Deed een ritje over het finalerondje van de wegritten. Een soort toeristische route langs alle landmarks van Parijs, maar dan wel over een soort kermiskoersparcours. Drie klimmetjes, waarvan de eerste en lastigste van Moulin Rouge naar Montmartre.
"It looks a bit like the World Championship course in Glasgow" - Initial reflections of 2024 Paris Olympic Games road race course
CyclingWednesday, 31 July 2024 at 16:30
On Saturday, August 3rd, the men's peloton will fight for an Olympic gold medal successor to Ecuador's Richard Carapaz. A number of the biggest names in the sport will be in action on the roads of the French capital, Paris, but what is the course like and who could it potentially best suit?
Dutch ex-pro turned cycling pundit Thijs Zonneveld has done a reconnaissance of the Paris course and taken to his official X (Twitter ed.) account to recap his thoughts and analysis, sharing a series of videos and pictures taken whilst out on the course.
"Did a ride on the final lap of the road races. A kind of tourist route along all the landmarks of Paris, but on a kind of fairground course. Three climbs, of which the first and most difficult one is from Moulin Rouge to Montmartre," Zonneveld writes. "The climb is a kind of Eikenberg, but between the terraces. Attention!"
"Then: complete chaos. Up, down, turning, turning, cobblestones. There is actually only one long straight stretch where you can easily move up or organize a chase. Most of the route is thundering through the city, or on the sidewalk, like here:" Zonneveld continues. "The other two climbs are not very steep or difficult, I think it's more about repeating the efforts. There is hardly any room to relax. Even on the descents, like here, you have to constantly pay attention to bends, potholes and cobblestones."
"All in all, it looks a bit like the World Championship course in Glasgow," Zonneveld concludes. "Or a cross between De Ronde van Vlaanderen, San Remo and the fairground race of Koekwauzerveen. If they start racing early, it could be very selective."
The likes of Mathieu van der Poel, Wout van Aert, Remco Evenepoel, Biniam Girmay, Matteo Jorgenson, Tom Pidcock, Mads Pedersen and more will soon be following the same route as Zonneveld. The difference then, an Olympic gold medal will be on the line.
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- yeah, that’s a more fair assessment. “reaching mathieu’s level” doesn’t mean you’re planning to replicate his whole career. the former IS doable, potentially. it’s just the latter that likely is not.OCexile25-12-2024
- That’s not entirely true. Every person follows their own development path and peaks differently. Remco and Primoz had hardly started cycling before elite level. Jonas was pretty much under the radzr until he unexpectedly had to take over responsibility at JV. Some guys only get real good in their thirties others have peaked mid-twenties. You can’t tell in advance how and upto what level they will progress, obviously his career might not have MVDPs length but nothing says he could not end up doing a few seasons at his level.Mistermaumau25-12-2024
- well, del grosso is 21 right now. when mathieu was a year younger than that, he was already winning elite level world championships, not U23. i think del grosso will be a very good pro for years, but if he was really going to be the next van der poel someday, he’d already have to be at that level right NOW. van der poel was showing signs of true greatness when he was 15-16. THAT’S what generational talent looks like.OCexile25-12-2024
- Yeah.... gear 😅.mikolajjj24-12-2024
- It shouldn’t be about expectations in the first place should it? Besides, if you look at everyone’s calculations as a whole they don’t add up in the first place. There’ll be 2-3 riders with a 50% chance, a dozen with 10 or 20% and dozens more with a 5% so we’re expecting at least 2 if not 3 winners. Remind me again who won before her? Says it all about using data to decide on participation.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- Ok, happy I’m not too interested in this team coz’ the account of what happened is really hard to follow.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- The UCI is worse than USA CyclingVeganpotter24-12-2024
- It's not like they wanted her to not win😅 She had an outstanding Olympics. But there's a reason why she wasn't expected to win the road race and that's ok. Things like this happen and it's great...better than seeing expected winners win.Veganpotter24-12-2024
- Bruyneel ? The man with a lifetime ban from cycling...why do you keep giving him and his doper mate, Armstrong, a platform?DJ24-12-2024
- yeah, agree. on the subject of being a “complete rider,” i do think that’s getting more interesting. mathieu seems to have decided he wants to get much better at climbing the the high mountain passes. he appears to be looking for new challenges, which should be interesting to watch. in most cases you’d dismiss a goal like that at age 30, but it’s mvdp. he’s never going to climb with the real climbers, but if he can improve enough it could open up stage wins when the parcours isnt just purely toothy and punchy.OCexile24-12-2024