Felix Lowe turns to the world of gaming to resolve the growing gulf between the top riders and everyone else
There I was, penning my thoughts about how the four main contenders for the Tour de France seem to be running away from everyone else, when three of that classy quartet – Jonas Vingegaard, Primož Roglič and Remco Evenepoel – ran off the road in a high-speed crash in the Basque Country that looks to have turned the season on its head.
Not one to let such a curveball become a pump in the spokes, I’ve picked myself up and pressed on regardless, noting the irony of such a calamity occurring as couch commentators the world over were ridiculing efforts to make the perilous Arenberg section of cobbles that little bit safer prior to Paris-Roubaix.
Before the Itzulia incident left the defence of Vingegaard’s yellow jersey in doubt along with Evenepoel’s maiden appearance at the Tour and Roglič’s first for Bora-Hansgrohe, their collective dominance this spring – along with the absent Tadej Pogačar – had elevated this stellar ensemble to an entirely different plane.
In Catalunya, Pogačar scooped a hat-trick of mountain-top finishes (the third after a break of 59km) before sprinting for a fourth win and the overall title in Barcelona. This after Strade Bianche glory on his return to racing and third in Milan-San Remo. Vingegaard’s Tirreno triumph was not as emphatic as his victory in O Gran Camiño but it meant the duo had already amassed 13 wins between them, begging the question: are the Big Two too big?
World Champion Mathieu van der Poel, meanwhile, is showing off his rainbow bands sparingly but devastatingly with just five races to date. That hasn’t stopped him from winning three cobbled Classics, including a rare Flanders-Roubaix double (a sentence I wrote prior to his Hell of the North masterclass, so sure was I of the flying Dutchman’s victory).
In short, the gap between those who are winning and those who are merely making up the numbers is expanding exponentially race by race. And this, I’m afraid, is replicated in the showing of the strongest teams, creating not only two-speed racing but a two-tier competition (or, in the Monuments, Alpecin-Deceuninck vs The Rest of the WorldTour).
When Wout van Aert crashed out of Dwars door Vlaanderen to curtail his spring campaign and potential involvement in the Giro, Visma-Lease a Bike were able to call on Matteo Jorgenson, who won the race before putting in yet another a solid showing in Flanders.
