Rey is back! 👑 @sebasmolano_ #CroRace 🇭🇷 #UAETeamEmirates #WeAreUAE
UAE Team Emirates' only sprinter becomes 20th rider to win in 2024: "I’ve been looking for this win for a long time but things just didn’t click"
CyclingThursday, 03 October 2024 at 11:00
It is almost becoming an internal joke at this point with certainty within UAE Team Emirates. The Emirati team, besides the extraordinary success it has achieved throughout the 2024 season with the likes of Tadej Pogacar, has also seen most of it's riders take a win. This Wednesday at the Cro Race, Juan Sebastián Molano became the 20th team rider to take a stage win this year.
It actually comes as a surprise as in 2023 the Colombian won stages at the Vuelta a España, UAE Tour and Tour of Guangxi among others. Quality victories at World Tour level that, despite not cementing him at the very top of the sprinter ranks, had UAE trust him as the team's sole leader for the 2024 season. But this year things just did not fit into place and only in October did he manage to take his first triumph, which happened on the second stage of the Cro Race.
“I’m really happy to take this win, my first of the season, finally. I’ve been looking for this win for a long time but things just didn’t click," Molano said in a press release issued by the team. "I want to try and add to it now and give everything to get more wins on the board before the end of the year.”
The 29-year old managed to take advantage of a chaotic sprint to surf through the right wheels and be clearly the fastest in the dash to the finish line, beating Polti Kometa's Giovanni Lonardi. Molano hence took victory number 76 for the team this season and is the 20th rider to open up his tally in the year - out of a team of 30 riders.
Today in the third day of the race Molano has the opportunity to grow this number even further, in a stage that will finish in the town of Opatija.
claps 1visitors 1595
Just in
Popular news
Latest comments
- 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