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Ranking the last ten UCI Road World Championships
The 2024 UCI Road World Championships concluded at the weekend with the men’s road race in Zürich, Switzerland. Tadej Pogačar closed affairs with his stunning road race victory, which came after a 100km long attack from the bunch. The day before, Lotte Kopecky retained her rainbow stripes with a hardy ride in the Swiss rain. How does this all stack up compared to Worlds before?
With another week of rainbow jersey hunting under our belt, it’s time to get reflective and look back over a decade’s worth of World Championships, from 2015 up to 2024.
You may think that comparing separate UCI Road World Championships is like comparing apples with oranges. Well, for this ranking, we will weigh the championships based on the course, the racing, the hosts and the overall vibes of the event. Most of these things are subjective, so feel free to share your opinion with Cyclist in the comments or over on our socials.
10. Doha 2016
This was always going to appear far down the list. As the only pure sprinter’s World Championships of the past decade, the Qatari offering in 2016 was pretty underwhelming.
It’s hard to sculpt a stellar Worlds route out of Qatar’s topology, I’ll admit that. However, seeing the riders weave their way around a luxury compound outside of town was not what I expected from this World Championships.
The men’s road race was a race characterised by echelons, but a uniform sprint, in the end, ruined any sense of excitement from the six-hour-long durge. This wasn’t isolated to the elite men either. The women’s road race and under-23 fares were also pretty lacklustre. That said, Amelie Dideriksen’s surprise win in the women’s race did provide some flair to the proceedings.
I just wish the Middle Eastern organisers had followed through with their suggestion of building a temporary hill to spice up the route.
9. Innsbruck 2018
It might be controversial to place Innsbruck 2018 so far down on the list – it was a mountain-focussed event after all – but most races ended up in long-range solos.
Anna van der Breggen won the women’s title by over three minutes, Remco Evenepoel wiped the floor in the junior races and Marc Hirschi attacked away from a group to seal the under-23 trophy. Overall, it was almost too attritional for nail-biting racing.
The much-anticipated rise of Rohan Dennis to the rainbow jersey became a reality. Annemiek van Vleuten smashed the women’s time-trial while the team time-trial received its swan song at the 2018 championships.
The men’s road race was the only flavour in this World Championships soup. A close-fought battle brought a group of four to the line, but it was never really in question that Alejandro Valverde would win this gallop.
8. Harrogate 2019
Harrogate 2019 was victim to bad weather all round. We saw Johan Price-Pejtersen swept away by a puddle, a crying Colombian and a distinct lack of TV pictures throughout this event. I understand that Yorkshire was enthusiastic to host, but it felt as though this was a bridge too far for the county in terms of cycling after five years of constant bike-race hosting.
The junior men’s race was a walkover for the Americans, and the under-23 race was soured by the farce surrounding Pascal Eenkhoorn who was later stripped of his title due to drafting a car in the aftermath of a nasty crash. The introduction of the mixed team relay also verged on farcical. It was very unclear how it was all going to pan out, and I’ll be honest, the event is still to catch on after five years.
The women’s race was hard to watch as Van Vleuten flew away from the bunch with over 100km to go. No one ever came close to her unsurprisingly. In the women’s time-trial, Chloe Dygert smashed the field in the first of her two two world title wins.
The men’s race was the week’s high point. The weather made the race far more attritional than many expected, leaving all focus on the front group in the final 50km. Mathieu van der Poel popping with 20km to go has become iconic and Pedersen’s shock win spelt great things to come after unseating Matteo Trentin’s tactically flawless position.
7. Bergen 2017
Norwegian hospitality was on full show at Bergen in 2017. The Norwegians came out in their masses to support the riders. The chocolate box city was also a beautiful backdrop for the races, with stunning swooping shots across the west of Norway’s fjords.
The elite time-trials were spiced up by an uphill finish to Fløyen. This brought with it a red-carpet bike swap area that sparked much debate during the week. Tom Dumoulin would claim the men’s title just a matter of four months after winning the Giro d’Italia. The team time-trial was just as victorious for Team Sunweb. They won both the men’s and women’s events, the men’s far more surprising than the women’s equivalent.
The men’s road race was slightly affected by a TV camera outage in the final 5km – yes, we were completely in the dark during the most decisive point in the race. In the end, a messy sprint saw Peter Sagan break Norwegian hearts in a photo finish on the line. Fair play to the Slovak, this made him a three-time World Champion. The women’s race on the other hand wasn’t quite as hectic. If anything, it was massively forgettable as the Dutch began their run of unexciting solo wins courtesy of Chantal Blaak.
6. Imola 2020
The 2020 World Championships has many caveats. It was in 2020, so that’s all you need to know. Due to global health circumstances that I’m sure you’re aware of, the racing was dramatically reduced to only four elite events.
The time-trial saw the crowning of Filippo Ganna as the new time-trialling overlord, a surprising move at the time given that he was only 24. The women didn’t have quite the same changing of the guard as Anna van der Breggen began her golden week in Imola. This would continue with her impressive solo ride to victory in the women’s elite road race. More talk, however, was on a helicopter TV shot than the Dutchwoman’s exploits.
Having come just off the back of the 2020 Tour de France, the World Championships that year provided a chance for everyone to clash once more. In tip-top form, Tadej Pogačar, Primož Roglič, Wout van Aert and Julian Alaphilippe came into this race closely eyeing each other up. They didn’t disappoint. This race was a thriller. After an uphill escape, Alaphilippe slipped away to become the first French rainbow jersey wearer in yonks.
5. Zürich 2024
Halfway through this list, we introduce the most recent World Championships. Switzerland was a fitting host in all its beauty, efficiency and cycling heritage. The routes were also punishing, but not too attritional like Innsbruck.
To open the 2024 event, the men’s time-trial was on a knife edge and the women’s race was equally as tense. Cat Fergurson broke through to claim a double in the women’s juniors in what was a somberly bittersweet event due to the passing of Muriel Furrer.
The under-23 men’s road race was a real humdinger of a race that ended in a development rider, Niklas Mehrens, outgunning WorldTour rivals. At the other end of the age spectrum, the elite races really rewarded the best riders in the world. Lotte Kopecky defied silly Dutch tactics to claim a reduced sprint in the women’s race after plenty of flyers in the final 20km. For the men, Pogačar cemented his name in history by closing out his Triple Crown bid with an otherworldly attack from 100km to go. This wasn’t without peaks and troughs though, as the race dynamic changed throughout the 278km parcours. With Pogačar’s win, this will probably go down in history more favourably than it does now.
4. Flanders 2021
Cycling came home to Belgium in 2021. Back to its full schedule after the reduced 2020 event, the Flemish Worlds were just as raucous as expected.
To begin, the men’s time-trial was a nailbiter between Ganna and Van Aert. Despite the crowd telling Ganna to slow down, the Italian took a second world title.
To the delight of only Italians and Trek-Segafredo fans, Elisa Balsamo mugged Marianne Vos in the final hundred metres to claim a surprise world title in the women’s road race. For the men, Alaphilippe let lightning strike twice with a surprise late move in the road race. France played this to perfection, leaving his rivals to scramble behind. At the end of the race, Alaphilippe was joined by a wild podium including Dylan van Baarle and Michael Valgren. The disintegrating race situation behind also sparked plenty of debate in Belgium surrounding Evenepoel and Van Aert’s joint leadership woes.
Last-minute jumps were a theme of these championships. Filippo Baroncini and Per Strand Hagenes won the youngster’s races in a similar manner. This is the kind of racing we should have probably expected on a typically Flemish course.
3. Wollongong 2022
Looking past the vast time difference between Australia and Europe that made most races unwatchable at 3am, the 2022 World Championships were pretty eventful in good and bad ways. In a week that included Van der Poel‘s hotel ‘incident’ and the flocks of seagulls attacking riders, the Wollongong event summed up everything we want from a World Championships.
The men’s time-trial was wonderfully unpredictable, with Tobias Foss finishing in first just a hairwidth from eternal bridesmaid Stefan Küng. This turn up for the books also birthed the Evenepoel ‘Foss’ meme. The men’s under-23 road race was won by under-the-radar Yevgeniy Fedorov while Zoe Bäckstedt announced herself on the world stage with wins in the junior time-trial and road race.
Evenepoel rounded out a year of redemption with a long-range effort to claim the road race rainbow jersey. This was a real genre-defining race for that kind of move. The women’s race couldn’t have been any more different. Van Vleuten, who had crashed a couple of days before, whizzed past the peloton to sneak away to gold, completing her women’s Triple Crown.
2. Richmond 2015
We’re heading across the Atlantic for the runner-up in this list. The 2015 World Championships held in Richmond, Virginia were propped up by brilliant course design, superb racing and unpredictable storylines.
The men’s time-trial was wonderfully unpredictable and downright anarchical as Vasil Kiriyenka took the world title ahead of Adriano Malori and Jérôme Coppel. Keep these names in mind as they are great cycling pub quiz answers (sorry, guys). The women’s race wasn’t quite as unpredictable, but it was incredibly close. Only five seconds separated the podium. The time-trials also started from inside a theme park, so kudos for that.
The course was designed with class and excitement at its core. Far from the typical rolling profiles of Worlds before, Richmond 2015 had the cobbled climb of Libby Hill, open streets, wide corners and false flats on the menu. This made for some epic racing. The men’s under-23 road won by Kévin Ledanois (another great pub quiz answer) was a barnstorming watch, but the women’s road race won by Lizzie Deignan (then Armitstead) was even more enthralling. The men’s road race saw Sagan take his first of three consecutive titles – a feat that might be equalled by Pogačar in two years time – after a pretty up-and-down season for the Slovak.
For Europeans, these World Championships also provided optimal late-night watching. What’s better than tuning into a ferocious race finale at 9pm?
1. Glasgow 2023
Taking the top spot are the Glasgow Super Worlds as they came to be known. Fundamentally, the Glaswegian city circuit was wildly unorthodox but incredibly exciting. As a result, the men’s road stands up as one of the decade’s best one-day races.
Van der Poel, Van Aert, Pedersen and Pogačar – arguably the four best Classics riders at the moment – raced their hearts out from the 75km to go marker. Their exploits across this criterium-style circuit around the Scottish city made for relentless competition punctuated with plenty of twists and turns, none more dramatic than eventual winner Van der Poel’s crash through a wet corner in Glasgow’s Merchant City.
After the display in the men’s race, the climbs of Montrose Street, Scott Street and Great George Street delivered yet more punchy racing throughout the week. Axel Laurance defied a star-studded chase group to claim the under-23 title, while Albert Philipsen continued his rapid rise to stardom with a dominant display in the junior men’s race. Lotte Kopecky closed the Glasgow World Championships with another attritional display of strength to hold on in front of Demi Vollering, the Tour de France champion that year.
Bonus points are also given for the inclusion of all the extra events at the Glasgow ‘Super Worlds’. I, for one, am looking forward to seeing Cycleball and Artistic Cycling return in some capacity soon. The Champs Coo, the Highland Cow mascot for the event, probably helps to cement the Scottish offerings at the top of this list too.
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