Tom Pidcock gives up cyclocross title fight, wants to challenge Peter Sagan on Olympic MTB course

Slovakian cyclist Pater Sagan is confident that if he qualifies for the Olympic cross country mountain bike race, his main challenger will be British INEOS Grenadiers rider Tom Pidcock.

The 24-year-old from Leeds can do it with a bike on virtually any surface and in any discipline. He can ride a cyclo-cross race well, be a valid member of the British track team. And is being considered by his team as a leader for this year’s Tour de France, the road cycling race. But he has chosen to make winning the Olympic mountain bike race his main goal this year.

Why did Pidcock choose a direct battle with Peter Sagan in the Paris Olympic race and not set a different goal? Perhaps winning the Olympic velodrome or the individual time trial? And what will the twenty-four-year-old winner of the 2021 Barbanti Arrow road classic, subordinate all that to?

Those are a few questions, but perhaps easily answered. First of all, Pidcock won the Olympic mountain bike race at the last Olympics in Tokyo. So he’s decided to defend his Olympic gold.

So Pidcock decided to sacrifice winning the Olympic mountain bike race to the so-called Ardennes Classics. He simply wouldn’t show up for the cobblestone single track road races. So he wouldn’t get injured and could defend his Olympic track championship.

Pidcock won’t be riding the World Cyclo-cross Championships

A number of classics riders must not be happy about this. As Pidcock, with his squadron from British team INEOS, is always a great competitor. Plus, he won’t be riding the World Cyclo-cross Championships either. This wasn’t really expected, but Tom must have realised that this year’s cyclo-cross season is entirely in the hands of Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel. The Dutchman has won virtually every major race of the cyclo-cross season apart from the Benidorm race where he crashed.

It is very likely that van der Poel will also win on 4 February at the World Cyclo-cross Championships in Tabor, Czech republic. That is, unless he crashes or a small cyclocross miracle happens.

In short, Pidcock has decided not to even risk a cyclocross battle for the world championship. And maybe possible injury in the field. For the record, he already has three golds at home in various categories of the cyclocross world championships. He won among the elite men two years ago.

But his motivation is still on the road, specifically at the Tour de France, where he should be the leader of the British team INEOS Grenadiers. And even though team owner Sir Bradley has decided to focus on Manchester United football rather than the cycling stable this year, the squad itself hasn’t stopped believing it is ready to win the yellow jersey at the Tour de France, which this year ends in Nice instead of Paris.

Meanwhile, with Pidcock yet to swap his cyclocross bike for a mountain one, Sagan is already training with his Specialized Factory Racing mountain bike team in South Africa, with Nino Schurter as his sparring partner.

The 37-year-old now former Swiss cyclist, who has won ten world titles on his mountain bike and has bronze, silver and gold in Olympic races. The aforementioned gold was won by Sagan’s current training partner at the 2016 Olympics, exactly four years before Pidcock. How symbolic!

Source: Cyclingnews