all words by Mike Franchetti
I don’t need to tell you about Paris-Roubaix’s history, brutality or several nicknames. And this is neither the time nor the place to explore the ‘Flanders vs. Roubaix’ argument (Roubaix wins). Instead, here’s my picks for a very open 2019 edition, featuring a favourite offering very little value and a possible changing of the guard.
The keen ones among us – or perhaps the stubbornly logical – will state that each new cycling season starts with Australia in January. The purists boast Omloop as the rightful curtain raiser, and some casuals might not feel at home until flicking through Cycling Weekly to see who won Paris-Nice. However, a small diehard
The Grand Tours keep coming. I can’t remember a season where the gap between the Giro and the Vuelta felt so quick. The Vuelta holds no surprises. The route is spiky and comes to a head in the final week. The field is packed with a mixture of big name GC riders seeking redemption and
The Tour de France starts this weekend. The route is interesting and the start-list is stacked. Here are my predictions for the race; most of them are realistic…
Simon Yates is absolutely flying. He’s clearly ahead in the GC, and clearly the best climber at this year’s Giro. Whilst he’s dancing a perfect ten, his closest rivals are trudging round the dancefloor at an ugly tempo. Unfortunately for Yates, there’s a time trial to come before three monster mountain stages bring the race
De Brabantse Pijl is cool race. It’s a date to look out for on the calendar and an event I’d one day like to watch live. Starting in Leuven, Brabant, the race is another under the Flanders umbrella. However, it doesn’t feel much like its cobbled siblings – taking place a full 10 days after
At the end of 2015 I wrote about the struggles of being a Vincenzo Nibali fan. I had watched him become a star, watched him throw a bottle at Chris Froome, watched him catch a ride from his team car to earn disqualification from the Vuelta, and then watched as he claimed an angry Lombardia
The best race you (might) not have been watching returns on Thursday, for ‘just’ its 98th edition. The first race was actually held in 1876 which means it’s older than Swan Lake, Tomato Ketchup and even the Gramophone. Some sources state the modern bicycle wasn’t even invented until 1885 – what were the ten original
Just Pro Cycling 