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Monday, June 17, 2024

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2023 Tour de France | 2024 Giro d'Italia

Now that I'm gone, I tell you, don't smoke. - Yul Brynner

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Bill and Carol McGann's book The Story of the Giro d'Italia, A Year-by-Year History of the Tour of Italy, Vol 1: 1909 - 1970 is available in print, Kindle eBook & audiobook versions. To get your copy, just click on the Amazon link on the right.

Upcoming racing:

• June 15 - 18: La Route d'Occitanie Cancelled because security forces busy with Olympics
• June 21 - 26: Many National Championships
• July 1 - 23: Tour de France
• July 27 - August 11: Olympic cycling

Latest completed racing:

• June 9 - 16: Tour de Suisse
• June 12 - 16: Baloise Belgium Tour
• June 2 - 9: Critérium du Dauphiné
• June 5 - 9: ZLM Tour
• June 7: GP Canton Aargau
• June 2: Brussels Cycling Classic
• May 29: Circuit Franco-Belge
• May 4 - 26: Giro d'Italia
• May 23 - 26: Tour of Norway
• May 26: Rund um Köln

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Tour de Suisse stage eight team reports

We posted the report from the race organizer with the results.

Here's the report from race winner Adam Yates' UAE Team Emirates:

UAE Team Emirates sealed another major victory in their 2024 campaign with Adam Yates taking the overall crown ahead of his teammate Joao Almeida on the final day of the Tour de Suisse.

Adam Yates wins the 2024 Tour de Suisse. Sirotti photo

Almeida was victorious on the final uphill TT stage from Aigle to Villars-sur-Ollon (15.7km), clocking a time of 23’33”, narrowly beating Yates by 8”. The win marks the 43rd triumph of the season for the Emirati team.

Almeida: “I’m really happy with the time trial stage victory, I think my first TT victory except nationals so that’s pretty good. At the start of the day, I knew it was quite impossible to win the GC against Adam. He’s quite strong and it’s not a flat TT so I’m super happy with the win and the second place behind him. We did a perfect team work so it was a great week.”

The result leaves the team in good stead ahead of the upcoming Tour de France where both Yates and Almeida are set to play crucial roles.

Yates: “It’s definitely up there with my biggest wins. About two days to go, I wasn’t sure if I could do it. Obviously, I had the two time checks with João in front of me and I knew he was going to accelerate a little bit there in the end. Actually, I just couldn’t accelerate, I was already over the limit so I just tried to hold the pace and thankfully it was enough.

"I’m still out of breath because it was such a hard climb but one thing I had in the back of my mind for a while was the 2019 Tirreno-Adriatico where I lost the TT on the last day by one second and this had lived rent-free in my head for many years so it’s finally good to win a race and win it with a TT like this. To win any big bike race is a big privilege and to share the podium with Joao as well, he’s a special teammate.”

Here's the report from fourth-place Matthew Riccitello's Team Israel-Premier Tech:

Matthew Riccitello capped off one of the most successful fortnights in Israel – Premier Tech history on Sunday by finishing fifth overall at the Tour de Suisse.

Labelled the “revelation” of the race by French newspaper L’Équipe, Riccitello placed fourth in today’s 15.7-kilometer mountain time trial.

Matthew Riccitello on his way to fourth place in the stage. Sirotti photo

So good was his ride today that the American came within 19 seconds of Egan Bernal and fourth place on GC, having started the day 1:11 behind the 2019 Tour de France winner

Riccitello’s performance at Suisse follows Derek Gee’s stage win and podium finish at the Critérium du Dauphiné at the start of June, and IPT Academy rider Pau Marti finishing third in the prestigious Giro Next Gen under-23 race earlier today.

“It was a good ride and overall I’m happy with how the week went,” he says. ”I’ve dreamed about racing with the top guys like this so the last few days have been really cool. It gives me a lot of motivation and now I’m looking forward to the rest of the season.”

British rider Stevie Williams briefly held the fastest time for the stage, while George Bennett finished 17th overall.

Here's the report from Egan Bernal's & Tom Pidcock's Team INEOS Grenadiers:

Egan Bernal finished the Tour de Suisse in fourth overall, with Tom Pidcock close behind in sixth, after a tough mountain TT to round out eight days of racing.

Tom set the provisional fastest time at the intermediate and final time check, with his effort enough to overhaul the deficit to sixth. Egan suffered on the unrelenting slopes of the climb to Villars-sur-Ollon, slipping down the standings to finish ninth on the day, and losing his podium position by just 10 seconds.

Tom Pidcock was fifth in the stage. Sirotti photo

The Tour of Slovenia also concluded today, with Cam Wurf getting in the breakaway on the final stage to Novo Mesto. He would later drop back to help Connor Swift and Jhonatan Narvaez pull back a dangerous move. Onto the final climb, and Narvaez would close the remainder of the gap himself, before a hectic descent saw him break clear with a handful of other riders. Unfortunately, the move was caught at about one kilometre from the line, with Ben Healy (EFE) taking the stage.

Here's the Tour de Suisse stage eight report from sixth-place Lenny Martinez's Team Groupama-FDJ:

This Sunday, Lenny Martinez eventually left Switzerland on a good note. The day after a real “bad day”, which cost him a good ranking overall, the young French climber bounced back in style on the closing climbing time trial of the Tour de Suisse. Over the 15.7 kilometers from Aigle to Villars-sur-Ollon, he showed all his abilities and obtained sixth place, among all the favorites. Joao Almeida won the stage, Adam Yates the overall.

Lenny Martinez riding to sixth place. Sirotti photo

Villars-sur-Ollon. It was again the destination on the Tour de Suisse today. In the aftermath of the queen stage around the Swiss city, the latter was also the finish of the final time trial of the race. A time trial mainly uphill from Aigle. “It was a nice time trial with a flat first part of 4.8 km,” explained Nicolas Boisson. “There was then a slight uphill section of 1500 metres, and then the climb they did yesterday, meaning nine kilometers at 8%. There were different possible strategies; to go 100% with the time trial bike, which we did with Sam and Stefan, in anticipation of the upcoming championships; three riders did it entirely on the road bike because they didn’t really have an objective; For Rudy and Lenny, the idea was not to lose too much time on the first part, with the time trial bike, then to make the change to finish with a lighter and more comfortable bike.”

Starting at 3:09 p.m., Stefan Küng was logically unable to fight for victory. “We put him in a situation like it was a flat time trial, and that obviously penalized him,” said Nicolas. “We knew he wasn’t going to win anyway, so we might as well use that day to work towards the national championship and the Olympic Games.”
Lenny Martinez, on the other hand, made a sensation half an hour later. In the lead after seven kilometres of climbing, he then beat the best mark, held by Damiano Caruso, by almost a minute at the summit. The young Frenchman kept the “hot seat” for a while before he had to give it away to the race’s favourites. Five of them, including the first three overall, beat him.

“I’m happy with my day,” said the young man. “I took a good pace and told myself that I was going to give it my all at the end. I felt like I had great legs, that’s nice. It’s weird, I felt good every other day this week. I don’t know how to explain it. The human body is sometimes strange. At least I could have some fun to finish this Tour de Suisse in style. Even if I’m a little disappointed with the overall result, I’m happy with my performance today.” “The idea was to remotivate him after yesterday, which was a very hard day,” added his coach, Nicolas Boisson. “The initial plan of this Tour de Suisse was to get close to the top-5 overall. He was fifth on Friday, and sixth today. I think that’s his real level, but we didn’t see the Lenny we all know on this Tour de Suisse. He has already performed very well since the start of the season, this is his first under-performance of the year. It happens, and we will work for it not to happen again.”

Despite his excellent performance on Sunday, Lenny Martinez was only able to move up to 32nd position overall, considering the amount of time lost on Saturday. “It’s been up and down,” confirmed Thierry. “Without his bad day, he could have done something nice in the overall, in line with his start to the season. His fifth place and his time trial remain great satisfactions. Apart from that, we saw Stefan get better every day, and that is the most important thing for the next goals. Sam also confirmed his skills in the prologue discipline, but it was a mixed Tour de Suisse overall.”

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