page_title: T-Mobile Team
section_title: Team Telekom
hierarchical_section_title: T-Mobile Team / History / Team Telekom
caption_attribution_description: English: Jan Ullrich and Udo Bölts crossing the Vosges mountains together in the 1997 Tour de France.
context_page_description: T-Mobile Team is a professional cycling team competing in international road bicycle races.
  It is named after its chief sponsor - the T-Mobile company. The team takes part in many editions of the annual Grand Tours of cycling, such as the Tour de France and the Giro d'Italia. Since 2005, the team has been one of 20 teams that compete in the new UCI ProTour.
  In December 2007 T-Mobile decided to pull out of cycling sponsorship, and end their sponsorship immediately although they had promised to carry on until 2010.
  The team was founded in 1991 as Team Telekom, sponsored by T-Mobile's parent Deutsche Telekom - but in 2004 their name changed to the current Team T-Mobile. It has 29 riders, 9 physiotherapists or nurses, 9 mechanics, and has 22 partners. The team is managed of Olaf Ludwig and Eddy Vandenhecke, and its sports directors, sometimes caleed directeurs sportifs Brian Holm, Tristan Hoffman, Allan Peiper, Valerio Piva and Jan Schaffrath.
context_section_description: Founded as Team Telekom in 1991 with Walter Godefroot the team manager, the team soon became important presence in international cycling. In 1994, the German sprinter Erik Zabel won the first UCI Road World Cup victory in the history of the team, the Paris-Tours. A year later, in 1995, Zabel won two stages in the 1995 Tour de France.
  The next two years saw the international breakthrough of the team. Godefroot brought in Danish rider Bjarne Riis, finished third in the 1995 Tour, and he went on to win the 1996 Tour de France. Jan Ullrich was then a support rider, and  finished in second place. In the 1997 Tour de France Ullrich as he won the race with support from Riis, who had earlier won the Amstel Gold World Cup race . Team Telekom also won the team classification, as the overall strongest team of the 1997 Tour.
  In both 1997 and 1998, Zabel won the Milan-Sanremo, while Ullrich finished second in the 1998 Tour de France. Ullrich went on to win the 1999 Vuelta a España, but missed the 1999 Tour de France due to a knee injury. The next year, Zabel won the overall World Cup victory, having won the Milan-Sanremo and Amstel Gold Race, while Ullrich placed second again in the 2000 Tour de France to Lance Armstrong. In 2001, Zabel won Milan-Sanremo for the fourth time. Ullrich came in second in the 2001 Tour de France, while Zabel won six stages combined in the 2001 Tour and Vuelta. Kazakh rider Alexandre Vinokourov won the Paris-Nice stage race in 2002, a feat he would duplicate in 2003, also winning the Amstel Gold Race and Tour de Suisse that year. As Ullrich left the team to form Team Bianchi in 2003, Vinokourov became team leader for the 2003 Tour de France. He finished in third place, just below the second placed Ullrich. Zabel won the 2003 Paris-Tours, while Italian rider Daniele Nardello took the Züri-Metzgete.
caption: 1997 Tour: Jan Ullrich in the leader's jersey, with Udo Bölts riding in support.
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