2025 Races with Spoilers.

[rich p]

As some wag put it yesterday World Bike Path Championship

Or The Race for Riders not Quite Good Enough for Other Disciplines

 

[Cathryn]

Or The Race for Riders not Quite Good Enough for Other Disciplines

Not for the women!

 

[Milzy]

Nobody even told me Oropa was on today. Next week there’s that China tour & then that’s it until next year ffs. I’m so depressed now.

 

[wakemalcolm]

Win number 3 for Trentin at Paris Tours. Were his previous victories in its previous incarnation?
Oh, and when did it become a chipper?

 

[No Ta Doctor]

Win number 3 for Trentin at Paris Tours. Were his previous victories in its previous incarnation?
Oh, and when did it become a chipper?

Direct orders from Eddy Merckx, co-signed by De Vlaeminck, neither of whom won it?

Good to see Laporte getting back into things with second place, his rehabilitation continues.

And from a Danish perspective, it's been reclassified from chipper to semi-classic at least, as wonderkid Albert Withen Philipsen took third.

 

[mjr]

Nobody even told me Oropa was on today. Next week there’s that China tour & then that’s it until next year ffs. I’m so depressed now.

There's also the Tour of Holland, but that's still depressing.

 

[mjr]

As some wag put it yesterday World Bike Path Championship

There was a lot of farm tracks and stuff, but the last kilometres didn't look good, including a castle lawn, some bike paths, an industrial estate and then finishing on that gravel bike path built on top of where they buried a motorway.

 

[matticus]

It's not road racing - it's Gravel - forget road racing tactics; you ride for yourself, despite your jersey.......People need to take off their road racing goggles when watching other disciplines.......

Nonsense. The winner was dragged back to the breakaway rider by someone sacrificing her own chances.

The final looked exactly like a 1-day road race, just slightly slower speed. (and more orange jerseys than usual)

 

[No Ta Doctor]

Nonsense. The winner was dragged back to the breakaway rider by someone sacrificing her own chances.

The final looked exactly like a 1-day road race, just slightly slower speed. (and more orange jerseys than usual)

This is essentially how road racing became a team sport - unofficial "alliances", riders bribed to domestique, was impossible to eradicate, so they formalised it by introducing teams

 

[MadMalx]

March 2026 feels a long way off

 

[Webbo2]

March 2026 feels a long way off

Yeah given todays dark, damp, grotty and not hint of the sun day.

 

[No Ta Doctor]

March 2026 feels a long way off

Time for the methadone of cyclocross as we face withdrawal from the heroin of the road season....

 

[rich p]

Time for the methadone of cyclocross as we face withdrawal from the heroin of the road season....

They do race on grass just to spice it up a bit.
I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere...

 

[No Ta Doctor]

Time for the methadone of cyclocross as we face withdrawal from the heroin of the road season....

Though of course, we're not quite done yet, and there are one or two important things to sort out by Sunday evening - head over to the 2025 promotion/relegation thread

Things are tight as a gnat's chuff here in the arse-end of the season

View attachment 789991

Uno-X just 331 points ahead now after Cofidis managed to pull some back, mainly through the Tour of Taihu Lake where they took 2nd on GC for 150 tasty UCI morsels

Cofidis will still need an impressive finish, even though they have two more races than Uno-X to ride: Tour of Guanxi and Japan Cup. These races have quite a strong startlist given that some riders see them as more akin to punishment duty at the end of a long season, so they're not guaranteed a big haul even though they're 2.WT and 1.Pro respectively. Cofidis got six points on the first stage, where Fernando Gaviria (amongst others) managed to get ahead of them in the sprint, which is pretty good for someone I'd assumed had retired.

Both teams ride the Walls Viennetta races (Giro del Veneto tomorrow, Veneto Classic on Sunday, both 1.Pro), where they'll hope to pick up the crumbs that UAE leave behind

The last two days have also seen the absolute back marker race of the season, the Chrono des Nations (1.1) gain a couple of entries. Uno-X were first to put names down, with Søren Wærenskjold and Carl-Frederik Bévort - the first an eminently capable TTer, the second more a young hopeful (21 yr old, some TT wins at u23 and Jnr, including DK champs at both levels and 6th in the Worlds u23 that Wærenskjold won in Australia, when he was just 18)

To combat this last minute points threat, Cofidis's Alexis Renard will be spending the next four days intensively studying what a TT bike is, how to ride one and why aero is important. His previous best TT result was 20th at a Tour de Suisse and he's yet to earn a UCI point in a race of truth.

I think it's Uno-X's, barring a real change of fortune and form for Cofidis

 

[mididoctors]

Pile up in china

View: https://youtu.be/OKCMlLux_Mg?si=I9shI6M2dGGcmnmT