‘My best shot so far’: Tom Pidcock bids to make history at wide-open World Championships road race
· Yahoo Sports
This Sunday’s World Championships road race in Montreal promises to be one of the most open in years, with two-time defending champion Tadej Pogacarnot on the start line. His absence, and a course suited to a wider range of riders than some in recent years, means any number could claim the coveted world champion’s rainbow jersey.
Among their number is Britain’s Tom Pidcock, co-leader of a strong squad alongside veteran Adam Yates. Pidcock is no stranger to rainbow stripes, having won world titles in cyclo-cross and on the mountain bike – including winning a second mountain bike cross-country crown just last month. But a world title on the road would trump every other victory in his career, and make him the first man ever to be world champion in all three disciplines.
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Speaking from a training base outside Boulder, Colorado, Pidcock tells The Independent and other outlets: “Regardless of everything else, I think becoming road world champion would be truly amazing. It’s going to be so hard to win, [but] I think this is my best opportunity so far in my career, that’s for sure. It definitely suits me, a hard course, the length of climb.
“I think the depth [in the peloton] is so deep, I might not even stand on the podium, so I think it’s quite an open race. Even having said that, it’s my best shot so far.”
Part of Pidcock’s build-up to the World Championships involved the two Canadian Grands Prix, one-day races in Quebec and Montreal. The results were positive – a fourth place in Quebec and sixth two days later on the tougher, more hilly Montreal course. It was the ideal dress rehearsal: the GP de Montreal features 16 laps of the same Mont Royal circuit which features 12 times in the 273.2km Worlds road race.
“I felt like it was very attritional,” Pidcock says. “The race in Montreal felt like it also took forever.” There was a headwind on the main climb, the Cote Camillien-Houde, which – if replicated on Sunday – could play a decisive role in how the race pans out. “I don’t know if that’s the prevailing wind or not, but it made it hard, but also hard to make a difference. I think it’s a course that favours saving for one big move.”
The 27-year-old can often be a harsh self-critic, but he sounded upbeat about his shape, following his strong showings in Canada, a win in a one-day race in Italy, and most significantly, that mountain bike world title in Val di Sole. “I’ve felt really good these last few weeks, actually, even training at altitude. I did some VO2 [maximum oxygen volume] efforts at 25,000 metres for the first time ever, and I actually managed to do them, so that must be quite a good thing,” he smiles. “I feel really, really good, to be honest, but yeah, one-day races, you can get it wrong, even if you feel good leading into it.”
Pidcock won the mountain bike cross-country world title for a second time late last month (AP)We can’t discuss this World Championships without talking about the enormous void left by Pogacar, ruled out of a “three-peat”, and the rest of his season, with a collarbone fracture and other injuries sustained in a crash at the Vuelta a Espana.
Pidcock was third at last year’s Vuelta, his first-ever podium at a Grand Tour, but opted to skip it this season. Given how the race panned out without Pogacar, did he have any regrets about missing it?
His mind was made up long before, he says: “When I was sick before the Tour [de France] I thought, yeah, I don’t want to go back to the Vuelta now, the Tour’s gonna be rubbish. The Tour was all right,” – something of an understatement: Pidcock finished ninth overall, his best-ever result at the sport’s biggest race – “but, no, I wanted to go to the mountain bike Worlds. I missed that last year, so, you can’t do everything all the time, but I’m quite content with it, really.”
He doesn’t even wait for the end of a question on the Slovenian’s absence at the Worlds before saying it “100%” changes the contours of the race. He says drily: “I wouldn’t know who to bet on now; if Tadej is racing, I want to bet on him.”
The two contenders that stand out to Pidcock in Pogacar’s absence are the Slovenian’s trade-team protege, 22-year-old Mexican Isaac del Toro – who won the GP de Montreal – and French teenager Paul Seixas.
Tadej Pogacar will not defend his rainbow jersey (Reuters)Interestingly Pidcock rates Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel, another favourite for the title and the 2022 champion, less highly: “Remco will for sure be good, and he’s always a guy that – in Montreal he got dropped on the climb and then he comes back because he’s so good – but I think Del Toro and Seixas are the guys who can make the difference on the climb more than the rest of us.”
Pidcock will co-lead alongside Yates, a former winner in Montreal and another of Pogacar’s trade teammates. After the Canadian double-header, Pidcock opted to head to Colorado for a change of scene and to avoid the “endless wait” in the team hotel before the racing actually begins, meaning he has yet to actually meet up with Yates and his other teammates, but he says the 34-year-old is a big boost to the squad. “He’s got a lot of experience. He’s also been part of the winning team for the past five years [UAE Team Emirates-XRG].”
Since a falling-out with then-team Ineos Grenadiers in late 2024 and his surprise move to lower-tier outfit Pinarello Q36.5, Pidcock has enjoyed a role as undisputed team leader, which has also given him more confidence in calling the shots in the national squad. “It’s definitely something that I’ve grown into,” he says.
Zoe Backstedt (left) won silver for GB in the elite time trial and Aalia Clay bronze in the junior TT (Chris Auld/SWpix.com)“Before in Ineos, even when I was leader, I struggled to ask for what I wanted because there were so many big names and experienced riders. I guess now coming to this team I felt almost more responsibility that I had to lead and ask for some things because I understood that people were there to support me, so I’m much better at that role.”
Only two British men have ever won the world title, Tom Simpson in 1965 and Mark Cavendish in 2011. The opportunity to make history and join those legendary names is something Pidcock is “very aware” of: “I think that’s why when Cav won it, it was so special. Also the Tour de France success that we’ve had, it’s not normal, shall we say, so I think it’s not to be taken for granted. That’s why it’s the world championship, that’s why it’s one of the most important races of the year.”