This was an edition where one rider dispatched his rivals at will and they were well ahead of the rest. Tadej Pogačar went solo for the win on the last time up the Oude Kwaremont climb but by then he’d already demonstrated he was the strongest in the race, he just had to convert this into a sufficient lead so he could hold off any chase on the long flat road to the finish.
175 riders on the start list, one non-starter on a cold and bright morning where the flag on top of the belfry in Brugge’s market square was slapping in the easterly breeze.
Plenty of the smaller teams tried to get in the early breakaway until a move of eight went away without several of these squads. Instead Marco Haller (Tudor), Elmar Reinders (Jayco), Alessandro Romele (XDS-Astana), Connor Swift (Ineos Grenadiers), Rory Townsend (Q36.5), Victor Vercouillie (Flanders-Baloise) and Sean Flynn (Picnic PostNL) and Timo Roosen (Picnic PostNL) went away with Swift the eye-catching rider as a possible relay for team mate Filippo Ganna later on. Several other teams tried to chase but their day was over.
The first unscripted event came in the form of crashes, at first UAE riders at different times, each left using up energy to chasing back and then Mathieu van der Poel was felled by a wave in the peloton. He back to the peloton in no time but Cyrille Guimard‘s adage of “no crash is ever harmless” came to mind and it was rare to see him among the mortals in the convoy of team cars.
Davide Ballerini attacked after the Molenberg with 110km to go and was joined by Stefan Küng and this marked a new phase. Several kilometres later Filippo Ganna joined another move which was on its way across to Küng and soon this formed a 14 group in the lead including the early breakaway. Ganna and Küng were outsiders trying to buy themselves some space but interestingly Tiesj Benoot was there for Visma-LAB, Quinten Hermans for Alpecin-Deceuninck and Lidl-Trek had Daan Hoole.
UAE were left chasing alone, twice over. The sole team doing the work and often with one rider while team mates were struggling to recover. This meant Ganna and Küng got over a minute and UAE were down on riders. But they still chased and ate into the lead on the approach the second time up the Oude Kwaremont.
If you’re a rider capable of winning Alpine stages in grand tours, how to win the Ronde? Pogačar answered this in 2023, using each climb to exploit his advantage over rivals weighing ten or more kilos more. No more so than the Oude Kwaremont, the longest climb of them all. He surged here and suddenly he was away with only Mathieu van der Poel, Mads Pedersen, Wout van Aert and Matteo Jorgenson for company. There were other riders on the course but at times they didn’t even look like extras, more like production assistants on a set expected to get out of the way once the filming started.
Pogačar exploited the climbs, attacked outright or just pressing hard. These teased out Van der Poel, Mads Pedersen and Wout Van Aert. Each time gaps opened up here, moves weren’t reacted to immediately: each time the Slovenian made a move it provoked a shake-up and had rivals reacting. It was like a game of musical chairs, only with Pogačar as a DJ rather than a participant. He played his tunes, he set the tempo.
The last time up the Oude Kwaremont saw Pogačar launch his final attack and Van der Poel responded but there was a gap. Like Ernest Hemingway going bankrupt, Van der Poel gradually being dropped, then suddenly. Pogačar was away. He went into the Paterberg with 24 seconds and kept this over the top.
This was what he needed to do but was probably at his most vulnerable all day because if he could be caught he’d surely lose the sprint. The long road to Oudenaarde, into a headwind and with a stellar chase group, including Stuyven, was his most dangerous moment. But after the chasers cleared Paterberg descent you could see the body language, elbows not quite bent tight and the time gap grew.
The Verdict
Predictable both for the victor and the manner in which he achieved it, Tadej Pogačar still put on a show. So did the others, Van der Poel, Pedersen and Van Aert never seemed to give in, at least until after the Paterberg, by which time they’d been distanced. There was suspense in it, seeing Ganna and Küng take a minute started to pose questions for UAE. Right at the end Pogačar was the strongest up the Kwaremont but it wasn’t certain he’d stay away in a headwind but it wasn’t long until the road to Oudenaarde once again became a victory parade.
Ed Pickering’s book De Ronde tells the story of the race but also the story of the 2011 edition, a tale of tactics, craft and guile as Nick Nuyens got the better of Sylvain Chavanel, Fabian Cancellara and Tom Boonen. This time no such subtlety required. The only “what if” question from the day was Mathieu van der Poel because he’d been ill since the GP E3, and his crash on the day would have cost him something too. Paris-Roubaix up next and a rematch, but this time on terrain to suit the specialists. And the forecast is hinting at rain.
Not as boring as I expected… I enjoyed it. And very glad WvA is back in the game ! I hope he can win Roubaix.
As for French riders we really are in a dark place, or rather, let’s hope, a joint between two good generations. First Frenchman was Paret-Peintre, 16th for his first Ronde (I suspect he can be better in Flandriennes than in GT and even one-week race : as usual, our better Flandrian reveal themselves after having chased the wrong objectives during several years…). In MSR it was Pacher, 29th… Gregoire was just behind and maybe a hope for the future. I guess we just have to wait for him, Martinez, Seixas and few others…
As for Belgians, isn’t it the longest drought in the Ronde of history ? Italians still have some nice cards to play, the trio Ballerini/Ganna/Trentin was fun to watch. The tradition of Spanish Flandrians is not very active in the moment, except the traditional Garcia Cortina’s top-10. Bisseger seemed very strong but always finds a way to disappear in the right moment, leaving old Küng alone for Switzerland. We could expect more of the US riders…
So far, for me, the biggest surprise of the classics is Arjen Lyvins. Always strong and just below the strongest, even if the results don’t always follow. Strange nowadays to discover a 31 years old rider doing his first world-class performances.
I’ve often done a “cobbled classics revelations” piece to highlight promising riders who had a good spring but maybe didn’t win but showed well, perhaps going in the early break and resisting for a long time or featuring in the second group. But that’d be difficult so far, the feeling that there’s just little room for anyone outside of yesterday’s podium; partly in terms of results but also attention from the cameras.
Do you think realisators show more the leaders and less the other riders than previous years ? It didn’t strike me whan watching but now you say it, I don’t remember so much images from behind… Is there really a difference with before ? Maybe it was because the suspense was already in the two or three first groups.
Rightly all the attention was on Pogačar, Van der Poel etc but to the point that when their first attacks saw them caught by the bunch we didn’t see the chase much. From a visual point it looked as if all the other riders were written out of the script, they had no effect on the race even if they were sometimes close and giving their all.
Yes, eight long years (since Philippe Gilbert in 2017) without a Belgian winner – and now the fourth consecutive year without a Belgian rider on the podium!
The only Spanish Flandrian I can recall is Juan Antonio Flecha with his 3rd place (behind Stijn Devolder in 2008).
My memory is too short to remember beyond Alberto Bettiol (in 2019), but I could hazard a guess that we´ll see an Italian winner before we´ll see a French one. (Just a hunch, obviously, no comment on current riders.)
Freire ? Not a very old tradition, obviously… The young Hector Alvarez could be the next.
Flecha… which was from Argentina 😉
(Living from a young age in Catalunya, he holds double nationality)
I’m very excited to see what Seixas can do. He is still young, but he seems like he has a very high ceiling.
All your problems would be solved if MVDP identified as French!
I was going to say that too. The same for Belgians given he was born there, lives there etc
LOL – MvDP belongs to all countries! Except he identifies as my grandfather’s netherlands… but I’m a Canadian so he isn’t mine exactly.
I thought it was a great race, even if the end result was predictable. I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish, I am moderately embarrassed to say.
There were two things about the race that were remarkable I think. From the second time over the Kwaremont until he was away Pogacar either attacked or, responded to attacks to shut gaps himself, relentlessly. He must have put in 20 or more accelerations of varying degrees of intensity. His ability to do this, like he did constantly in Milan-Sanremo from the Cipressa onwards, is unlike anything I have ever seen before I think. The old rules about conserving your energy and licking other peoples plate clean etc don’t seem to apply to him. Even after all that, and with 250km in the bank, he still pulled away into a headwind and didn’t look especially put out by it. It would be interesting to know how long a race actually needs to be before it induces fatigue in him.
The other remarkable point was Van der Poels seeming indestructability, until he cracked. The way he just seemed to appear back at the front of the peloton having just stacked it at 50mph reminded me of T-1000 from Terminator 2. And even after that he was responding to all of Pogacar’s moves, until he couldn’t. Anyone else would have been in a heap, like poor Degenkolb was.
The race was way more tactical than other editions between tha last couple of Oude Kwaremonts, with frequent drops in speed on the (few) flattish sections. Lots of what could be seen between bergs were skirmishes, not really any high intensity forcing or all-in bets. You could see dropped athletes coming back on the front again and again. As I noted below, this was hard enough to crush the best but, in a broader perspective, it wasn’t as deeply selective as 2023, not even by far, which contributed to even faster climbing, of course.
OTOH, the -100km to -50km hour (roughly) had been high speed, the peloton often strung out to keep at bay the powerful breaks ahead.
As a side note, I remember a similar style of racing in Classics to be Bettini’s case, although obviously not at the Ronde where he was always deployed as a support rider. Among more recent generations, Alaphilippe at his best raced sometimes with this sort of approach, both for stages and one-day races.
Generally speaking, it wasn’t uncommon at Roubaix, where sometimes the strongest rider needs to demolish the opposition with more and more accelerations on the pavé sectors to drop as many rivals as possible despite the slipstream effect.
Curiously enough, and a very different case, indeed, Nibali was also apparently doing the same on some occasions, but that was mainly because of his lack of peak power and searing acceleration, so he had to increase speed multiple times until the rivals got broken.
” It would be interesting to know how long a race actually needs to be before it induces fatigue in him”
Don’t know about weather conditions and all, but GCN claim Pog’s last ascent on the Kwaremont where he left VdP was 10 seconds slower than the previous ascent, where VdP matched him. So the length did affect him, just not as much. Coming off the Paterberg into the final run, Pog was still focused, compact and aero, the following group had hands in the drops and looking gassed and you knew they weren’t bringing him back.
I think that Pogacar was running on fumes at the end of the world championship race. If they have numbers on that effort then I would say that is his limit.
Improvements in nutrition have had a big impact on race tactics. It means riders can make multiple efforts, like Pogi in this race. And it means that riders can attack from further out and still have something left for the end. Lastly, it means that long solos become possible. Overall, the riders no longer have to try to conserve their energy for the last 30 kms of the race. I think this makes the races more exciting (but others might no agree).
Exactly, Pogacar keeps attacking and attacking and never sits on waiting for moves or waiting for an event. And that’s what is exciting. He always goes for it, so I’m very excited for this upcoming Sunday.
Err, so the Terminator terminology doesn’t work then.
Great everything! Riders, crowds, weather, breaks, course, and a winner that was predicted before the start but delivered. Never an easy thing to do.
Role on Roubaix!
“So what do you do when you’re a big favourite to win but the two other riders everyone is tipping are bound to out-sprint you? Make them suffer on every uphill stretch and turn final climb into a tortuous effort. Tadej Pogačar did just that, launching on many climbs before making his final move on the Oude Kwaremont to go away solo. This kept Mads Pedersen and Mathieu van der Poel at bay so all he had to worry about was holding on for the finish. Easy to say, hard to do. This was an overwinning by Pogačar.”
I went reviewing the 2023 edition and this is from inrng’s piece back then. Copy & paste for a copy-paste race, this time probably even better, as the rivals posed more of a challenge with a broader set of tactical options. Even the time differences were quite similar between the two editions, only this time MvdP stayed with the other chasers. A faster race but on a easier day, this time around nearly 50 riders (46 to be precise) made it to the line within 2’30”, whereas in 2023 46th-placed was some 7 minutes back.
The funny thing is that out of about one hundred comments to the piece, largely enthusiast, just one or two hinted at doping insinuations.
What’s even more funny is that from a merely technical POV the couple of seasons that went by in the while should make this last race even more consistent with the profile of the rider, not the other way around.
It looks like that most commenters, when they decide to – ahem – “analyse” the credibility of a race or a rider don’t rely at all on any technical aspect. It’s just that he who wins a lot gets the bashing.
The above case-study makes it especially manifest, but of course there are several other “commutation tests”: some people focus on the dark figure of Gianetti, and reasonably so, only to end up rooting for athletes who’re riding for teams with equally dubious DSs and an even more disturbing past as a structure. Others are worried by the athlete tackling with success different kinds of competitions, i.e. Classics, cobbles and GCs, obviously disregarding the fact that the most blatant cases of “hard” doping flourished in a context of utter specialisation.
I will agree with some of your post, but I cannot really warm to Pogi. He has chosen to align himself – closely and on an insanely long contract – with one of the most odious guys in pro cycling.
I hope that Pogi is clean – for himself and for pro cycling – but I have to say that I always prefer any other rider to win. Fair or not.
I understand that, of course, and I’ve endured similar issues with athletes I liked but on the «wrong» teams. That said, personally I finally tend to root for the rider, but it’s a question to deal with, no doubt.
As for the rest, I don’t dare to hope as much. I just hope there’s some fairness towards the ahletes in terms of at least minimal respect of their health (wishful thinking) and among teams, as in when a team goes too much over the bar, being «suggested» to slow down a notch. Of course, I’m not hoping for any public scandal, they never helped much, not even in terms of a «cleaner» sport. Mutual moral suasion would work better.
“the most blatant cases of “hard” doping flourished in a context of utter specialisation”
Yes, the doping era had riders only competing for a narrow window in the season. And they rose to prominance in their late 20s: riders would typically ride their first season or two clean during the doping era, and then gradually get introduced to doping when they realised their results were poor. Competing all season and from a young age are what happened before 1990 (the “pre-doping era”). So getting this happening now is encouraging.
I might whisper this, but for sustained enjoyment, I enjoyed that more than Milan-San Remo, which was effectively a couple of all-rounders hanging on to a climber for a couple of moderate hills then beating him in a sprint. I semi-joke as it was compelling for 30 min, but it is funny how much a race is judged by how close the action is to the finish (and perhaps the “enjoyment” of seeing Pog getting beat?).
Here, there was genuine action from >100 km out with the quality break including Kung and Ganna, the diminished UAE resources chasing, the possibility of the break making it over the final hills, the WVA redemption sub-plot, Visma and Trek having multiple riders at the latter stages, the lead group getting caught between hills, and the lead riders sticking with Pog for a longer than some expected – until the elastic snapped it seemed a real possibility that MVDP and possibly Pedersen would stay close enough to Pog, especially with MSR fresh in the mind. Nearly every rider in the top 10 had an active role in shaping the race (only Cortina seemed to slip under the radar to me) and I can’t imagine many teams/riders had regrets about how they tried to take the race to Pog, or where they finished. And then the strongest deservedly won.
Also enjoyed Mads Pedersen’s interview:
“You seem quite emotional?”
“Nah, I’m just f**ked”
I don’t think you need to whisper it?
I’ve long disliked MilanSanRemo as a race but this years was possibly one of the best races I’ve ever seen? It was simply magical and that very rare feeling that you’re watching some of the greatest ever in a defining moment.
Similar to Flanders ’23 (which is probably still the best race I’ve seen).
I’m extremely thankful to this generation for the shows they’ve put on as it’s reinvigorated my love for the sport beyond what I thought was even possible.
Still – I don’t think we should be too down on Flanders ’25, because yes it was a carbon copy of ’23 which lessened it’s impact, plus we’re aware that Roubaix levels they playing field which made this weekend feel like a starter before next weeks main course! At the same time there was still more attacks and sustained action in this Flanders that many I’ve watched, the eventual winner hitting an elite group every time they go uphill for nearly fifty kms is pretty much unheard of at any classic, so I for one think it’s important not to get too complacent about what we’re witnessing during a clearly golden generation. Although it’s fair to tire of the same winner, I just find when it’s Pog & MVDP in a race currently despite one of the two winning, the fireworks to get there are worth it despite their dominance. Maybe both Liege and Lombardia less so.
Something occurred to me yesterday – is Pog riding LBL this year?
Do you think he had a secret plan to win all five monuments in a year that MVDP scuppered at the first hurdle? I’ve realised he’s probably the first rider in a while to be able to achieve Gilbert’s ‘strive for five’ but not only that he’s possibly able to do it in a single year if he’s able to find a way to win Roubaix that’s not as random/MVDP dependent as his route to MSR victory.
Yes, to LBL
Hello oldDave. Absolutely agree with your points. We’ve had two remarkable monuments out of two this season. Sure, the same names winning but the races have been exquisite.
Can barely wait for Paris Roubaix; an improving WVA, Ganna in the mix, Pogacar of course. It will be compelling.
LBL – he is on the start list
5 monuments in a year. Possibly. I think his first target would be three in a year to match Merckx. The ambition will be to go one better.
You hit the nail on the head, in a round the houses kind of way! When Pogacar and MvdP race together on a course where both can win its great, golden era stuff. When one isn’t there and the other walks it, its tedious. Liege, and in particular Lombardia, suffer for being weighted too much towards Pogacar. And it would appear that no race organisers can ever countenance making their race less hilly. We await with bated breath the annual announcement of which hill has been added to Liege after La Redoute..! Though to be fair we are yet to have full strength Evenepoel v Pogacar there. Maybe Thibau Nys can shake the Ardennes races up this year.
It’ll be interesting to watch Pogacar at Roubaix. As much as he is an immensely strong all round rider and excellent time trialist, his MO has always been to attack and get separation on a hill, ideally a steep one. Obviously he won’t have that in Roubaix. In some ways the boots will be much more on the feet of the Vans, Pedersen, Ganna, Milan et al.
I think you both don’t recall well the two Lombardia which ended in Bergamo, as in neither Pogi appeared to be so clearly the strongest rider; the first time his uphill “attacks” (more progressions, and often even having to defend) were to no use and he had to pick his moment to sneak away in a false flat section before the Selvino descent, taking the rest by surprise. Then he was matched by Masnada all the way to the sprint, Boccola wall included.
Two years later he still struggled to make the decisive cut on the longest and hardest climb, and not only on Rogla but also on the likes of Vlasov or C. Rodríguez; he was even attacked himself by… Woods or Harper. It was a very lively fight. Anyway he could finally get away alone this time but then he cramped badly on the flat and the chasing group looked several times on the brink of being able to bring him back, although every time they were getting closer somebody stopped working, and the chase halted again and again.
Of course the route is perfect for him, which makes it even more relevant how much “effort” did it actually require to win on those two occasions.
In Como it was a different story, of course. And, well, despite what Richard S says, last year RCS actually made the route much easier (forced by a landslide… yet they could include the wall of Sormano to “compensate”, and didn’t. Or multiple times up San Fermo).
We all remember how it went, in fact I suspect you “project” it on past editions, too.
The other teams played it great from the start and could push UAE team against the rope, but they only succeeded in forcing Pogi to move a little earlier than planned, not in derailing the whole race. Then Remco put down major watts, but that didn’t work, either. It was indeed one of the most absolutely commanding performance I’ve seen by Pogi from a merely athletical POV, and, as I said at the time, while most people assumed it as the natural going of things, for me it was still a bit *surprising* in quantitative terms.
Gabriele, you are the absolute master of finding one tiny crack of exaggeration in a comment and expanding on it to canyon proportions. Fair play to you, nothing you have written isn’t true.
Well aside from that I do remember both races and loved!
Lombardia has long been one of my favourite races.
What I meant above was specifically the most recent races, where in truth what I’m actually saying is *I’m willing to understand why people are finding Pog boring, as it’s fair enough*, when personally I find his feats incredibly watchable however much he demolishes the competition – as well as enjoying other races also simply because I love cycling.
@Richard S
Away from the erosion metaphor implying destruction, conflict or substitution of sort, think about the crack as a positive place where a seed can find the occasion to then give place to a tree 😉
“Liege, and in particular Lombardia, suffer for being weighted too much towards Pogacar. And it would appear that no race organisers can ever countenance making their race less hilly.”
I know this happens a lot in GTs, but really, is it a good idea to tailor races for or against individual riders? The big classics have each their identity, each tests riders in a different way. Liege is hilly, PR has pave, etc. Do we need to MSR-ize everything because of a transcendent rider who appears once every few decades?
Secret plan to win 5? I don’t think anyone has won more than three in a season – which Merckx (inevitably!) did in ‘69, ‘71, ‘72 and ‘75. Probably 1975 was Merckx’ best year in the monuments and other classics – 1st, 1st, 2nd, 1st and 6th in the five monuments, as well as winning Amstel and podium in Flèche Wallone, Championship of Zurich and Paris-Brussels. Of course, that was the first year he didn’t win a Grand Tour and was really his last truly great year.
Could Pog still win 4 this year? Low, but not zero, chance I’d say. Despite the hype, a win in Paris-Roubaix would be truly remarkable, his natural advantage uphill is removed as a factor and you’d have thought even if he drops some rivals, at least one of MVDP, Van Aert, Ganna, Pedersen etc might hang on. Plus a crash or untimely puncture is possible. LBL – depends how fatigued he is. Lombardy – hard to see anyone beating him if he rides and is motivated. No-one has won it five times in succession…
oh yes – I wasn’t suggesting it was likely!
Which is why I mentioned it being a secret dream that they’d never share as it’s such a radical scenario. Was simply meaning he’s one of only maybe three or four cyclists ever where it’s been even 10% possible so might have run through his mind as a way to achieve something no one had ever got near.
But I emphasise I’m not delusional enough to think it was likely.
I don’t think he has more the slimmest of slim chances in PR, unless a lot crash out.
“he had a secret plan to win all five monuments in a year”
I think this is a bit unlikely (but who knows). Nobody except Merckx has ever won more than two in a year. And Merckx only ever managed three in the same year. If Pogi gets three in the same year then that will already be an exceptional achievement. This year there is a good chance he will manage it since it is difficult to see anyone beating him at either Liege or Lombardia. I personally am going to appreciate this enormous achievement if it happens.
This year MSR vs. RVV is like a poem vs. novel debate of sort
^____^
I find it difficult to believe the chasing group would not have caught Pogacar if they had all pulled. Thus I conclude they were all racing for second. Which is fair enough but a bit of a surprise given those riders.
I’m a bit bemused by this point of view.
Obviously everyone is entitled to their opinion and I’m not criticising – I just find it confusing to think any group would come back on that route as we’ve not seen it in ten years (without indecision from a leading pair) since the revised Flanders layout? (Happy to be corrected if wrong).
Instead we’ve regularly seen riders go clear on one the final climbs and solo to the end with what look like tiny gaps when topping the climb of their attack, so despite the commentary trying to keep a sense of jeopardy I saw almost no scenario where Pog was going to be caught.
Not only does the recent history of that course point to a ten-twenty second gap being sufficient for the strongest rider on this Fanders route (headwind or no headwind, which is something I can’t explain, but remember similar from either Sagan or Cancellara riding into a headwind), it also seems pretty rare in recent spring Monuments during the last 10-30kms that any attacker is brought back by a small group no matter how strong? Usually because that group is simply too tired and unwilling to cooperate, so even on that level I saw Pog going clear as at least a 75% chance the job was done.
The Terpstra win of Roubaix and Bettiol Flanders win always stick in my (again recent) memory as exceptionally strong chase groups being unable to claw their way back to a lone attacker and everyone being forced after to acknowledge how much stronger the winner was.
“In theory that’s nice, but the legs said otherwise” — Jasper Stuyven, when asked about that after the race.
And Van der Poel was clearly completely cooked (he almost went backwards on the Kwaremount). Pederson admitted he was “f—ed”. Van Aert was pretty cooked too, given he couldn’t do anything in the sprint (how many times had he come back on previous climbs?). In my opinion (I might be wrong), the chasing group had absolutely nothing left.
I agree – as a collective they had nothing left…As individuals I think a couple were stronger than the others, but the group dynamics then become a problem – if the weaker riders sit on, then everyone stops riding. If the weaker riders pull through, they’re not strong enough and the group slows down (which is what appeared to happen early in the chase after the Paterberg descent).
For me the moment the race was one was after they topped the climb when POG finally got a break and the camera showed the chasing 4 for a couple of seconds and i saw MVDP struggling / unwilling to come through. At this moment i knew the race was won.
When the chase group topped the climb together and POG only had about 10 seconds lead i had thought they could bring him back until i saw the group had no cohesion.
Pogacar only had 12 seconds at the top but hadn’t needed to take out an overdraft to do it. The others went over the limit to keep it down to 12 seconds. The race was won when Pogacar was able to push on as the others recovered.
I seem to remember Tom Dumoulin being pinged in the TdF for doing a lot less drafting to get back on than MvdP. What are the rules exactly?
Well the rule is probably you cannot draft at all more than needed to get back through the caravan. Obviously interpretation will differ due to what the commissaires see – individual tolerances for each commissaire. The reason the rider was behind in the first place.
If the car is drafting the rider at super high speed past other riders that’s a real no -no. I did see mvdp being drafted but i was not sure how long as they didn;t really show much of it on my broadcast. He could only have drafted until the back of the convoy which was probably 20 – 30 seconds off the back of the peloton at which point the riders can sneak back through behind each car.
I was once driving the following / spares car in an amateur race and came up to a rider dropped on a hill. When i enquiring if he had a mechanical (he had not) he thought he could hang on to my open window to get back to the group. He could not do this he was told moderately forcefully.
When I started racing (as an older adult) I was in an amateur race. I punctured about 40 km into a 100 km race. Wheel car came and pretty quickly gave me a new back wheel. He said to draft him and he would try to get me back to the field. Trust me, that might work for the pros, but we amateurs are not used to being within a foot or two off the back bumper of an auto. After about a minute of me flailing, the driver shook his head in degust and went off to support the field.
I once drove a support van for a cat. 1/2 race in Michigan (mixed asphalt/dirt roads… carnage). After the first long dirt section two riders were about a minute ahead of the field but they took a wrong turn on and the field passed them. I was at the back and saw what happened, so shouted that I’d help them get back on.
Trying to drive at a steady ~30-35 mph pace, often on pothole-laden dirt-roads, in a van with no rear window, without suddenly stopping (and causing the guys to crash into me), was intense and exhilarating! Thankfully they both got back on to the peloton by the start of lap 2. But it made me appreciate just how tricky it can be for the drivers, not just the riders.
When a retired rider becomes a team director one of the things they worry about most is driving a team car as they can come up with tactics on the day because they’ve experienced it beofre; or take days and nights to work out logistics plans that will take them hours with some experience… but driving in the convoy, there’s no introductory course. Some riders ask to sit in the passenger seat at first to get used to it.
I would love to hear people’s opinions about Jorgenson vs. Stuyven. Was the difference between their results down to the way they raced, or simply that Stuyven was strong enough to stay in the top five but not strong enough to drag Pederson closer to Pog? I’m always curious when a team who is not going for UCI points has two top finishers but not the winner. Not
judging, genuinely curious.
In a race as hard as Flanders who is at the front and the order in which they finish is entirely dependent on strength. Beyond the brief flurry from Visma there were no tactics at play. And that was very much Benoot and Jorgenson playing their last cards knowing they were going backwards on the next hill. Stuyven was there in the finale but he had nothing to give, Pedersen pulled more than he did.
I think Stuyven was key for Pedersen’s 2nd place over MVDP. The latter couldn’t play the slowing down then bursting he is so good at. Pedersen was able to start his sprint from 300m or so which proved to be too much for MVDP already in the past.
Time for Flanders to go back to the old route wich ended with the Muur and the Bosberg. Less hard, more tactics and more randomness involved, should make for a more fun race as long as a few super-humans are so dominant. That said, I think this was generally a fun race. For a while there you actually wondered if it was not a forgone conlusion to the race after all. And that part was great!
The organisers wanted to change the course because the old route looked like it would regularly end in a large group sprint. Moreover, they want to have several loops over the same roads so that fans get to see the race several times. This has two advantages: (i) fewer roads need to be closed, hence less disruption to people living there; (ii) they can have ticketed areas in the fields next to the route and generate some money to pay for the race organisation. The organisers are likely also happy that “a few super-humans are so dominant” and don’t want randoms winning their race.
I think the new route, with multiple loops, works brilliantly for fans (and presumably road closures & locals too)…but an alternative could be to change the loops that they use – perhaps loops of Taainberg & Berg Ten Houte, or Oude Kruisberg & Karnemelkbeekstraat before Paterberg and the 13km run-in to town…that could change the dynamics of the race and keep tactics & outcomes a little more unpredictable…though I can understand why the organisers want the Kwaremont to feature most, given there’s 2km of space for VIP tents!
The twin domination of Pogaçar and van der Poel in monuments is breathtaking.
Of 26 monuments since 2020 (Paris Roubaix wasn’t held that year) the score is:
Pog – 8
VdP – 7
All others – 11, of whom only Evenepoel has won twice.
In those 11 in which neither rider won, in two events neither finished. (LBL in 2022 when neither started, and 2023 when Pog crashed). Of the remaining 9, one or the other has been on the podium 5 times without either winning. Only once has their collective best finish in a monument been outside the top 10 (MSR in 2020, when they finished 12th and 13th).
The only comparable era I’d suggest would be the early 1970s, with Merckx and DeVlaeminck. If you took the comparable period 1970 – first two classics of 1975 (27 races) the pair also won 15 monuments, but more skewed to Merckx (10-5 over that period).
I wonder if between them they will win all five this year? It must be a possibility; you suspect it would only be chance (for example a crash or badly-timed mechanical) rather than form that would prevent it. I don’t think that has ever been done before (i.e. two riders sweeping all five monuments) – Merckx and De Vlaeminck were close in 1975, but Moser won in Lombardy.
Edit to add: 1972 they were also close, winning 4 of 5 that year as well.
I should probably add the small caveat that the concept of a “monument” didn’t exist at that time, but it is still a useful benchmark of the most important classics.
It’s pretty reminiscent of recent tennis, which I do not follow, but through the Fed/Nadal, Nadal/Djok and even before Sampras/Agassi, Borg/Mac etc etc where the top tier events were split between very few competitors.
Obviously incomparable between different sports I just mean the overall narrative. Although I guess Pog is also winning GT’s so maybe dominating padel or table tennis also.
I feel like I/we’ll be speaking about this moment (20-2025/6/7) for the next twenty years. It’s astounding.
I wonder if great players of various sports dominate more now than they used to because knowledge of training and sports science has meant that the occasional inexplicable bad days or build up of fatigue people used to have has been eradicated? Just a thought.
The biggest obstacle to the two rider’s winning all 5 this year is probably Sunday. Roubaix naturally throws up stuff that can take people out through no fault of their own, and is probably also the race best suited to the supporting cast. Van Aert and Ganna should be strong there, and Lidl might be able to work something between Pedersen, Stuyven, Milan et al. Liege with Evenepoel sub par you’d think would go Pogacar’s way. Lombardia is so far off anything could happen in the meantime, but you’d expect Pogacar to win it if he’s there and fit.
Also Pogacar has been in an incredible golden spell since late 2023, Van der Poel similar. You’d think there would be some sort of natural drop off at some point.
Van der Poel is 30, so there can’t be too long before he drops off. (We should really enjoy him an Van Aert while we still can, since it won’t last much longer). Pogi will likely be good for the next 5 years, unless he gets injured or bored. (Or busted if you believe he is not playing fair, although there is no evidence for this).
If you’ll forgive another non-cycling analogy, Larry Bird was the greatest basketball player in the world for a while but pretty quickly broke down physically and ended up with a relatively short window of greatness. It seems like this kind of thing happens less often now due to progress in medical and sport science. Add to that the fact that athletes who can focus on fewer days (i.e., not a long season with no breaks like football etc.) are able to fine-tune their performance scientifically, and you end up with MVDP who almost never has bad performances.
Of course, this doesn’t apply to “Energizer Bunny” Pog who never seems to get tired, which is why some people wonder if he’s on the up-and-up. For my part, I think he’s just a once in a generation freak.
One trap to be careful of is Liège-Bastogne-Liège and the Flèche Wallonne because in some years the Flèche was the superior event, held on a Sunday, part of the Super Prestige series; while Liège was the mid-week race.
Sorry Mr Inner Ring, I don’t like doing this, but you may find this interesting.
LBL only ran mid-week in 1969 (Tues), 1970 (Fri) and 1972 (Thu). Otherwise, LBL has always run on Sunday. FW ran the day before, on Saturday, in the 1950s, making an Ardenne Weekend. FW ran at the weekend again 1969-1972 but otherwise has always ran during the week. It switched from Thu to Wed in 1985.
They had a similar status from the 1930s until the late 1980s, being the top races in Wallonia. But neither race was regarded as highly as the other “classics” (e.g. the monuments, FW, Paris-Tours, and Paris-Brussels). Normally only one of the two Ardenne races was included in the “Super Prestige Pernod” which was a series which decided the seasons best rider and included the top races: it ran until the late 1980s.
In the late 1980s, the World Cup and the world rankings began (later becoming the World Tour). Controversially, FW was excluded from the World Cup since it ran midweek. And this is the key reason it did not become a monument (Paris-Tours, and Paris-Brussels lost prestige already in the 1970s so were never candidates for monument status). As a result, FW was shortened to 200 km, and became the race we all know with the finish up the Muur de Huy.
Fabulous writing. I loved watching it on Sunday, laid up with a dodgy back, and I loved reading about it again this evening just as much, thanks to your talent and the healing powers of time. Chapeau!
“Like Ernest Hemingway going bankrupt” = “gradually and then suddenly”. Great one!
The comparison of Pogi to Merckx is so tired, boring and stupid. If you have Microsoft Excel and a terrible opinion you can easily declare Merckx the better rider, but it’s really better for everyone to just stfu about it.
What’s even more stupid, in many people’s book, is to come on to a cycling blog to tell people to stop discussing cycling.
I will copy and paste this into this Roubaix preview…
…but my thought re this Sunday is what are Pog’s tactics?
Because it seems sensible for newcomers in any race to follow the best and look for an opening late in the race – but it also feels like during Pog’s career each time he’s raced a one day that he’s eventually won, he’s learnt to attack earlier and earlier and repeatedly as a way of burning off rivals or eventually grinding them exhaustion.
So given that, maybe we should expect repeated attacks from early on the cobbles? It might be his best tactic to stop this being a ‘learning year’, despite it seeming reckless? Obviously the above attacks were on hills *not* on flat cobbles which may (or likely will) change everything. It’s just either way, the longer Pog’s in the company of the Roubaix specialists the more chance he has of losing the sprint, so reckless could be his best tactic?
It’s also interesting to see what Alpecin&MVDP do along with Visma, as recently it seems like all teams are happy to go hard earlier to whittle down the peloton long before even Arenberg – will they do this with Pog in the race? You’d expect so as it’s been successful till now and they shouldn’t plan anything in the fear of losing to a newcomer who’s (vaguely) ill-suited to the parcours.
But I’ll be tuning in as early as possible because the kms between 150-100 have been great recently and feel like they might be important Sunday.
It will be interesting with Alpecin. Will they try stuff to soften up Pogacar or just back MvdP to beat him mano a mano. You’d definitely expect Visma and Lidl to try and work things with numbers.
You’d expect both Visma & Lidl would prefer a calmer race that allows them to either nab the sprint or have numbers and chances of sneaking away at the end? Failing that their tactics seem pretty simple: follow Pog & MVDP and hope to pip them in the sprint?
The only twist on that would be firing people up the road but I guess you always need to be careful if a teammate is needed to hand over a wheel/bike or ride a leader back to the pack.
I see Alpecin riding the exact same race as last year and trusting in Matthieu, with UAE helping them break up the race. MVDP just needs to trust his ability and not think about Pog till the business end.
Pog is the joker this weekend – if I were their DS I’d be putting forward a slightly mad plan of kicking off the festivities as early as possible in the hope repeated attacks might be his best bet over the final 120kms – and hoping that tactic also allowed Pog to be in a small group at the head of the race early where he could start to play it by ear, deciding whether he preferred to race aggressively or passively once he saw the damage his attacks were able to do.
(ie if he sees his megawatt legs weren’t dropping riders like in Strada/Flanders then dial it back and wait for a moment to slip away or go all in on the sprint)
I actually think it suits Visma & Trek to open up the race as early as possible. Unlike in Flanders and other hillier races, where they know their leaders can’t match Pogacar & MvdP on a red-line effort on the climbs, their leaders (WvA & Pedersen) are better suited to the drawn out efforts on the flat cobbles here, and so it’s in their interests to reduce the size of the front group and reduce risk of something going wrong…
I think Alpecin’s biggest problem could be managing the MvdP / Phillipsen dynamic…Phillipsen must be itching for a win in P-R after being so close the last couple of years, so we could see some subtle ‘in fighting’ between them!
I guess I don’t see why Visma nor Trek would do Alpecin & UAE’s work for them? Why break it up early and risk losing your secondary cards too soon?
If Alpecin hadn’t won with a 1-2 the last two years running maybe, but why help them if they’re the team you want to be dropping helpers the most?
Re Philipsen, not to disagree completely or sound boring, this is only my opinion – but all the evidence for this points in the opposite direction, he and MVDP seem to work extremely well together and know how they dovetail – MSR last year being the case in point – it’s seems to me that both MVDP&Philipsen are aware that by supporting each other they’re likely to win more in the long run than they are by busting the relationship through jealously. Philipsen needs MVDP committed for the Tour and if multiple green jersey’s mean he misses out on Roubaix then so be it, especially as he already has a Monument to show for sticking to the team rules?
There’s also his recent crash meaning this year he might not have the confidence to defy team rules should he be unable to cash any checks an attack on MVDP puts out.
He can definitely still win though, it’s just most sprinters tactics in these races are to play the long game anyway, so his best bet for winning either way would be to sit in the bunch and hope they bring back any lone attackers (MVDP or otherwise) which means it’s even less foreseeable that he has any reason to rock the apple cart?
I’m not suggesting Lidl or Visma pull. I’m suggesting they lmight want to play their cards in different moves. Why line Pedersen, Stuyven and Milan up behind MvdP and wait for him to pull their pants down? Make his team mates chase them, then ideally he’d have to chase them himself and, if all goes to plan, he will have used his matches before its time to light the fireworks. All theoretical of course.
You’ve pinpointed here why Pog is very unlikely to win, or go close. He needs climbs.
Although most races look like they’ve gone into a performance contest (as athletes who can deliver a superior performance like it better that way, and rightly so), still it could happen that the race is decided by some strictly tactical situation, somebody attacks hard, someone else has to counter, then what if a third man jumps then etc.
Plus luck, of course.
If there’s a Monument where you can see more often than elsewhere how the strongest ain’t necessarily win the day, that’s Roubaix. 9 out of the last 25 editions were won by an athlete who arguably wasn’t the strongest on that specific occasion…
A different question is how this all will apply to Pogi who’ll be looked at as being one of the very top favourites even if he might not be actually such.
As many already pointed out, the last winner under 70 kgs was Knaven nearly a quarter of a century back. Then Madiot before him ten further years back (both in a rainy muddy race).
But, of course, Pogacar’s got the absolute watts of a heavier rider, so…
However, as I was saying, Roubaix’s not just about getting the most from your qualities, it’s rather about getting the most from a given situation. Both are true for any race, but for this the latter holds even “truer”.
Daniel Friebe casting doubt on Madiot being under 70kgs on The Cycling Podcast
Yeah, logical (imaginin’ a range of weights for that physical type well around official 68-69 kgs, you tackle Roubaix on the heavier side of the bracket), but really matters very little. You got Hinault that same decade. And as we have Knaven later, it’s not like “you must be Hinault”, either. Anyway, very special, yes, but then one should check startlists, relative relationship between quality and weight in those startlists etc.