Second signing for next season

Rioja native, 24, returns to Spain next year with Telefónica-backed squad after resounding performances in past few years.

The Movistar Team confirmed Wednesday that Sheyla Gutiérrez (Varea, Logroño, ESP; 1994) has signed a contract for next season with the Blue outfit, and will be a member of Eusebio Unzué’s organisation in its second year in the women’s peloton.

Affectionately known as ‘La Leona’ (‘The Lion’), Gutiérrez has brought Spanish women’s cycling some of its most remarkable performances during her six years in the pro scene, three with Lointek (2013-2015) plus another three with American squad Cylance Pro Cycling (2016-2018). In the last two years, Sheyla has achieved most of her international success, including a stage win in the Giro Rosa (2017), the Belgian classic Le Samyn (2017), two UCI stageraces in China -the Tour of Zhoushan Island and the Panorama Guizhou Road Race, both in 2018- and the 2017 Spanish Road Race Championships in Soria, as well as the 2015 GP Morbihan while still riding for Lointek.

Hit by a car while training in early June conditioned his health for the second half of the 2018 season. However, Gutiérrez did not stop shining, as she wore the QOM jersey in the Giro Rosa after coming just 500 meters short for a breakaway victory on stage two of the Italian Grand Tour. Out of racing since late July as a long-term consequence of that incident, the Rioja native -a powerful rouleur, one for the Northern classics, with great top speed and enormous tolerance to pain- will seek to further improve her level by the side of DS Jorge Sanz.

Picture (c): Vélofocus