I mentioned Iranian cycling once before, but thought I’d do so again when I saw this Boulder Report piece discussing several European pro teams’ interest in Mehdi Sohrabi of Iran’s Tabriz Petrochemical team. It seems that he’s now part of Lotto-Belisol.

According to the Boulder Report piece and this article, the European teams wanted Sohrabi for his UCI points in order to qualify as WorldTour teams (the articles explain it better than I can).

Still, perhaps this is a trend. The Boulder Report does point out that “for somewhat undetermined reasons, visa issues for Iranian riders appear to have lessened, meaning [Iranian riders] Sohrabi and Zargari can actually sign contracts for foreign teams.”