Tag: Vincenzo Nibali

Milan-San Remo 2016: Why So Much Drama?

Shortly after the start of each Milan-San Remo fans will glance at the race profile and remember there’s well over 250km of Italian tarmac for the riders to cover. Save for the gentle Passo Del Truchino, the opening two thirds are traditionally flat and this makes the race differ from the other four, more challenging,

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Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico

For the last few years March’s stage racing action has been my favourite outside the Grand Tours. The overlapping races of France and Italy attract everybody who’s anybody (almost) and act as preparation for the classics, the Giro or even the Tour. However, Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico are so much more than mere preparation. Tirreno-Adriatico has developed

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Happy at Home

With Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico marking the return of the World Tour, I’ve been looking into which riders have been racking up stage victories since the turn of the decade. What started as a rummage through http://www.procyclingstats.com ended up as a fixation on answering the question – which races have the greatest number of ‘home’ wins?

Vincenzo Nibali: King of Lombardia and Shark of Pro Cycling

Last Sunday in Lombardia Vincenzo Nibali dashed away on the descent of the Civiglio and soloed to his first Monument win. In doing so, he became the first multiple Grand Tour winner since Laurent Fignon (1989) to add a Monument to their Palmares. There was a strange inevitability to it all. Nibali had been in

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Chasing the Rainbow

With a list of winners including Tom Boonen, Paolo Bettini, Cadel Evans, Mark Cavendish and Rui Costa, the World Championship Road Race is successful at sharing out the title of the ‘World’s Best’ across a number of different rider types. In very few other one day races could Vincenzo Nibali and Elia Viviani be considered

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Tour de France 2015: A Froome with a View

Yesterday Chris Froome won his second Tour de France becoming the 20th rider in history to take more than one title. The race leader since Stage 7, Froome was rarely troubled until things took a difficult turn when the race reached the Alps. The only man with any chance was Nairo Quintana and his measured

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Tour Talk: Rest Day 2

Fireworks were expected for the second week of the Tour but after Chris Froome lit up the field on the Col de Soudet seven days ago it’s all got a little cagey. Froome’s attack on the Soudet, a summit finish but the first and only climb of the day, blew away the field with next-best

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Tour de France 2015: The Big Preview

With July comes cycling’s most celebrated race; the Tour de France. The three-week race has now reached its 102nd edition but is continuing to grow in popularity. The jerseys are the most iconic, the stories the most told and the prize the most prestigious. This year’s race  can boast a seriously impressive start list, with

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