by Simon Crisp
Katusha Alpecin How did they do in 2017? Poor given the calibre of riders they have. Whilst drawing a blank in terms of Grand Tour stage wins is not unusual, Katusha were the only team to manage it in the World Tour in 2017, although Ilnur Zakarin did salvage a podium at the Vuelta after a... Continue Reading →
Movistar How did they do in 2017? It's a tale of two men. Alejandro Valverde had, by his own assessment, his best season ever up until the point he fractured his kneecap in the Tour de France opening time trial, securing Liege Bastonge Liege and his fourth Fleche Wallone in a row. Add to that the... Continue Reading →
BMC Racing Team How did they do in 2017? In terms of volume of success, BMC had a stellar 2017, wracking up the highest number of victories in the team's lifespan, with almost all of the team taking a win of some kind. They also managed to finally secure their first Monument win courtesy of... Continue Reading →
Ah Milan-San Remo, La Primavera, The Sprinter's Classic, the first Monument of the season, the easiest race to ride but the hardest to win, La Classicissima. It goes by many names, and for a race said to favour the sprinters, it produces a myriad of outcomes. Below, we celebrate the last 21 editions with some... Continue Reading →
Got your head around that title? I havent quite, so let's go over what this is about. As in tune with my work-in-progress Grand Tour Stages project, one of its many, many aims is to try and count what bicycles stage winners in Grand Tours used, and thus which has the most wins in history... Continue Reading →
Stage wins, yellow jerseys and top 10s As mentioned before, the Tour began with 198 riders, of which there where three previous winners of the race, as well as five other Grand Tour winners. There were also 36 previous stage winners, who had won 106 stages between them, as well as eleven previous wearers of... Continue Reading →
Here's a few facts and figures to wile away the hours until the Tour begins. Time Trials Just 1.24% (41.8km) of this year's route will be made up of Time Trials, the lowest amount in the 1980 to 2015 period. The only other times it has taken up under 2% between 1980 and 2015 was... Continue Reading →
The green jersey is arguably the third competition in terms of importance in this year's Tour de France, being behind, of course, the yellow jersey, but given this year celebrates the 40th anniversary of the King of the Mountains Polka-Dot Jersey, it slips behind that, no thanks to the fact that it has also not... Continue Reading →
It's 2015, which means that before we know it, we will be at the Giro, and the Grand Tours will be under way. So, as an interesting aside, I thought it would be novel to look at just how many riders actually win a Grand Tour stage. Since (and including) 1999, there have been 48... Continue Reading →
Ah, the UCI. Not only did they tear up the Olympic rule book and remove the Individual Pursuit from the program having removed the Kilo TT as well, they also decided that the most important things to do in the sport were to stop overshoes going more than halfway up people's calves and that saddles... Continue Reading →
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