Yesterday the Katusha team was presented at the headquarters of bike sponsor Canyon in German city of Koblenz. Celebrating its 5th year anniversary, the team presented a largely unchanged team that will mainly target success in the Ardennes classics, the Giro d'Italia, and the Vuelta a Espana with star rider Joaquim Rodriguez.

5 years ago, the Russian Global Cycling Team was started with the aim of providing a path for young Russian riders to shine on the biggest scene. The main driver in that attempt was the WorldTour team Katusha which gained immediate entry into the WorldTour after merging with the existing Tinkoff Credit Systems team.

With 25 wins and a solid roster dominated by sprinters, the team had a good first season in 2009 but the ball really got rolling when they signed Joaquim Rodriguez for the 2010 season. The duo proved to be a perfect match, with the Russian team looking for a grand tour leader and Rodriguez eager to see what he could do in captaincy role.

With podium places in all three grand tours and victories in major classics like Il Lombardia and Fleche Wallonne, Katusha have a come a long way in its first 5 years of existence. Yesterday the team celebrated its success at the team presentation where the riders for the coming season were all in attendance.

"Today we do not just celebrate the fifth anniversary of our main Russian cycling team and open the season of 2014 for Katusha, but we also celebrate a jubilee of the Russian Global Cycling Project," the founder and head of the project said. "In the past five years, the Katusha Team as well as the whole Project have covered a long way and went through many trials. Fortunately, they have got a hundred times more success and victories.

"First of all, I want to thank our athletes, the Katusha riders for the success they have achieved and their victories," he added. "I thank sports directors and the entire technical personnel of the team for the immaculate job done on the way to our victories. I can tell you with all confidence that good luck smiled at us for all those five years."

"The Katusha Team has gained a great number of devoted fans, while the support to us on the part of the press made us confident that we had chosen the right track. Certainly, we cannot imagine our team without our reliable partners, especially such powerful and well-known ones as Gazprom, Rostec, Itera and Canyon are. We hope we shall continue together. After all, the main thing we had understood in those five years was that while we are united, we are invincible!"

Katusha has had a largely unchanged roster, with the only new signings being Egor Silin who returns to the team after a few years with Astana, and Alexander Rybakov and Pavel Kochetkov who join from Rusvelo. Leaving the team are Xavier Florencio and Denis Menchov who have both retired, and Timofey Kritskiy who has stepped down a level by joining Rusvelo.

The team is again spearheaded by Rodriguez who will target the overall wins in the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a Espana as well as success in the Ardennes classics. His loyal domestique Daniel Moreno is expected to get more personal opportunities after winning the Fleche Wallonne and two Vuelta stages in 2013 but will follow mostly the same schedule as his team captain.

In the Tour de France, the team will focus on sprinter Alexander Kristoff while also giving the chance to some of the Russian riders like Yury Trofimov and Eduard Vorganov. Luca Paolini and Kristoff will again be the captains in the cobbled classics while the team will be eager to see continued improvements from sprinters Alexander Porsev, Rüdiger Selig and Marco Haller and stage race talent Simon Spilak.

In 2013, Rodriguez won the individual WorldTour ranking for the third time while the team ended up 3rd in the teams ranking despite missing out on the opening event, the Tour Down under, due to uncertainty about its WorldTour license. The team has got its season off to a solid start, with new signing Silin finishing 10th in this year's edition of the Australian race.

Katusha roster for 2014:

Maxim Belkov, Pavel Brutt, Sergei Chernetckii, Vladimir Gusev, Petr Ignatenko, Mikhail Ignatyev, Vladimir Isaychev, Dmitriy Kozonchuk, Alexander Kolobnev, Pavel Kochetkov, Viacheslav Kuznetsov, Aleksandr Porsev, Alexander Rybakov, Egor Silin, Iurii Trofimov, Alexey Tsatevich, Eduard Vorganov, Anton Vorobyev (all Russia); Alberto Losada, Daniel Moreno, Joaquim Rodriguez, Angel Vicioso (all Spain); Giampaolo Caruso, Luca Paolini (both Italy); Marco Haller (Austria), Alexander Kristoff (Norway), Aliaksandr Kuchynski (Belarus), Rudiger Selig (Germany), Gatis Smukulis (Latvia) and Simon Spilak (Slovenia)