Cycling news - Richard Carapaz insists he was not 'disloyal' to Movistar

Carapaz became the first Ecuadorian to win a grand tour title in 2019 with his Giro d'Italia triumph, but parted company with Movistar just four months later to join Team Ineos on a three-year deal.

Speaking in the Netflix documentary 'El dia menos pensado' [The least expected day], which covers the whole of Movistar's 2019 season, director Pablo Lastras said: "I don’t care about his [Carapaz’s] future. He’s not been loyal and I don’t want a rider who’s not been loyal in my team.

"They might have given him more money [in Ineos] than we could, but he jumped the gun, because there was money this year [2020] in the team."

However, in an interview with ESPN Bike, Carapaz defended his actions, and pointed to how he was simply looking to further his own ambitions.

"The kind of trust that I needed [from the team] was never really provided," he said. "I’ve not been disloyal. I gave the team more than they asked for. As a rider I gave it everything and, if they don’t value that, then people can draw their own conclusions.

“I did not want to be in anyone’s shadow. I wanted to make my own way. I never had the trust, which was maybe never given to me or only given a little bit. I was 25 and I wanted to try new things, and if that ended up being the wrong decision, I prefer to be wrong now and not later.”