Tag: Spring Classics

Opening Weekend Notebook: Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne

On By Spencer MartinIn CyclingLeave a comment

Professional road racing has been on since January, but Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne mark the true opening of “real” road racing. These back-to-back races give us a first look at the spring classics contenders and see who is on-form, who is out of shape and who might be a little fit a little too early.

Saturday’s Omloop is the harder race and better judge of things to come, while Kuurne tends to be one for the sprinters. While the route was modified this year to increase the difficulty, we still saw a large group go to the line together.

The Winners: Jasper Stuyven (Trek) at Omloop and Kasper Asgreen (Deceuninck – Quick Step) at Kuurne. Both bagged the biggest wins of their careers this weekend with impressive performances.

Stuyven, 27, has been highly touted as a classics contender since he was at Bontrager Livestrong team way back in 2012, but he has struggled to convert this potential in actual results. We thought he had finally arrived when he won Kuurne with an impressive solo move back in 2016, but the next step never arrived. He looked incredibly strong and like a true classics star with his commanding performance on Saturday and even came back to finish 5th on Sunday at Kuurne, so don’t be surprised to see him on the podium next month at Flanders and/or Roubaix. One things to note, nobody has even won Omloop and Flanders in the same season, so its possible Stuyven is peaking too soon.

Asgreen, 25, displayed his massive talent when he finished second at the 2019 Tour of Flanders and bagged a third overall at the Tour of California later in the spring. His win on Sunday at Kuurne was ridiculously impressive, as he single-handedly turned a sprinters classics into an exhibition of his solo power. The Dane rode across the early breakaway with 28km remaining and then proceeded to ride them off his wheel one by one. His gap only maxed out at roughly 34 seconds with 20km remaining and was whittled down to 15 seconds with 6km to go. Despite this measly gap and large chasing group behind, he amazingly held on for a solo victory.

The win showed two big things, Asgreen’s massive potential and Deceuninck – Quick Step’s uncanny ability to turn near-misses into victories in the following race. After getting Yves Lampaert into the winning move only to be outsprinted by Stuyven on Saturday, they played the field perfectly on Sunday, with Fabio Jakobsen and his QS leadout sitting in the chasing group while Asgreen forced the rest of the teams to chase.

The Losers: While Deceuninck-Quick Step sent a rider up the road while their sprinter sat comfortably in the bunch at Kuurne, Sunweb and Lotto-Soudal did the majority of the work to chase Asgreen down. When the sprint finish came, their best results were John Degenkolb (Lotto) 18th and Cees Bol (Sunweb) 33rd. Giacomo Nizzolo (NTT) and Alexander Kristoff (UAE) went 1-2 in the bunch sprint and rounded off the podium thanks to this work (also, count these guys as mini-winners from the weekend). As the spring rolls on, Sunweb and Lotto might want to think about getting more creative and aggressive with their tactics and not pulling the race back together so their sub-par sprinters can fail to get results.

CCC got Matteo Trentin into the winning break on Saturday at Omloop, only to see him dropped on the Muur van Geraardsbergen. While it’s still early and we don’t want to read too much into these performances, it could be tough for Greg van Avermaet to trust his new co-leader later in the spring when he can’t trust him to not break the first rule of bike racing (don’t get dropped from the breakaway).

Should We Worry?: Last year’s Paris-Roubaix runner-up, Nils Politt, was minutes off the back at Omloop. You don’t want to peak too soon but it can be tough to make up for a complete lack of form in four weeks.

Current World Road Race Champion Mads Pedersen was close to ten minutes off the back at Omloop.

Sep Vanmarcke, Tim Wellens, Bob Jungels, and Niki Terpstra all failed to stay in the main chase group at Omloop.

Who to Keep an eye on: Philippe Gilbert was invisible on Saturday at Omloop, but the defending Roubaix champion had a secretly great race. He was minutes off the back at one point, only to claw his way back into the peloton and finished in the top ten. Gilbert appears to be in great form for the upcoming Milan San Remo (if it happens).

Wout van Aert looked like the strongest rider in the race at Omloop, but the Dutchman did too much too early and missed the winning move. The same thing plagued him at last year’s Tour of Flanders and he will have to start playing the waiting game more if he wants to convert a big one-day win.

Heinrich Haussler turned back the clock to 2010 and looked fantastic at both races. Watch for him to make a mark at Flanders or Roubaix.

Stefan Kung finished top ten at Omloop. After last year’s 3rd place at the World Road Race Championships, he is emerging an incredibly solid one-day rider.

Causation or Correlation: Does Rider Height Matter at Paris-Roubaix?

On By Spencer MartinIn CyclingLeave a comment

Now that we find ourselves firmly in cycling’s “holy week” (defined as the start of the Tour of Flanders and the finish of Paris-Roubaix), it is time to take stock of the usual contenders and see who has the best chance of winning Paris-Roubaix this Sunday.

Predicting Paris-Roubaix is always difficult. While the strongest rider almost always wins Flanders, Roubaix has the unique ability to serve up wildcard winners like Johan Vansummeren in 2011 and Matt Hayman in 2016. While this can make predictions difficult, there is a common thread through most Roubaix winners. They are almost all over 6-feet (1.83 meters) in height.

Since 1999, 14 editions of Roubaix (73%) have been won by a rider over 6-feet tall, with only 2 winners under 5 feet 11 inches. Compare this to the Tour of Flanders, which, in the same timeframe, has seen 11 editions won by riders over 6-feet tall, with 6 editions being won by riders under 5”11. 

The difference is even starker when we pull out this comparison to every Monument. Milan-Sanremo has only seen 4 editions won by a rider over 6-feet since 1999, Liege-Bastogne-Liege 3, and the Tour of Lombardy with only 2 (note: these 2 editions were won by the same riders, Phillipe Gilbert).

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(These numbers are obviously nuanced and complicated due to factors like repeat winners and potentially inaccurate rider height data and should be taken with a grain of salt.)

A factor for taller riders triumphing at Roubaix is that it features the least amount of climbing of any major race, and taller riders tend to be heavier than shorter riders.

This extra weight not only makes it difficult to get up and over climbing-heavy courses but also helps when dealing with the constant punishment dished out by the cobblestone roads. A slightly-built rider like Michał Kwiatkowski is always going to have difficulty managing the rough, 6+ hour ride over the Napoleonic roads of Roubaix.

However, if weight was the only factor, one would think there would be heavy riders under 6-feet winning the Queen of the Classics.

This leads me to wonder if there something about Paris-Roubaix that actually rewards taller riders.

Let’s take a look at a list of the lead contenders for Sunday listed in order of height.

Niki Terpstra-6”3
Sep Vanmarcke-6″3
Wout Van Aert -6”2
Jasper Stuyven-6”1
Zdenek Stybar-6”0
Philippe Gilbert-6”0
Gianni Moscon-6”0
Peter Sagan-6”0
Oliver Naesen-6″0
Alexander Kristoff-5”11
Arnaud Demare -5”11
Greg Van Avermaet-5”11
Edvald Boasson Hagen-5″11
John Degenkolb-5″11

Now let’s look at the list listed in order of their odds according to Sky Bets.

Peter Sagan-11/4
Greg Van Avermaet-7/1
Niki Terpstra-7/1
Philippe Gilbert-9/1
Sep Vanmarcke-9/1
Zdenek Stybar-12/1
John Degenkolb-14/1
Arnaud Demare-18/1
Wout Van Aert-18/1
Alexander Kristoff-20/1
Edvald Boasson Hagen-22/1
Jasper Stuyven-22/1
Gianni Moscon-25/1
Oliver Naesen-25/1

It is possible rider height matters at Roubaix. It is also possible this is simply a crackpot theory. But judging from recent history, if you are in interested in picking possible winners, the smart money should go with a rider measuring 6-feet or above.

Tour of Flanders Power Rankings: Who to Watch This Sunday at De Ronde

On By Spencer MartinIn Cycling1 Comment

The Tour of Flanders is nearly here. For a true cyclophile, it doesn’t get any better than Flanders. I would argue that it is hands down the “best” race of the year. The Tour de France has the history, the Giro d’Italia the beauty, Paris-Roubaix the carnage, but no race requires the same mixture of skill, fitness, power, and finesse as Flanders. For the first time in a few years, we don’t have a clear favorite going into Sunday, which makes the pre-race speculation all the more fun. Let’s run through some of the riders who are peaking at the right time, and who hasn’t done their homework before the big exam on Sunday.

Note: This isn’t a comprehensive list of favorites, merely the ones that are the most interesting to talk about at the moment. 

Greg Van Avermaet
What do you get the rider who has won nearly every race of significance? If it’s Greg Van Avermaet, its a Tour of Flanders win. It is the glaring gap in his Palmares. The Olympics, Paris-Roubaix, and Tour de France stage wins are nice, but to be a true Flandrian champion, you have to win Flanders, full stop. Unfortunately, Van Avermaet hasn’t enjoyed the smoothest run-up to the most important block of his season. His BMC team has been severely outgunned by Quick Step in the semi-classics building into Sunday, and he generally hasn’t displayed the sparkling spring form we’ve come to expect. Missing the front group at this week’s Dwars Door Vlaanderen tuneup race was either a calculated move to throw rivals off his scent, or more likely, a signal that he simply isn’t at his best. I previously said we needed to see a sign of life at last weekend’s E3 Harelbeke and Gent-Wevelgem. While he finished third at E3, his attack in the last 5k of the race lacked any punch (he only succeeded in dragging the entire group along).
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To compound his wet blanket attack at E3, GVA was a complete non-factor in the sprint finish at Sunday’s Gent-Wevelgem. While I wouldn’t completely write off GVA, the strongest rider usually wins at Flanders it appears that GVA seems to be slightly off his usual form this spring.

Niki Terpstra
While he’s rarely the favorite, Terpstra can never be counted out for a big Classic. This guy is what American sports radio hosts would call a “gamer.” He shows up when it matters. In the past, he’s leveraged an incredibly strong Quick Step team and ability to time trial to win a monument (Paris-Roubaix 2014). So far in 2018, he has looked strong, and more importantly, his Quick Step is on an absolute rampage. They have rolled into every Northern Classic with a phalanx of capable riders, each one capable of winning as the next. This allowed Terpstra and his teammate, Yves Lampaert,  to ride off the front of E3 with only 70 kilometers remaining. Lampaert is a very strong rider, and Terpstra made the young Belgian look pedestrian on the bergs late in the race. The only big knock against Terpstra is that he has absolutely no sprint. If he is going to win Flanders on Sunday, he is going to have to get away on the Patersberg or Oude Kwaremont late in the race. However, he certainly appears to have the form to get away and the team to keep him there.

Peter Sagan
The three-time World Champion won Gent-Wevelgem on Sunday in the sprint finish against some of the best classics sprinters in the world. Normally this would be a great sign of things to come in Flanders, but this edition of Gent-Wevelgam only told us that Sagan’s sprint is there, while his overall form is more of a mystery. Sagan was dropped from lead group two days earlier at E3 and has looked somewhat off his best form since his stunning chase at Tirreno. Sagan opted out of today’s Flanders tuneup race, Dwars, to fly home to Monaco to get a few days of warm weather training. Considering the miserable weather in Belgium this week, this could prove to be the right move. Nothing wears on a rider’s body like hard racing in the springtime rain/cold of Belgium. Sagan’s biggest weakness in past editions has been his overenthusiasm, so perhaps a slightly off-form spring could force Sagan to finally sit and play the waiting game at the critical moments.  

Jasper Stuyven
Stuyven was supposed to be the Belgian that was promised a few years back, but since his breakthrough win at Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne in 2016, the rider once hailed as the “new Boonen” has failed to bag a signature win. He’s been consistent so far this spring, and with the absence of a true favorite this spring, there is no time like the present for Stuyven.

Sep Vanmarcke
Today’s finish at Dwars proves that Sep Vanmarcke is, in fact, allergic to winning bikes races. When last year’s winner Yves Lampaert slowly drifted off the front inside the final kilometer, Vanmarcke correctly wound it up to mark the move. Unfortunately, he marked the coasting Mike Teunissen, instead of the rider who was clearly riding away with the win.
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Vanmarcke has been showing great form in recent weeks and his talent was on full display at E3 when he pulled back nearly five minutes following a crash with 100km remaining. But if he wants to finally capitalize on the promise he displayed with second place at the 2013 Paris-Roubaix, he has some major mental blocks to overcome.

Philippe Gilbert
Last year’s Flanders champion hasn’t had a standout result so far this spring, but he has certainly looked strong in the past few weeks. He appeared to be toying with the lead group at E3, and would certainly have delivered a knockout blow had his teammate Terpstra not been up the road. Even if Gilbert doesn’t bag a repeat win on Sunday, look for him to factor in by breaking up the race from a long way out. He attacked with 55 km remaining in last year’s edition and displayed a herculean effort to stay away until the finish. It is likely he won’t be able to repeat such a feat, but I would be surprised if a Gilbert long bomb didn’t shake up the race.

Tiesj Benoot
The young Belgian is on the form of his life. He’s the real deal. However, I wonder if his future truly lies in cobbled classics. While he won Strade Bianche in fantastic fashion, if you watch that video closely, he was alone at the finish line. He made the effort to get away alone because the kid cannot sprint his way out of a paper bag. This is going to severely limit his chances of victory at Flanders. He is sure to be a factor, but don’t expect a W from the rising star.

Alejandro Valverde
(Edit: Since writing this, Valverde has announced he will not be racing Flanders. Don’t I look silly now.) It isn’t even certain that Valverde will be on the start line on Sunday, but if he is, he certainly can’t be counted out. His performance at Dwars, which he only road to get a feel for the cobblestone roads that will feature in this year’s Tour de France, turned heads with his ability to handle a one-day cobbled classic. On Wednesday at Dwars, we were treated to the rare site of a climber at the front of a cobbled classics. He even seemed to be looking around wondering why everyone says these things are so hard.
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We saw a Ground Tour contender shock the world with Vincenzo Nibali at Milan-Sanremo, but Valverde winning Flanders would be one of the most surprising wins in the race’s history. In an age of specialist, we thought we had seen the end of the days of Grand Tour winners contending for a one-day classics victory, but for all his personal faults, Valverde is a thrilling throwback to a bygone era of racing.

There are certainly riders outside of this list that can and will play a factor on Sunday. Michal Kwiatkowski has to be considered a threat in any race he starts, but we haven’t seen the former World Champ race since Milan-Sanremo. I worry his legs may have gone a bit stale in the two weeks between the two races. Wout van Aert has been shockingly strong all spring, but until he kicks his cyclocross habit to the curb, he won’t have the legs late in these races to take a victory. There are a plethora of B-level contenders that could take a big career step up by winning on Sunday: Gianni Moscon, Zdeněk Štybar, Matteo Trentin, Oliver Naesen, and the entire Quick-Step team. Of these, Naesen seems the most likely to finally make the next big step, however, his lack of finishing kick could doom him to a career of Flanders top tens, without ever touching the top step of the podium.

Tuesday Power Rankings: Milan-Sanremo, Spring Classics, Who’s Trending Up and Who’s on Blast

On By Spencer MartinIn CyclingLeave a comment

Milan-Sanremo is behind us as we head full-speed into the meat of the Spring Classics season. While Sanremo is traditionally a mere amuse bouche, this year’s version was an instant classic, and we still have E3 Harelbeke, Ghent-Wevelgem, Tour of Flanders, Paris-Roubaix and the entire Ardennes triplet ahead of us. For single-day racing fans, the next few weeks are as good as it gets. Let’s run down who the winners and losers are coming out of this past week of racing.

Let’s take a look at three riders trending up coming off the first big block of serious racing.

Who’s Looking Good

Vincenzo Nibali
Bravissimo! Vincenzo Nibali, the shark of Messina, lived up to his nickname by displaying extremely aggressive racing to become the first Italian to the win Milan-Sanremo since Filippo “Pippo” Pozzato in 2006, and the first Grand Tour winner since Sean Kelly won in 1992. With this victory, the Italian goes a long ways towards cementing himself as the best all-around racer of his generation. This Milan Sanremo victory was his third Monument victory. This adds to an already impressive list of wins, which includes all three Grand Tours.

Milan Sanremo is normally billed as the “Sprinters Classic,” and is often won from a reduced bunch sprint. However, Nibali turned the race on its head by attacking the slopes of the final climb of the race, the Poggio, and beat the long odds by making the solo move stick to the line. Fabian Cancellara won La Classicissima solo in 2008, but the Swiss strongman snuck away on the final 2km run into the finish, not with a dramatic attack on the slopes of the Poggio. The attack and solo win harked back to cycling’s age of heroes, specifically Eddy Merckx’s solo win in 1971. Nibali ‘s attack with 7km to go in the race was perfectly timed, as he was able to play the remaining sprint rivals off each other, which meant any significant chase failed to materialize until it was far too late.

Nibali’s solo win in the sprinter’s classic adds much-needed excitement to the Italian Spring Classic and Italian racing in general. The finish line was awash with a palpable energy as victory-hungry Italian fans cheered as the chasing pack looked to swallow the lone Nibali. The image of the climbing specialist posting up for victory in front of the chasing groups of sprinters was powerful enough to land on the front page of La Gazzetta Dello Sport, real estate that is almost exclusively reserved for soccer news. Watching an attacking climber/non-sprinter foil the fast men will certainly inspire similar racers, and hopefully, mean more lively finales in the future.

As a bonus, the Italian wants to get a feel for the cobblestones ahead of the cobblestone-ridden Tour de France Stage 9 and is heading north for the Tour of Flanders in two weeks time. Cycling fans are in for a treat If the Italian can capture some of that magic at La Ronde.

Alejandro Valverde
If Nibali is the most versatile racer of his generation, he is merely following in the footsteps of Alejandro Valverde. The Spanish all-rounder has been around for ages, winning his first professional race all the way back in 2002. Valverde crashed out of the 2017 Tour de France with a severe kneecap fracture and many questioned if time had run out on his already long career. The answer came in his first major race of the 2018 season when he rode away from a full Team Sky train to victory on stage 2 of the Tour of Valencia. Just to make sure we knew this wasn’t a fluke, Valverde chased down Adam Yates two days later on Stage 4 to win on the brutally steep summit finish. Just to make sure we hadn’t missed the message, Valverde stormed away on the Queen stage of the Abu Dhabi Tour, winning the stage and taking the overall lead. After an impressive fourth place at the one-day Strade Bianche, he found his place in the winner’s circle once again by taking the sprint and putting himself in the driver’s seat for the overall at the Volta a Catalunya. This run of form is incredible, especially when we consider Valverde is 37 years old and coming off a potentially career-ending leg injury. One has to wonder how Nairo Quintana feels while he watches this run of victories. Movistar announced plans in December to send all three leaders, Quintana, Valverde, and Landa to the Tour de France. At the time, I assumed Valverde would be lucky to be at the start. Now I’m marking him as a favorite for every Ardenne Classic, as well as a major name to watch as he head into a Tour de France with minimal time trialing kilometers and an excess of technical challenges.

Caleb Ewan
The young Australian sprinter wasn’t mentioned among the favorites for Milan-Sanremo, but if not for the heroics of Nibali, Ewan would have walked away with the biggest victory of his career. Ewan’s burst of speed at the end of a hilly 300-kilometer race was highly impressive and showed that he a pure, flat-line sprint specialist. Ewan was on my “Trending Down” list in the January Power Rankings, but on Saturday he showed that he was added a previously unseen depth of fitness and climbing ability to his lethal sprint. Watch out for the young Australian to make some waves when he takes the start line at his first Tour de France start this July.

Now let’s take a moment who I have trending down after the first big monument of the season.

Who’s On Blast

Michal Kwiatkowski & Team Sky
Kwiatkowski was highly touted by some coming into Milan-Sanremo, and while his fitness seemed to be there, the tactics employed by the former World Champ and his team left a lot to be desired. After setting a quick tempo on the Cipressa, they moved to the back of the pack leading into the divisive climb, the Poggio, and were caught looking when Nibali made his move. What makes this an especially horrible tactic is that they lacked a sprinter that could have won from a big group at the finish. They seemed to be setting pace out of habit, and then sat on their hands when they needed to be the aggressor up the Poggio. If Kwiatkowski was going to the race, he needed to get clear with Nibali on the Poggio, not sitting back and waiting for others to pull the move back and rolling the dice in the sprint finish. The good news is that the Polish rider looks to be on good form physically and has a strong team heading into the Northern Classics.

 Greg Van Avermaet
Where is the Greg Van Avermaet we all fell in love with last spring? GVA has been MIA for the meat of the spring season outside a few impressive climbing days at Tirreno-Adriatico. There have been moments this spring where I’ve legitimately forgotten Van Avermaet exists. Becoming that anonymous that fast is an incredible feat after posting one of the most impressive run of Classics results ever in 2017. So far in 2018, he laid a goose egg at Strade Bianche and was a non-factor at Milan-Sanremo. Keep an eye on the dominant Belgian this weekend at E3 and Ghent-Wevelgem. If he is going to turn his season around, he’ll need to back some noise before we get to the big-show of Flanders and Roubaix.

Matteo Trentin
The Italian dazzled at the end of the 2017 season and was a high-profile signing by the Mitchelton-Scott team heading into 2018, but his solo flyer with 4 kilometers remaining might have cost his teammate Caleb Ewan the win. If he had displayed patience and used his energy to pull Nibali back for his fast-finishing teammate, it certainly would have given the chasing back the firepower it needed. One has to imagine choice words were exchanged between Ewan and his new teammate back in the privacy of the team bus.