Road Cycling at the Summer Olympic Games Paris 2024 Road to Paris 2024

[mpjmcevoy 269]

40 minutes ago, phelps said:

actually, I think it makes it easier for the best legs to make the difference...

 

I guess a Pogi vs MVDP head to head duel it's easier to develop in this context rather than with 12-man teams, especially if the course/weather are not so tough

2800 m climbing, much of it cobbled, lots of short sharp hills at around 6-7%, without huge team support? I think it kills off the sprinters, all right, but there's plenty of random energy there.

 

I think this could be a race of brakeaways and counterpunchers - or counterpuncheurs - if you aren't part of the golden quartet of Tadej, Mattieu, Remco and Wout vA, there's a good excuse for trying to get in the break, and hope they mark each other out.

[dodge 903]

I still expect the cream to rise but the world championships have teams of 7/8 to chase the early breaks and set up the leaders

 

If a break gets away with Stuyven, Hayter, Lozkano and Mohoric (for example), it could stay away as the four big nations there will all fancy a medal

[mpjmcevoy 269]

1 minute ago, dodge said:

I still expect the cream to rise but the world championships have teams of 7/8 to chase the early breaks and set up the leaders

 

If a break gets away with Stuyven, Hayter, Lozkano and Mohoric (for example), it could stay away as the four big nations there will all fancy a medal

Yep, break(s) of the day will be hugely important - all the players will try to get somebody up there to save the rest of the small team's legs. As Team GB showed in London, you just cannot control a peloton with 4 riders - and London was a relatively benign course, and Paris isn't. You need to be able to soft pedal a fair amount of the parcours to be ready when you're needed - and you can't do that if say Belgium, the Dutch and the Brits are up the road with one rider each, perhaps in combination with other teams with a decent puncheur/climber but little to no team depth (Ben Healy instantly springs to mind there) and the big guns of those three slightly stronger teams are whistling away allowing the poor oul Slovenes to ride themselves into the ground.

 

That said, Pog could just decide to rip the legs clean off everyone and use them as drumsticks on his way to gold.

 

Hayter's not doing the RR, only the TT, but I suspect Fred Wright would and could fill an almost identical function. If it doesn't entirely work, both Tarling and Eddie Dunbar obviously have the legs to drag things together with long shifts.

[Oscar 42]

 Women's team:

 

Mavi García (road race)

Mireia Benito (road race and time trial)