prospects. “I am aware that I will also have to learn their language, Dutch, and for this I have already attended a course in the Netherlands a few weeks ago. In recent years I have always studied English and I can speak it well enough so for now there are no communication problems. It certainly does not come as natural as speaking Italian but little by little I'll get used to it. However, as we ride on Bianchi bikes, I have not abandoned Italy totally.”

Battaglin has started to make some goals for 2016.

“For now I'm sure that I will start at the Tour Down Under in Australia and from there we will define the rest of the calendar.

”I will focus on one-day races or suitable stages in the grand tour that I hope to do. I really like Sanremo so it could be a good opportunity for me.

”I have no particular objectives. First I will to find the consistency in teams of the results that everyone expects from me and I hope I can finally get some great satisfaction.”