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Friday, April 25, 2025
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2024 Tour de France | 2024 Giro d'Italia
An arrogant person considers himself perfect. This is the chief harm of arrogance. It interferes with a person's main task in life - becoming a better person. - Leo Tolstoy
Bill McGann’s book Why Your Bike Is Made in Asia: My career in bicycles as I watched two continents squander an industry is available in print, Kindle eBook & Audiobook versions. To get your copy, just click on the Amazon link on the right.
Current racing:
- April 21 - 25: Tour of the Alps
- April 24 - 27: Vuelta Asturias
Upcoming racing:
- April 27: Liège-Bastogne-Liège
- April 27 - May 4: Tour of Turkey
- April 29 - May 4: Tour de Romandie
- May 1: Rund um den Finanzplaz Eschborn-Frankfurt
- May 9 - June 1: Giro d'Italia
Latest completed racing:
- April 23: La Flèche Wallonne
- April 20: Amstel Gold Race
- April 20: Tour du Doubs
- April 15 - 18: Giro d'Abruzzo
- April 18: De Brabantse Pijl
- April 12-13: Paris-Roubaix
- April 7 - 12: Vuelta Ciclista al Pais Vasco
- April 8 - 11: Region Pays de la Loire Tour
- April 9: Scheldeprijs
- April 6: Ronde van Vlaanderen
We posted the report from stage winner Thymen Arensman’s Team INEOS Grenadiers with the results.
Here’s the report from Team Picnic-PostNL:
The fourth and penultimate stage of the Tour of the Alps took the peloton from Italy into Austria under harsh weather conditions. Torrential rain and a relentless pace from the very start made it a particularly tough day in the saddle, quickly resulting in a heavily reduced bunch. Thymen Arensman launched a solo move and rode strongly to the stage win. Max Poole spent a good portion of the day in a chasing group, with Romain Bardet riding just behind in a steadily thinning group of favourites.
In the lead-up to the final climb, Poole and Bardet regrouped in the same chase. With one climb and 13 kilometres to go, they were part of a select group of eleven riders in pursuit. On the last ascent of the day, that group split, and it was Poole who crossed the line first for Team Picnic PostNL in seventh place. Bardet followed just a few seconds later to take ninth. With just one stage remaining, Bardet and Poole sit seventh and eighth respectively in the general classification, with Poole also taking the lead in the young rider’s classification.
Thymen Arensman wins stage four.
After the finish, Poole reflected on the day’s stage: “It was a super tough stage today with the weather and the way the race was ridden. There was quite a battle for the break, and although a group eventually went clear, it was brought back pretty quickly once the pace really picked up. From there, it was pretty much just the group of favourites all day, with Romain and me trying to manage the race.
With around 60 kilometres to go, I followed a few moves to try and bridge across to the front, but unfortunately it wasn’t the right combination. After that, I ended up riding alone through the valley before hitting the two steep climbs. There I managed to survive and come over with Romain in a small group and then we did the best we could to fight to the line. Tomorrow will be another hard day so we’ll give a good go again!”
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Here's the Tour of the Alps stage four report from second-place Derek Gee's Team Israel-Premier Tech:
Inspired by his teammate Marco Frigo’s solo victory yesterday, Derek Gee went all in under the pouring rain on stage 4 of the Tour of the Alps. In the end, Gee had to settle for second place on the day, but he is now third in the general classification.
“I’m really happy with how my legs are progressing throughout this race. It took me a few days to get into it, but I’m feeling better every day,” Gee said after the finish line.
The peloton part way into stage four.
The wet and cold weather conditions, combined with several challenging climbs, made for an extremely hard day on the bike for the riders. With about 80 km to go, Thymen Arensman (INEOS) went solo, and shortly after, Gee took off as well in pursuit of the Dutchman.
“The weather was miserable all day, and the race exploded really early on with groups everywhere. Luckily, I managed to get up the road and give it a good shot.”
“However, he [Arensman] was on a great day. I came close—only 25 seconds—and he was right in front of me on the steep climb, but I just couldn’t close that last little bit. Then my legs went out with about 10 km to go,” Gee explained.
The 27-year-old Canadian managed to hold on to second place, which saw him jump to third overall, one minute ahead of his nearest podium rival.
Tomorrow, the Tour of the Alps finishes with yet another hard day in the mountains. Nothing is settled until the riders cross the finish line in Lienz.
“It’s going to be super hard, but if my legs keep going like this, I think tomorrow might be okay. But it’s really going to be in pieces,” Gee said before heading into the bus to start his recovery after an excruciating day in the saddle
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Here’s the update for Vingegaard’s Team Visma | Lease a Bike:
Jonas Vingegaard has begun his preparation for his main goal: the Tour de France. The planned schedule leading up to the Tour, including altitude training camps and the Critérium du Dauphiné, remains unchanged.
The specific build-up to the Tour de France for Jonas started this week with a wind tunnel test in Aalborg, Denmark. Soon, the Danish rider from Team Visma | Lease a Bike will head to Sierra Nevada for high-altitude training with the team. This will be followed by the Critérium du Dauphiné. After that race, there will be another altitude training camp in Tignes as the final preparation for the big goal in France.
Jonas Vingegaard before this year's Paris-Nice stage four. Sirotti photo
During this year’s Tour de France, Jonas and the other Team Visma | Lease a Bike riders will wear a special edition kit, which will be officially unveiled on April 25.
Jonas: “This week I was working in the wind tunnel in Aalborg. We made preparations for the Tour de France there, specifically focusing on my position on the bike. It’s important to work on that and to leave nothing to chance.”
Physically, everything is back to normal for Jonas: “The focus is now fully on the Tour de France. The preparations for this race have truly begun. I no longer have any issues from the concussion I sustained earlier, or any other physical problems. It was really unfortunate that I couldn’t finish Paris-Nice and also had to miss the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya. But now I’m training without any problems and will soon head to the altitude camp.”
“I’m really looking forward to racing again. I haven’t raced much this past year, so I’m eager to get started again. That goes for both the Critérium du Dauphiné and, of course, the Tour de France. But first, I’ll go to altitude training to get in shape. After that, I’ll try to win those races.”
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Here’s the team’s news:
The oldest Monument in the world, created in 1892, is set to run another episode this weekend, when a relentless up-and-down parcours venturing into the heart of the Ardennes will await the peloton. This year’s Liège-Bastogne-Liège – the 111th in history – consists of eleven climbs, making for an elevation gain of almost 4400 meters, which are sure to test the riders vying for a good result at the end of Sunday’s 252 kilometers.
Côte de la Redoute, Côte des Forges and Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons, all of them featuring some nasty double-digit gradients, are the final three climbs of “La Doyenne”, stacked inside the last 36 kilometers, and this combination promises to be again decisive in the outcome.
Victorious in Liège-Bastogne-Liège in back-to-back years, Remco Evenepoel headlines Soudal Quick-Step’s squad for the fourth Monument of the season. The double Olympic Champion, who missed last year’s race due to injury, will be joined by Gil Gelders, Maximilian Schachmann – third at the 2019 edition – Pieter Serry, Ilan Van Wilder, Mauri Vansevenant, and Louis Vervaeke.
Remco Evenpoel winning the 2023 Liège-Bastogne-Liège. Sirotti photo
“We have so many beautiful memories from this race and we hope to create some more on Sunday, but we know it will be difficult, because at the end of the day it’s a Monument, and one with a very hard course. The team that will be at the start is a strong one and goes there with plenty of motivation and a strong morale after our most recent results in the Ardennes. This makes us really confident we can fight for a good result”, said sports director Klaas Lodewyck.
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