After 260km a large group of riders started the final climb of the Cauberg together. The Italians set the pace but Philippe Gilbert accelerates and nobody can match him. His eyes are fixed the road ahead whilst behind Edvald Boasson Hagen hunches low on his bike and Alexandr Kolobnev cannot follow. Gilbert reaches the top of the Cauberg first and, aided by a tailwind, speeds at 6okm/h to win solo. This was the moment the race was won.
The Cauberg climb is not long nor steep. Instead it is repetition that multiplies this small hill into something significant and when coupled with the Bemelerberg we have a tough finishing circuit will help select the 2012 world champion.
Philippe Gilbert and Peter Sagan are the obvious picks but neither offer convincing certainty and so this is an open race with many contenders that could become highly tactical in the final hour.
Here’s a preview of the course, the contenders, the weather, TV times and more.
It’s that time of year when the UCI publishes its accounts for the past year after approval at the UCI’s annual congress. Now we can see what happened during 2011 and if accounting is boring, often the money isn’t.
Here’s a quick take but we will probably need to re-read the full report a few times to understand the finances in full.
Ahead of a full race preview, a short note to explain the new communications system being used by the Dutch team for Sunday’s road race.
With race radios banned for the worlds, the Dutch will use telecoms and roadside matrix display boards to give unique tactical advice to their riders.
With a lull in the world championships allowing the inhabitants of Valkenburg a chance to drive to the supermarket, the next two days see the UCI getting down to official business including the announcement of the 2013 calendar as well as some potential structural changes to the sport, like a salary cap.
As well as the governing body there is also news about next year from Cannondale and the Giro d’Italia which announces a visit to France for a mountain stage with a difference. There is also the guarantee of additional doping headlines in 2013 as the dates for the trial of Spain’s Operation Puerto have just been set.
And I’ve also got an exclusive update on the plans for a breakaway league. Here’s a peek into 2013.
With many of the world’s best time trial riders not here, today’s field of 58 riders might lack some obvious picks but there are still plenty of contenders, if not for the rainbow jersey then for a medal. The race should be a battle between Germany’s Tony Martin and Spain’s Alberto Contador but the course is deceptively hard and a surprise is possible, especially with changeable weather forecast.
Here’s a look at the contenders, the course, TV listing times and a full startlist too.
Vélo by Paul Fournel
Remember those action films where someone would get poisoned and only a special serum could cure them? Our ailing hero would be close to death but the antidote always arrived just in time.
Following pro cycling can leave many feeling sick thanks to unredeemable controversy and scandal; although this can be part of the intrigue too. Still this should be a beautiful sport that uses a bicycle to turns farm tracks into paths to glory and exploits mountain ranges as arenas. In truth there are still lots of good stories but they’re being drowned out by the poison of the past.
There’s no magic remedy to these problems but you can find escapism. The easiest escape route is a ride, the simple pleasure of pedalling can often remind you that cycling isn’t about someone else’s race. Indeed this is what Fournel’s book is about and over the pages we get a series of short essays and vignettes that cover cycling and many of the related experiences, from click-clacking in cleated shoes to the pleasure of aching legs.
Norway’s Oskar Svendsen is the new junior time trial world champion. Who knows what the future holds for him now but it seems he could well become a force to be reckoned with in the senior ranks in the years to come.
Why? Because it turns out the time trial is a good measure of talent. This might seem obvious yet the road race is a very different story where past winners have flourished, proved mediocre or vanished into cycling obscurity despite the glory of a rainbow jersey.
Here’s a look at the correlation between junior performance and adult success in the time trial and road race. Plus what this means for today’s gold medallist Oskar Svendsen, who isn’t just the world time trial champion, apparently he has the world record for the highest VO2 Max ever recorded.
It was a close contest for the men and women. Look at the faces of the victorious Omega Pharma-Quickstep team as the picture says plenty although maybe the €100,000 prize pot had something to do with it (the women got a more modest €30,000).
In a brief “the moment the race was won” analysis, when BMC went up the Cauberg we saw gaps start to appear as Tejay van Garderen surged ahead and the others, notably Alessandro Ballan and Taylor Phinney, were in trouble and had to regroup. The extra effort, the briefest confusion and then the acceleration was probably worth more than three seconds, the margin of victory on the day.
Past editions, personal experience and even legends from yesteryear combine to help form your thoughts about a race. But since this is the first time we’ve had a team time trial in the world championships, at least in this format, it is going to be a new experience.
Yet for all the novelty and the 40 teams racing, this will be a race that should be decided between just a few squads.