The revelation of last Track World Championships in the center of scouts' attention: "Five or six different WorldTour teams asked for my data"
Cycling
Josh Charlton became quite a surprising world record holder in the individual pursuit when he clocked 3:59.304 in the qualifying round of the 2024 Track World Championships in Copenhagen. His reign was brief as Jonathan Milan broke his record at the same venue just hours later in the final, but it was enough to draw interest from big road teams.
"I didn’t realise the potential I had until October," he told Cycling Weekly. The Brit became only the third rider ever at the time to go below four minutes in the discipline. "I didn’t realise how good I was at it until that day."
To put into perspective, that's two seconds faster than Filippo Ganna's gold medal time at the 2023 Worlds. Asked if road teams took notice of his performance, Charlton said: "I had a few nearly opportunities come about after the world record in Copenhagen, but nothing really came of it."
"My agent had five or six different WorldTour teams asking for data, asking for TrainingPeaks, stuff like that. It’s a difficult time to do such a good ride like that in October, when rosters have been decided, budgets have been used up. If I’d done it in September, maybe it would have been a different story."
"It just shows there is potential, there’s definitely interest. I’ve got to keep pushing, keep driving, doing fast times, winning stuff, and eventually they’ll hopefully take notice," Charlton expresses.
Like many other British riders, Charlton found it unpleasant for his then team Trinity Racing to have folded at the end of last season. "I’m lucky that I’ve got the track, and I’ve got the funding from British Cycling, so I can still keep doing it," he said. "I know there’s a lot of guys, even guys who I rode with, who had to end their careers because the team folded."
"The guys I’m competing against, guys like Filippo Ganna and Jonathan Milan – Milan has won everything at the UAE Tour this week, and Ganna’s Ganna – if you’re going as fast as those guys, surely you’re going to be of some use to the big teams," Charlton said.
Actually a bit surprising how distinct the two disciplines stay.
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- To quote the article: riders from Arkéa - B&B Hotels and a few others seized the moment to launch an attack, increasing the pace as Pogacar was briefly off the bike. Not coolmij08-04-2025
- I don’t think it was a matter of easing up. I think it was a matter of attacking. And MVDP said his team would respect similar situations. Perhaps not on the penultimate climb, but I believe they would. To accelerate is a jerk move.mij08-04-2025
- His basic attitude always has been (and we know age often reinforces inherent values), if I’m going down I’m going to try taking you with me.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- I know it’s tradition and nice but to make the discussion more interesting, if an Arkea rider had driven up to tell Alpecin or UAE to ease off for Mozzato or Vauquelin having a P, would they have been as gentlemanly?Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- That’s probably about right although if they’d talked it over it would have been in all their interests to work together to chase Pog down because those 4 arriving at the finish in that scenario would have left all 4 with a chance of victory.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- Exactly, that easily makes for a minute at the front. You don’t see Pog cracking often either (less often than MVDP even) but when he does it’s lights out and over too. This is completely normal and to be expected, at the level of competitiveness all these guys are they only crack once they’ve pushed beyond their manageable limit and there’s no coming back from that. When your rival forces you into the red to keep or catch up, it’s over, in that respect, well done to WVA who seems to be world champion in staying just outside the red for as long as he can.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- If I remember well, Pidcock slowed, whether out of respect or strategically or just happy he could ease off a bit, only he knows. Your point?Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- I believe Mathieu rather gets beaten by a stronger rider than one who raced smarter. That is why he wanted to team up with Pogacar to drop the JV riders and Mads who were not helping in the chase of the first group since they had a teammate up front.JoostMehrtens08-04-2025
- Just shows that LA is not truly repentant. JUSTICE was served. No winner, no second , no third on the podium for those 7 years. No real winners could be determined, ever. Lance got to keep most of his money , he really should can it . He is toxic to cycling.dave08-04-2025
- Tricky one as while I agree Pogi and UAE are simply faster over a long distance which means Visma and MVP need to be as smart with energy use as can, it's also been proven in the past that one way for Pogi to be beaten is relentless attacks, to put him into the red. However that does require a rider to as good as sacrifice themselves for that one move which makes riskHoopoeChai07-04-2025