Cyclist
6 pro cycling things I’m looking forward to in 2024
I love the fresh start a new year brings. A blank slate ready to be filled with possibilities, from maiden victories to heartwarming stories, revelling in attacking prowess and a peppering of panache, with new stars born and old ones bowing out.
Medals have already been dished out, with Aussies Grace Brown (FDJ-Suez) and Luke Plapp (Jayco-AlUla) winning their national individual time-trial titles, Jayco-AlUla’s Caleb Ewan and Ruby Roseman-Gannon of Liv-AlUla-Jayco winning the criterium championships and Plapp and Roseman-Gannon securing road race victories too. Many riders have already made their way to Australia, itching to get the pedals turning at the upcoming Tour Down Under. The women’s race will kick off from 12th-14th January with the men’s following from 16th-21st January.
The 2024 season is ready and waiting. Here are six things I’m looking forward to seeing this year.
1. The 2024 Paris Olympics and Paralympics
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26th July-11th August; 28th August-8th September 2024
An Olympic and Paralympic year. My favourite kind. Coming what seems like sooner than usual due to the pandemic-postponed 2020 Tokyo Olympics being pushed back to 2021, the 2024 Olympics will be held in Paris (for the most part). The time-trial and road events will start from the Esplanade des Invalides and Trocadéro respectively.
At the Tokyo Olympics, Richard Carapaz (Ecuador) won gold in the men’s road race ahead of Wout van Aert (Belgium) and Tadej Pogačar (Slovenia) while Anna Kiesenhofer (Austria) surprised the field and upset the Dutch favourites, with Annemiek van Vleuten (Netherlands) winning silver and Elisa Longo Borghini (Italy) taking home bronze. Disappointed after initially thinking she had won the road race, Van Vleuten regrouped to comfortably win the time-trial, with Primož Roglič (Slovenia) beating Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands) for the men. Sarah Storey also became Great Britain’s most decorated Paralympian, winning three more gold medals (one in track, two on the road) to reach an incredible grand total of 17 gold medals.
And all that road cycling is before we get on to the other disciplines. Track cycling, mountain biking, BMX… aren’t we lucky? It feels like the combined 2023 World Championships all over again. What a delight.
2. Tadej Pogačar racing his maiden Giro d’Italia
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4th May-26th May 2024
Men’s cycling’s best entertainer since the peak of Peter Sagan, UAE Team Emirates’ Tadej Pogačar announced in the off-season that he will race the Giro d’Italia this year, with the aim of winning the mythical Giro-Tour double last achieved in men’s cycling by Marco Pantani in 1998. Pogačar won the Tour de France in 2020 and 2021 but has struggled to overhaul his rival Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike), who reigned victorious in 2022 and 2023.
Last year, he won the Vuelta a Andalucía and Paris-Nice before jumping into the Classics. Known for their chaotic nature and arbitrary dishing of fates with punishing cobblestones and punchy climbs aplenty, it was no surprise that one of the most talented and enthralling riders of his generation thrived, immediately laying down the gauntlet at the Ronde van Vlaanderen. Such was his early success in the Amstel Gold Race and La Flèche Wallonne that the Ardennes Triple was on the cards, only Liège-Bastogne-Liège standing in his way. Sadly he crashed out of that race, breaking his wrist and scuppering his run in the Classics and preparations for the Tour.
Speaking at his team training camp recently, Pogačar said, ‘Let’s see how it goes… let’s not think about the double, let’s just go to enjoy racing.’
3. Who will challenge Demi Vollering?
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SD Worx’s Demi Vollering had quite the year in 2023, with success at the Tour de France and being crowned Queen of the Ardennes in 2023. She has become the rider to watch in terms of the general classification, especially considering there is also now an Annemiek van Vleuten-shaped hole in her list of rivals to beat. Vollering will be poised to repeat her success in 2024, particularly in her defence of the maillot jaune at this year’s Tour de France Femmes, which features Ardennes climbs of the Amstel Gold Race and Liège-Bastogne-Liège where she dominated in 2023, and finishes with a decisive ascent of Alpe d’Huez.
So, who can challenge Vollering? Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek) immediately springs to mind as someone always lurking in the one-day races, ready to pounce at a moment’s notice. She escaped with Vollering for a two-up sprint finish at Liège-Bastogne-Liège in 2023 and was overtaken by the Dutchwoman in the final 75m. It was not the best season for Longo Borghini, who admitted on her Instagram that there had been ‘too many setbacks’ in a year with many downs and never felt that she reached her full 100%. At her best though, she is an attacking force. I have to mention her teammate Gaia Realini too. At only 22 years of age, she has fought her way to podiums in both the Vuelta Femenina and Giro d’Italia Donne and has many years to develop even further, which is an exciting prospect indeed, so exciting in fact that there’s more on her later on…
There is also FDJ-Suez’s Marta Cavalli. Injury forced her out of the inaugural Tour de France Femmes and lingering effects of the concussion sustained in that crash plagued her recovery. Almost a year later, she fought her way to overall success at the 2023 Tour Féminin Pyrénées and the Tour Femenin l’Ardeche but still wasn’t quite a the level she found before the 2022 Tour. I’m looking forward to her presence in the Tour de France once again this season.
It’s not just Demi Vollering that exudes dominance either. Her whole SD Worx team remains stacked with big hitters including Marlen Reusser, Lotte Kopecky and Lorena Wiebes. Will they command the peloton once more?
4. Thomas De Gendt’s final Volta a Catalunya
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18th March-24th March 2024
Perhaps a better pairing than a cheeseboard and fine wine, Thomas De Gendt (Lotto-Dstny) has had plenty of success at the Volta a Catalunya over the years. His first win in the race came on Stage 7 in 2013, where he beat his three companions in the break to the Barcelona-Montjuïc finish. He accumulated four more stage victories in the race between 2016 and 2021, as well as two mountains jerseys and one sprint classification.
2024 will be the start of my 16th and final season as a pro. My big goals are a 6th stage win in Volta Catalunya and a 2nd stage win in Vuelta a Espana. But above all, enjoying every race i will do in my final year.
— Thomas De Gendt (@DeGendtThomas) November 18, 2023
After 16 years of dedication to attacking mastery, De Gendt announced he will retire at the end of the 2024 season. His goals include making it six at the Volta a Catalunya and another stage win at the Vuelta a España, but most importantly ‘enjoying every race’ in his final year. I can get behind that philosophy.
5. Lidl-Trek’s powerhouses Gaia Realini and Shirin van Anrooij
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Two forces to be reckoned with. In addition to the Grand Tour results mentioned above, Realini’s prosperous 2023 season included podiums at the Tour de l’Avenir Femmes and La Flèche Wallonne. Her maiden Grand Tour stage victory came against the legendary Annemiek van Vleuten by mere inches on Stage 6 at La Vuelta Femenina. Gaining experience and learning with none other than Elisa Longo Borghini as a teammate is a tantalising opportunity.
Alongside her is Shirin van Anrooij. At 21 years of age, she won the inaugural and much-anticipated edition of the Tour de l’Avenir Femmes, topped off with a blistering 30km solo attack on the fifth and final day. She also claimed her maiden WorldTour win at Trofeo Alfredo Binda. Van Anrooij had been racing for her cyclocross team Baloise Trek Lions during the road offseason but unfortunately she has ended her cross season prematurely due to a broken rib sustained in a training crash. I hope she avoids such misfortune during the road season. She is extraordinary.
6. Anything Wout van Aert does
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Wout van Aert is a conglomeration – part robot, part superhero, part robot superhero, part superhero robot. He has spent the past couple of weeks trying to challenge Mathieu van der Poel in cyclocross races, with unbeaten Van der Poel finishing on top in Baal and Koksijde by nearly two minutes this year.
With two cyclocross races remaining in his schedule, eyes are already turning to the road training camp with his renamed Visma-Lease a Bike squad in preparation for the Classics and beyond. Van Aert is undoubtedly one of the strongest and most talented riders in the peloton and clinched victory at the E3 Saxo Classic in 2023, but he didn’t reach the level he’s capable of. A variety of factors contributed, including a stacked cyclocross programme and illness, hence the reason for the cut to his ‘cross schedule.
Van Aert will additionally miss Strade Bianche and Milan-San Remo in 2024. However, this could be the right move for an entertaining Tour of Flanders (without defending champion Tadej Pogačar) and Paris-Roubaix. It’s almost certain Wout van Aert will be right up there…
Good luck for the 2024 season, everyone.
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