all words by Mike Franchetti
In an Olympic year, the most awkwardly placed race on the pro calendar gets a little more awkward. This isn’t necessarily a problem; San Sebastián is well-equipped to attract a smorgasbord of riders with fresh legs, tired legs, and quite possibly oh-dear-what-happened-to-my-legs. But do you really want to have thousands of Tour miles in
On Sunday we’ll once again wave hello to the Old Lady of the calendar, now back in her usual springtime slot. The frustrating thing about Liege is that it promises so much but can fail to deliver any big moments. I’ve heard riders comment on how hard the race is, far harder than its meagre
The 2020 pro cycling season could be filled with real change. The backdrop of the sport shifted noticeably in 2019 with plenty of riders making the jump from the junior ranks, and the merry-go-round of team leaders clunking into gear during contract season. We got three debut Grand Tour winners in 2019; a feat which
Julian Alaphilippe was never supposed to be the saviour of French stage racing. He is destined to wear Rainbow stripes, dominate the Mur, and stack up an enviable Monument record, perhaps even completing an unprecedented full set. It was last year that we realised just how good he was at riding uphill fast and outfoxing
La Fleche Wallonne is potentially great, potentially boring, and potentially rubbish. The conclusion to last year’s race was brilliant as we saw master (Valverde) and apprentice (Alaphilippe) duke it out on the Mur and a phenomenal underdog victory. The ‘apprentice’ now returns at an ugly short price (8/11) and I find it hard to back
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
I spent most of Tuesday night messaging people to tell them why I thought Julian Alaphilippe was going to upset the status quo and defeat Alejandro Valverde on the Mur de Huy. A lot of my points were based on blind faith and I attempted to swat away Valverde’s obvious threat by repeating line like
It was all relatively calm… and then Peter Sagan went ballistic. If the Slovakian’s attack on the Poggio was eyebrow-raising then Michal Kwiatkowski’s stealthy, slipstreamed sprint on the Via Roma was jaw-dropping.
Just Pro Cycling 