Bicycle Racing News and Opinion,
Sunday, March 31, 2024
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2023 Tour de France | 2023 Giro d'Italia
Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor. - James Baldwin
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Current racing:
- March 31: Ronde van Vlaanderen (Tour of Flanders)
Upcoming racing:
- April 1 - 6: Tour of the Basque Country/Vuelta Ciclista al Pais Vasco
- April 2 - 5: Region Pays de la Loire Tour
- April 3: Scheldeprijs
- April 7: Paris-Roubaix
Latest completed racing:
- March 30: Gran Premio Miguel Indurain
- March 30: Volta Limburg Classic
- March 29: Route Adélie de Vitré
- March 27: Dwars door Vlaanderen
- March 27: Paris-Camembert Lepetit
- March 18 - 24: Volta a Catalunya
- March 24: Ghent - Wevelgem
- March 24: La Roue Tourangelle
- March 19 - 23: Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali
- March 22: E3 Saxo Bank Classic
- March 20: Classic Brugge - De Panne
- March 16: Milano - Sanremo
- March 16: Classic Loire Atlantique
- March 15: Brendene Koksijde Classic
- March 14: GP de Denain
Here’s the team’s self-assessment:
Team Visma | Lease a Bike had a difficult but instructive day in the Volta NXT Classic. In the Limburg hills our guys missed the first battle for the breakaway group. After a strong chase, the team just failed to close the gap on the leaders. Tosh van der Sande finished as the first of the team in 20th place.
Timo Kielich was the winner in the finish city of Eijsden.
With 38 climbs and over 3000 meters altitude, the riders had a tough course in South Limburg. The race was hard from the start and there were a lot of attacks. Nine riders eventually managed to escape. The leaders had a two-minute lead and seemed to be caught by the peloton at 70 kilometers from the finish.
In the end, this did not happen. However, a group of six rode away, but unfortunately without any of our riders. As a result, the team had to sacrifice several riders to close the gap. Despite strong work from the youngsters, the leaders proved too strong and Belgian-Limburger Timo Kielich won the race. Van der Sande and Vermote finished in the peloton.
"What we performed today is unfortunately not reflected in the results. The guys rode really well today and as a team," sport director Sierk Jan de Haan looks back with satisfaction. "Even though we missed the breakaway of the day and just couldn't keep up with the counter-attackers, we kept showing initiative. Our Devo riders gave the best of themselves and that makes us happy," De Haan said.Team Visma | Lease a Bike sees this Volta NXT Classic as a great learning moment. "It is important that they dare to take initiative and make decisions during the race. And they learned from that today," De Haan concluded.
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Here’s the team’s post:
Racing in Spain returned on Saturday afternoon for the hilly GP Miguel Indurain, where Team dsm-firmenich Post NL took a strong result with Oscar Onley in third place.
With a variety of weather conditions in store for the riders as they rolled out of the starting area, the team began the day with the objective of looking after Oscar Onley, Warren Barguil and Gijs Leemreize until the final of the race. Doing so ably they stayed safe in the wet conditions and ensured the trio were in the dramatically reduced bunch with around 30 kilometres to go. From there the attacks started flying with Onley covering several moves and making some of his own, although he was always shut down by those behind. Over the top of the penultimate climb McNulty made a strong attack to go clear and build up a gap, while there was hesitation in the chasing group. A strong pull from Barguil saw the gap halved as they hit the final climb, before Van Gils attacked. Not following initially, Onley dug deep at his own pace and crested the climb in third place. Managing the tricky descent well, he almost caught back up to the leading duo but to no avail. Nevertheless, it was a strong showing from the team as they take third with Onley; a promising result in his return to racing.
Brandon McNulty wins the 2023 GP Miguel Indurain.
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Onley said: “The guys did a good job staying around myself and Warren today and making sure we were in position into every key point. I’m satisfied to pick up third after a long time away from the races but also know I was maybe capable of more if I’d ridden a bit differently. We can take this confidence into Itzulia next week though and hopefully come away with some more results there!”
Team dsm-firmenich PostNL coach Christian Guiberteau continued: “It was a nice race from the guys today and a good podium with Oscar in the end. It was a long, difficult day and then with the wind and rain it added some extra stress. All of the guys did all they could do to help Oscar and Warren who were our finishers today and get them into position for the final. It was an attacking and active end to the race with Oscar on the attack but he still then had enough left in the legs to get a podium. It is a good result for his confidence in his first race back after his crash, and overall it is nice for us all to get a podium here as we move towards Itzulia next week.”
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Here’s the team’s post:
Despite different fortunes at Dwars door Vlaanderen, both Lidl-Trek squads are heading into the first race of Holy Week as motivated as ever.
The team leaders give us their thoughts and expectations ahead of Ronde van Vlaanderen:
Mads Pedersen:
“To be honest, it’s a pain that we lost Jasper and Alex. If we take Alex as a helper first, he’s super important for the run-ins, for positioning and so on. He knows these roads so well. Of course we have Tim [Declercq], Otto [Vergaerde] and Eddie [Theuns] who are basically riding these roads every day, but one extra would have been nice. I’m also going to really miss Jasper and I think, as a team, we are going to miss the card that Jasper would have been sitting with. I feel really sorry for him too. He found the shape again and he showed really good signs for Flanders and he didn’t deserve to end on the floor with a broken collarbone neither did Wout [van Aert].
Mads Pedersen at the start of Dwars door Vlaanderen. Sirotti photo
“I don’t think it would smart of us though to completely change the way we are racing after Dwars door Vlaanderen. We are in a really good rhythm and we like to race like this as well so I think it would be wrong of us to just completely sit back. We are still going to make a plan and still going to do ‘our’ race and then, we will see how the body is reacting from my side.
“You are not healing in three days and the body won’t be perfect so, you know, I have to start the race in a different mindset to the one I would have had if I didn’t crash on Wednesday. I know that to win Flanders you have to be 100% and I have to be honest that I am not 100 percent right now, after a crash like this, but on the other hand, everything is also possible and if everything really plays out in my favor, it is still possible. It’s 50/50 which way it goes.”
Elisa Longo Borghini:
“I feel very good ahead of Flanders tomorrow. To say I am ‘super confident’ would be a little too much but I am just really happy that I can ride with such a strong team next to me. We showed in the previous races that we really are a team and when riding together, we can achieve great things so I am really looking forward to Flanders.
“This is something that we, unfortunately, couldn’t do last year and I wish people could really understand what we went through last year because many didn’t. This is our potential. Finally we are racing in a way that shows our full potential and, this could have been us last year too, but because of many injuries and sickness, we couldn’t do what we knew we were capable of. So, now, we are really just showing how strong we are, how strong we always have been, and how keen we are to make the race hard and to get the best out of every race.”
Shirin van Anrooij:
“I took a lot of confidence out of my second place at Dwars door Vlaanderen and, in fact, I think the whole team can be proud of how our Classics season has gone so far in 2024 but, we still want to achieve more. I think one of our strengths as Lidl-Trek is how we race together, we are really united and tomorrow will be no different. I am really looking forward to racing with this group of women.
“I did not feel the way I wanted to at Gent-Wevelgem but then, on Wednesday, I saw that my shape is there and, now, I just need to believe in it. Elisa [Longo Borghini] and me have been in a lot of finals together now and I think we will be there in Flanders again. With Lizzie, Lucinda, Lauretta and Barzi [Elisa Balsamo], we have proved in the past we can achieve results together and so, I hope we can play the game the way we want to at Tour of Flanders.
“Dwars door Vlaanderen was my first big podium in a Belgian race and it came after another perfect race from the Team. It was really cool to be able to race the way I did on Sunday, I didn’t get too stressed, I was able to just sit on which I normally would never do because I always just want to race and I think it was a signal that I have really made another step up this year.”
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