"I found myself alone off the front" - 'Captain America' Brandon McNulty wins amidst total chaos in Croatia
Cycling
Croatia is known for it's beaches and good weather but as we enter the fall, rain begins to fall quite a lot. Today at the Cro Race the peloton was decimated by the difficult weather conditions, but Brandon McNulty took full advantage of the situation to take a brilliant solo win.
"Today was a good day I felt good. A confusing day with the GC but I found myself alone off the front," the UAE Team Emirates rider said in a post-race interview. "The gap held and I tried to stay for the GC time and then just kept going for the stage, kept the gap so yeah it's a nice, a good day".
It is the 14th time this season that UAE Team Emirates finish with a 1-2, as Igor Arrieta managed to take a strong runner-up on the day after benefiting from the work of his rivals who were in hot pursuit of McNulty. The American attacked with over 50 kilometers to go, joining Kim Heiduk but quickly setting off by himself in the Croatian hills.
The peloton never took it easy and never let the gap grow much above a minute but it proved to be impossible to bring back McNulty in that terrain and with him putting on such a strong performance. He won the stage and also 26 seconds on the majority of the GC field. Because of the bad weather conditions, GC times were taken on the penultimate lap which meant he didn't win as much time as he could potentially, but the 36 seconds were nevertheless enough to boost him into the race lead and into the position of man to beat for the overall classification in this race. This was win number 77 for the Emirati team in 2024 and the chances are very high that they will end the season with over 80.
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- That may be but that is unknown to others and nothing says that’s the whole truth. Again, don’t try to misinterpret, it is a call and technically it is correct. Besides, even if there is a valid reason, that does not disqualify the ruling or punishment as far as the rules have been developed. I don’t think they’re as far as in football where for handball there is a distinction (in some ways and specific cases) between intentional or not. And football can be just as harsh and people live with it, eg the offside rule, also judged to within tiny fractions but often wrong or ignored. It’s the nature of every collective organisation and sometimes I wonder if our rebellion against it isn’t seated in the feelings we carry from the injustices we’ve felt personally, like being flashed driving 1km/h too fast when we are explained limits are just a security measure but we are absolutely certain not to have endangered anyone with our transgression. The problem is, nobody has better solutions and no 2 people have the same interpretation of where a limit should be.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
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- he is doing 460 watts for 35 min to achieve 7 w/kg with VO2 at 96 , just unreal numbers.abstractengineer08-11-2026
- Just do it, and put up with the consequencesJumpyjohn08-11-2026
- "was a headliner at the Tour de France" Nobody cared about Piddie. Only rivals that were there for Pogi, Jonas, Remco, Sexias, Lipo, Del Toro and they were all expected to lose. Piddie was not even in any conversation.abstractengineer08-11-2026
- exactly, he had an amazing season, but with these overstatements they don‘t do him good.Ketterechts08-11-2026
- More to the point, it isn't his remaining goal.Renz08-11-2026
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🏆🇺🇸 Captain America does it! @BrandonMcNult 💪 #CroRace #UAETeamEmirates #WeAreUAE
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