Tour of California announces team lineup for 2015 edition

LOS ANGELES (AP) Sprint stars Peter Sagan and Marcel Kittel will continue their budding rivalry at the Tour of California, the eight-day stage race and key Tour de France prep scheduled to begin May 10.

The Tour of California announced its lineup of teams on Friday.

Sagan will anchor his Tinkoff-Saxo team while Kittel will sprint for Team Giant-Alpecin. They will be joined by fellow WorldTour teams BMC Racing, Etixx-Quick-Step, Cannondale-Garmin, LottoNL-Jumbo, Trek Factory Racing and British heavyweight Team Sky.

Among the remaining 10 teams is MTN-Qhubeka, which recently became the first team registered in Africa to receive a wild-card invitation to the Tour de France.

This year's course stretches nearly 700 miles through 13 host cities. For the first time, there will also be a three-day women's race beginning May 8.