After two seasons away, Gene Bates will return to the GreenEDGE Cycling family in 2025 as the Team Manager and Head Sport Director for Liv AlUla Jayco.
Bates is not new to the Aussie outfit after making his directorial debut with the women’s squad back in 2014. He later transitioned to the men’s team in 2019 before taking up a new role with the Australian national team in January 2023.
The 43-year-old returns to the set-up after two successful years as the head of endurance at AusCycling, where he oversaw the road, mountain bike and track endurance programmes. With a new season on the horizon, he’s raring to get stuck into the new challenge.
“If I was to describe it in one word it would be excitement,” Bates says. “I’ve gone pretty much full circle. I started with the team, working with the women, and now I’m back in a similar role, though probably a little more elevated. There’ll be a bit more management as well as directing. I’m just really motivated and excited to be back and working with some promising talent and great people.”
During Bates’ first stint with the team, he played a key role in developing Annemiek van Vleuten into the world-beating rider she would become. The double road race world champion later described how Bates had pushed her and also convinced her to train with the men’s team, something that was well-highlighted in the media.
“Last three years we were both challenged by DS/coach Gene Bates to set some out of our comfort zone goals,” Van Vleuten wrote about herself and fellow GreenEDGE Cycling alumni Amanda Spratt on social media in 2018. [The result] beautiful results, number one and five in the UCI ranking and second in team ranking.”
Upon his return to the squad, Bates will will move into the role currently held by Martin Vestby, who took over from the Australian ahead of the 2019 season and has led the women’s team since. Vestby has guided the team over the past six seasons and seen it grow significantly through a period of massive change for women’s cycling.
While there will be some people that Bates knows from his previous time with the team, there will be plenty of new faces to get to know as well. He will get the chance to do that when he meets the whole squad for the first time at the end of this month.
“I’ve always had a keen interest in the women’s team ever since I left it, and I’ve watched that progression over the years. It really is exciting to see fresh talent and new women coming into the team and seeing what they can produce,” he says.
There will be other familiar faces for Bates in the Liv AlUla Jayco staff with former rider Jess Allen set to become a full-time sport director in 2025. Since retiring from racing at the end of last season, Allen has been splitting her time between the GreenEDGE Cycling media team and directing.
“It’s fantastic to see Jess go from rider to becoming a staff member then going into a director’s role next year,” says Bates. “I think Jess has got a huge amount of recent experience to offer and also a really calm and level head that will put her in good stead with the women and with the team in general.”
A love of cycling, and Italy
Bates will be based out of Italy, where the team’s service course is located, just as he was when he got his first taste of European racing as a wide-eyed teenager. Having picked up the cycling bug from his older siblings as a child, the young Bates knew very little about racing on the other side of the world when he made the trip as a junior.
These days, you can communicate with almost anyone around the globe via relatively cheap internet calls, but it wasn’t so simple back then. Riders from Down Under making the jump to Europe had to be even more resilient and self-sufficient than they are now, and Bates believes this has proved beneficial in the long run.
“It was completely new, it was nothing I’d ever experienced before. There were a lot of Australians in that period of time that came over, before the internet, before easily being able to contact home,” he says.
“You either swam or you sank quickly and there was a point where teams were really looking for Australians because of that factor. If you were someone who had made it to that point, then they knew they had someone who was resilient and hardworking and could make it stick. I think those early experiences really helped me later in my career as well.”
It wasn’t just cycling that Bates had fallen for, he was also hooked on Italy. He remained there throughout his racing career.
“I stayed in Italy the whole time. The national federation had a base there and then I rode with a few different clubs. I was with Zalf, a bit of an iconic Italian team, and LPR. I’ve always felt most comfortable in Italy and around Italian cycling,” he explains.
“I think it’s the passion that you see there. It was contagious and I couldn’t help but get sucked along into it. There was a period there when Italian cycling was at its absolute peak. Just watching that and seeing it on a regular basis, it was hard not to get caught up in the excitement of that.”
Having gone back to Australia to study following his career and then working as a coach at the Tasmania Institute of Sport, Bates returned to the country when he joined GreenEDGE Cycling for the first time. With the then lead sport director Dave McPartland moving over to the men’s team, he jumped at the opportunity and returned to Italy.
“Honestly, it was a really quick decision, it was something that I always wanted to do. I thought, ‘there’s no better opportunity to give it a go’. Initially we thought we’ll move over for a couple of years and then probably move back but then two years turned into close to 10,” Bates says.
Building on solid foundations
It has been a year of flux for Liv AlUla Jayco, but it has also been a successful one with plenty of wins and big results to reflect on as the season approaches its close.
The end of 2023 saw the merger between GreenEDGE Cycling and Liv Racing TeqFind, with riders from both teams coming together seamlessly as one for 2024. Almost half of the team has been on the top step of the podium at least once while several more have enjoyed breakthrough performances that bode well for the future.
“I think there’s a lot of talent there. We’re starting to see some great results from some young riders and some of the more experienced riders are shining as well. I look forward to hopefully enhancing that next year with another season under their belt,” says Bates.
“I think we are in an advantageous position that the athletes have had the opportunity to do a season together and now they know a lot more about each other, how they race and what their strengths are. That’s something that I will really lean into in our October camp, really understanding what is working and how we lean more into that, and what are some of the things that haven’t been working and how do we improve on those.”
The merger also resulted in the creation of a Continental women’s development team for the first time. Several of the new development riders have already had a chance to test themselves at WorldTour level since the beginning of the year and it’s a set-up that Bates is excited to see develop.
“We’re only just starting to see the potential in that,” he explains. “In the first year, there’s always going to be some teething to go through. Hopefully, in the not-too-distant future, we can turn that into a really good pathway scouting, attracting, retaining, and developing talent and moving them up into the WorldTour team. It’s certainly the model that we are looking to make successful in our team.”
2025 Liv AlUla Jayco sport directors:
Gene Bates – Team Manager & Head Sport Director
Jess Allen
Wim Stroetinga
Shawn Clarke
Photo: KRAMON
