The Wollongong 2022 UCI Road World Championships are just a few days away from starting, with international riders just getting accustomed to Australian conditions after arriving from around the world.
Remco touches down in Australia
The recent Vuelta champion will be one of the favourites for the time trial and will be a strong card for the powerful Belgian squad in the road race. He wore a shirt bearing the names of the entire QuickStep Alpha Vinyl squad who helped him win the Vuelta a Espana, with his name in red as the champion.
AVV doing as much from afar to get herself ready
Annemiek van Vleuten is again one of the favourites for a rainbow jersey in Wollongong after another strong season for the two-time time trial world champion and 2017 road race world champion. The 39-year-old went as far as doing some training rides during the Challenge by La Vuelta, mixing in her race-winning performance with some morning rides to get her body in the right mode to compete in Australia, eight hours removed in timezone from central Europe.
She's in Wollongong now, just putting the final touches on her preparation for another tilt at worlds.
How it started vs How it’s going
Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo) has only done one summer out in Australia in her professional racing career, but it clearly made an impression in her mind. Searing temperatures greeted the peloton that year in South Australia, the Italian star is clearly relishing the more temperate climate of the NSW coast.
A cool new kit for the Aussies
The traditional green and gold stripes are re-imagined with designs from Kalkadoon artist Chern’ee Sutton throughout the green portion in a kit that highlights diversity and inclusion.
Time zone gripes
Every international cycling viewer in Australia knows the choice of staying up into the wee hours of the morning and sacrificing sleep to keep up with the biggest races live, but the Europeans don’t, so expect to hear plenty of complaints over the next few weeks of disrupted sleep schedules and inopportune viewing times.
I think the general response from Australian fans will be ‘harden up’, but if the primary goal of a city/region hosting the event is tourism, then you want as many eyeballs on the race as possible.
Welcome to Wollongong!
And ‘welcome’ in a more ironic sense
Tadej Pogacar was welcomed to Wollongong by a puncture that saw him stranded by the side of the road, might have been a surprise for the Uber driver to have a two-time Tour de France winner hop in!
Tadej Pogacar gets a flat on his first ride in Australia (Instagram)
