Sports Poets Society

PHILIPPE GILBERT HAS WON ALMOST EVERY RACE HE HAS SET HIS MIND TO, INCLUDING FOUR MONUMENTS AND THE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS. AHEAD OF HIS FINAL YEAR IN THE PRO PELOTON, HE TELLS PROCYCLING WHAT IT WAS LIK E TO BE THE BEST R IDER IN THE WORLD, AND WHAT HE WANT 29 Dec 2021 - Procycling Writer: Adam Becket  Portrait: Jesse Wild Few riders can claim to be the truly dominant rider of a year. Of course, there is always someone with the most wins, and it’s common to end the year with a best sprinter, a best stage racer and a best classics rider, but it is rare for one rider to be the definitive best of a season. In 2021 Tadej Pogačar was clearly that, with his wins at the Tour de France, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia ; in 1972 Eddy Merckx won more than most top riders win in their entire career, but 11 years ago it was another Belgian rider in Philippe Gilbert . In one season, he won 17 races, including the Ardennes double of Liège and Flèche Wallonne plus the Amstel Gold Race ; also...

The 1980 Tour de France is often remembered as the one that Bernard Hinault lost, rather than the one Joop Zoetemelk won. Procycling looks at the race afresh, and tells a story of Dutch dominance and a worthy winner 11 Sep 2020 - Procycling Writer William Fotheringham   Image Offside Sports Photography Forty years ago, the 1980 Tour de France was the classic race of two halves. It was won by Joop Zoetemelk, but is now primarily seen in the context of one rider: Bernard Hinault . 1980 is the Tour of the Badger’s Wounded Knee . It’s the one where Hinault came down with tendinitis so severe that he had no option but to pull out of the race. It thus divides into first half with the Badger dominating the race and an anticlimactic second after he retreated to lick his wounds in his burrow in Brittany. Looking back, the prescient editor of Miroir du Cyclisme , Henri Quiquéré , could see this coming a mile off. Dusting off the crystal ball when he reviewed the race, Quiquéré hypothesised ...

SWITZERLAND’ S GINO MÄDER HAD A BREAKTHROUGH YEAR IN 2021, WITH A STAGE WIN AT THE GIRO. HOWEVER, IT WAS HIS FIFTH PLACE AT THE VUELT A WHICH REALLY CAPTIVATED THE ATTENTION.  PROCYCLING FOLLOWED HIM THROUGH THE SPANISH GRAND TOUR Procycling / December 2021  #53 Writer: Kate Wagner Images: Cor Vos.  Long before he would take a bow, clad in the white jersey, on the podium in the shadow of the Cathedral de Santiago de Compostela, long before he would rise in clever, frenetic fashion to fifth on GC in the Vuelta a España, Gino Mäder rolled to a halt at the foot of a different cathedral in Burgos, the evening light pooling shadows in its high-Gothic tendrils and spirals. Big disc wheel slowing, whomp, whomp, whomp, he stopped when called and coughed into his fist from the dry heat. “You cut your hair,” I observed. We had never spoken before, and this was an easy opener, the absence of Mäder’s familiar head of afro-like curls. He laughed. “I had to do something to help with th...

https://procyclinguk.com/womens-strade-bianche-2022-race-preview/ Mathew Mitchell March 2, 2022 -  Women's Cycling Women's Strade Bianche 2022 Race History Strade Bianche will once again be the first Women’s WorldTour race of the season. Last year’s race saw SD Worx take control of an élite group. With Chantal van den Broek-Blaak matching an attack by Elisa Longo Borghini , she was able to just sit on until the ascent into Siena. Naturally, that tired out Longo Borghini and Van den Broek-Blaak was able to put more power down and take the victory. After 2020’s rescheduled race was held in the scorching heat, the 2021 race was a return to normal March conditions . This year, there is rain forecast for the day before but the race itself should be dry. We have had a wet Strade Bianche not too long ago, back in 2018 where Anna van der Breggen was the victor . If the gravel doesn’t dry by Saturday it will be a wet crunchy sludge. That could swing the race advantage to the strongest r...

The Netherlands is first and foremost a cycling country, so it’s no surprise that it has produced some of the greatest riders of all time, and the current world-beating generation of female athletes. Procycling looks into the roots of Dutch cycling culture, to find the reasons for its continuing success WRITER Thomas Olsthoorn  PROCYCLING UK - Issue 287, November 2021 There was a beautiful moment during the closing ceremony of the recent Vuelta a España. Fabio Jakobsen stepped onto the podium, before the impressive façade of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. Bike in hand, his machine sprayed the same colour as the jersey that hung over his shoulder. The Dutch sprinter had won the green jersey and he received loud applause from the gathered fans. His confirmation as the best sprinter in the Vuelta came 396 days after his terrible crash at the Tour de Pologne in August 2020 . Jakobsen narrowly escaped death, and after a rehabilitation process that took months, he first got ba...