Bicycle Racing News and Opinion,
Tuesday, November 1, 2022
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2022 Tour de France | 2022 Giro d'Italia
Nature and nature's laws lay hid in the night. God said, "Let Newton be!" and all was light! - Alexander Pope
Les Woodland's book Cycling’s 50 Craziest Stories is available in print, Kindle eBook & audiobook versions. To get your copy, just click on the Amazon link on the right.
Current racing:
Upcoming racing
- Nov 5 & 6: European Cyclocross Championships
- Nov 20: Vlaamse Druivenveldrit Overijse Cross
- Dec 4: Scheldecross Antwerp
- Dec 10: Exact Cross Essen
- Dec 26: Gavere Cyclocross
- Dec 27: Heusden-Zolder Cyclocross
- Dec 29: Diegem Cyclocross
- Dec 30: Azencross-Loenhout
- Jan 1: GP Sven Nys Cyclocross
- Jan 14 - 22: Schwalbe Classic & Tour Down Under
- Jan 22 - 29: Vuelta a San Juan
- Jan 25 - 29: Challenge Illes Balears-Volta Ciclista a Mallorca
- Jan 28 & 29: Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race
Latest completed racing:
- Oct 29: Superprestige Ruddervoorde Cyclocross
- Oct 11 - 18: Tour de Langkawi
- Oct 16: Japan Cup
- Oct 16: Veneto Classic
- Oct 16: Chrono des Nations
- Oct 12: Giro del Veneto
Here’s the team’s annoucement
UAE Team Emirates are finalizing their 2023 roster with Michael Vink being one of the latest integrants incorporated into the Emirati squad for the upcoming season.
Vink was put on the radar of the team through the virtual cycling platform ‘My Whoosh’, which is a free app founded in the UAE and is designed as a training tool for cyclists of all levels. Through his strong results across a number of competitive races on Whoosh the team took note and further testing was done before it was arranged for him to join the squad for 2023.
Michael Vink
Prior to his ‘Whoosh’ fame, the 30-year old has had an established road career and tasted success with several National titles across different categories in his native New Zealand, most notably taking the national road race championships title in 2012 and the individual time trial title in 2015.
Mauro Gianetti (Team Principal & CEO): “We’re very pleased to welcome Michael into the team. While he has had some good results on the road before, we really became more aware of him through his performances on Whoosh. Throughout the year our riders use Whoosh as depending on the weather it’s not always possible or practical to train outside : in some of these races we began to see Michael’s name popping up at the top of the results and contact was made.
"Cycling is constantly evolving and new innovations like Whoosh, which we are proud to say is a platform founded in the UAE, are even helping us discover new riders which would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.”
Michael Vink: “I’m extremely grateful to be given this opportunity with UAE Team Emirates. To be asked to be a part of such a great team is truly humbling and is something I plan to take full advantage of. This is the start of a new chapter in my career and I can’t wait to see what I can do in the World Tour peloton.”
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Here’s the team’s update:
October has been the last month with racing for the 2022 season, but we wrapped it up with good results across all our programs.
The last chapter of the season opened with a strong team performance at the CRO Race. After a solid first two days with two top 10 finishes, the first stage set to shape the GC was on the menu. A hilly day, things came down to the final kick to the line, where the gravel roads guaranteed an exciting final. When the race kicked off, Development Team DSM rider Oscar Onley was the only rider who could challenge Tour de France winner Vingegaard for the stage win. He came short by just a few centimetres, but jumped on the provisional GC podium and took over the lead in the mountain classification. It was the queen stage that shaped the final GC and after a day full of climbing, a small group of favourites stayed clear including Team DSM’s Chris Hamilton and Oscar Onley. Both showed amazing fighting spirit, trying to jump away from their opponents several times, and following their attacks. In the end, it all came down to a battle at the line where Oscar came close to the win and took his second podium of the week and secured an impressive third place in GC and the youth classification, with Chris Hamilton rounding off the strong team performance with 9th overall.
Our Women’s program took to the start line for the season’s last one day race at Binche Chimay Binche and on the selective parcours, the team stayed on top of things, bringing a reduced group to the local laps. On the final kilometre, Pfeiffer Georgi did a massive pull to bring European Champion Lorena Wiebes to the front, causing splits in the bunch and ensuring that only a small group fought for the win. Lorena launched her sprint at the right moment and brought home her 23rd and last win of the season for the team.
2022 Il Lombardia: Romain Bardet can be seen behind sixth-place Alejandro Valverde. Sirotti photo
Back to the last of the men’s one day races, Casper van Uden and Romain Bardet brought home two more top 10 results, at the Münsterland Giro and Il Lombardia respectively, making it a successful last period of racing for the program.
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The first edition of the Tour de Romandie Féminin concluded the Women’s WorldTour racing with three challenging days of racing. On the opening day, Liane Lippert got things off to a flying start as she sprinted to a strong second place in a reduced bunch sprint. Day two saw the peloton take on the long climb of Thyon 2000, where Liane followed the best until deep in the final, finishing in 4th place, with teammate Juliette Labous in 10th. Liane finished the race 4th in GC and Juliette rounded up the team’s strong performance in 9th. In addition, Elise Uijen won the mountains jersey and Liane the best young rider; the icing on the cake after a great last race of the season.
Tobias Lund Andresen rounded off the Development program’s season at Paris-Tours Espoirs with a solid 9th, his last race before his promotion to the WorldTour program from 2023.
With one race win, several classifications and jerseys and 10 more top 10s, it was a successful last chapter of 2022 for the whole team. Now off-season is calling for the riders, 2023 preps are already in full swing for our staff back at HQ. We had a great 2023 kick off with all riders and staff last week where we already started to get to know each other. With that motivation in mind we are already looking forward to seeing what the new year brings!
We hope that you all enjoy the off season, don’t miss the racing too much! We’ll be back out on the road soon!
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Bicycle Retailer & Industry News posted this report:
OSAKA, Japan (BRAIN) — Shimano said “strong interest” by consumers in bicycles shows signs of cooling down, but demand is still higher than it was prior to COVID-19.
In its third fiscal quarter financial summary, the component giant said market inventories are low for high-end bikes, although demand for those bikes is high. It said demand for lower priced bikes has cooled, and didn’t remark on inventory levels for those bikes.
Shimano noted that in Europe there are shortages of some high-end bikes and e-bikes, but otherwise inventory levels were approaching appropriate levels.
In the first three quarters of the year, sales of bike components increased 20.6% from the same period last year, to 384,654 million yen ($2.59 billion). Operating income increased 21.6% to 109,119 million yen. Quarter over quarter, third-quarter sales were up 25.7% over the same quarter last year. Shimano’s second- and third-quarter figures exclude Dash America (the parent of Pearl Izumi), which it sold to United Sports Brands in May.
You can read the entire story here.
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