It didn’t take a genius to predict the winners this year. You can tell, because I did it. Lotte Kopecky won the women’s race for Belgium, and Tadej Pogačar took the men’s title for Slovenia. Even given how obvious it was that these were the two riders to beat, the way these two races played out were anything but predictable.
Here are some thoughts on what we saw:
- Lotte Kopecky retained her rainbow jersey in a six-woman sprint. The riders in that group had to know she was the fastest, but maybe they hoped she had burned all her matches in the hilly circuit around Zurich. The women’s race went off in cold wind and rain, and so it was more attritional than most World Championships, but Kopecky’s strength coupled with good teamwork from Belgium won the day.
- American Chloé Dygert had to be thrilled with her silver medal. The time trial specialist rode one of the races of her lifetime to stick in that front group to the end, and she wasn’t all that far off Kopecky when the sprint wound up. American race fans have to be excited to have Dygert at this level, not to mention US teammate Kristen Faulkner, who won gold at the Olympics.
- With Elisa Longo-Borgini coming third, the obvious question was, where was Demi Vollering? Where were the Dutch? Riejanne Markus and Marianne Vos attacked repeatedly before Vollering, who had been sitting the bunch, tried her own attacks that ended up dropping her teammates. A lack of plan and teamwork doomed them.
- Turning to the men’s race, what can you say about what Tadej Pogačar did on the road in Switzerland? He attacked from 100km out. Yeah. Nonsense. No one should be this much better than everyone else. Adding the World Championship to the Giro and the Tour, not to mention Strade Bianchi and Liege-Bastogne-Liege, makes this one of the greatest seasons of all-time. It’s not normal.
- I was impressed with Ben O’Connor’s performance at the Vuelta. I didn’t think he had the maturity and grit to pull off a podium result at a Grand Tour, so it was refreshing to see him make the step up to that level. I never expected him to follow it with a silver medal at Worlds. As the race played out, he didn’t look like a contender, but he kept himself in contention and sprung his attack at just the right time to bring some glory to the talented Australian team.
- Mathieu van der Poel finished third from a small bunch sprint. I didn’t think he could climb well enough to win this race, and I was right, but the bronze is a good result for the 2023 World Champ. He probably ought to have finished in front of O’Connor, but he depends more on power than tactical nous, so bronze is solid.