On Wednesday, it was announced that Tiesj Benoot is among the eight riders who will represent Team Sunweb at this year's Tour de France, which has been rescheduled from August 29 to September 20, after taking a stage win and second place overall at Paris-Nice in March, Benoot was expected to lead the team to a top GC finish. However, the 26-year-old Benoot told Belgian media that he is not the team leader and will not be aiming for the overall classification.

"That's what you think," he told Sporza.be.

Instead, Benoot explained that the team is made up of "freelancers," some of whom could go for the stage win.

"We don't have any riders going for the overall ranking. We're going for stage wins with some of the riders." C.S. Boll has the option of joining the breakaway group on the flat stages and the breakaway group on the mountain stages.

Benoot and Boll join Nikias Arndt, Søren Kraag Andersen, Jarsha Stalin, Marc Hirschi, Joris Nieuwenhuis, and the experienced Nicolas Roche in Sunweb's 2020 Tour squad.

"It's a broad, strong, versatile team, but no classified riders," Benoot said. 'When you have riders going for GC, it takes away from our chances of success. We are a team of freelancers. We will attack and try to participate in the breakaway as often as possible."

He finished second to Mitchelton-Scott's Daryl Impey on stage 9 of last year's Tour.

"These transition stages should suit me best," he said.

He won the sixth stage in Paris-Nice in March, finishing second overall behind Beulah Hansgrohe's Maximilian Schachmann.

"You have to take a good look at [the route], but the opening day in Nice looks beautiful right off the bat," he said.

Benoot explained that riders like him can choose which stages to target and save something for post-Tour races.

"With a leader, it's harder to get into a breakaway in the mountains," he said.

"This way you can save a little bit of energy on some days and save your energy for after the Tour.

Benoot plans to restart his season on August 1 at Strade Bianche (a race he won in 2018) and hopes to make a strong start.

"It's a short season, but it's also a long one with no breaks. 'Normally you don't race for 12 weeks at a time,' he said."

"I'm also looking forward to the Liège-Bastogne-Liège (October 4), the Amstel Gold Race (October 10), and the Tour of Flanders (October 18).

While Benoot and his teammates are looking for stage wins at the Tour, the team appears to be taking a more targeted approach to the Giro d'Italia, announcing its Italian Grand Tour lineup at the same time as the Tour de France team and on Wednesday also announced its longlist for the Vuelta a España.

Michael Matthews heads to the Giro as the team's main sprinter, looking for a tougher finish, while Wilco Kelderman and Sam Omen will be looking for GC in Italy.