2021 PARIS ROUBAIX PREVIEW – RIDERS PREPARE FOR WET AND UNPREDICTABLE RACE

The miles of mud and millions of cobblestones on the epic Paris-Roubaix one-day race on Sunday will be turned into a spectacular splatter-fest by heavy rain. Rescheduled for October this year instead of April, Paris-Roubaix is a major date of the French sports calendar with its 160 mile course including 34 miles of rough, cobblestone roads where the usual traffic is heavy farm vehicles and ambitious amateur cyclists. In April, the wheat would usually be high in the fields of northern Picardy region but the October date means the sweeping fields will be exposed to winds that could make the race faster and potentially even more risky. Given the wet and windy forecast, a young and powerful rider might be expected to win over the bone-shaking cobbles and the mud-slick country roads. With that in mind the recent world champion Julian Alaphilippe and Olympic mountain-bike champion Tom Pidcock, who is young but slight, have been left at home by their teams. But debutant Mathieu van der Poel appears to have the panache to win a race that his French cycling legend grandfather Raymond Poulidor rode a record 18 times.

“I’m in top shape now,” van der Poel said at Saturday’s teams presentation.

“It’ll be cool if it rains,” said the 26-year-old Alpecin rider who proved his form when he finished in a small group behind Alaphilippe in the world championships last week.

Remarkably for an event that finishes on the Franco-Belgian border there has been no rain on the race itself since 2002, but if it continues on Sunday it will make slippery the already treacherous, rough-hewn cobbles. Much of the race is contested on tarmac but the 25 teams of seven riders will also endure 30 paved sections, each given a 1-5 star difficulty rating, that set the pulses racing for an avid television audience in France. The 34 miles of cobbles, containing more than six million stones are preserved by volunteers as part of local culture in the former mining region.

Six million cobblestones

The winner of the race is awarded a cobblestone for their efforts, while local officials plead each year with the fans and curious onlookers not to take away any as souvenirs. The race was last run in 2019 when it was won by Belgian Philippe Gilbert. The Quick-Step rider escaped with Nils Pollitt and outpaced the German in the Roubaix outdoor velodrome, which can make for thrilling cat-and-mouse finishes on its steep banks. Race folklore has it that the road — and especially the cobbles — decide the winner,

Van Der Poel said: “You can be as adept as you like, if someone in front of you falls, you go down with them. You have to ride your luck to win here.”

Gilbert, the hugely popular defending champion, now rides for Lotto, while 2018 champion Peter Sagan from Slovakia is capable of making a tilt in his last race for Bora-Hansgrohe. Jumbo’s Belgian star Wout van Aert, the Dane Kasper Asgreen of Deceuninck and Dutch Ineos powerhouse Dylan van Baarle all possess the pedigree and physical traits needed for a win on this race that may just come down to a ‘last man standing’.

Van Baarle said Ineos had sent a strong team to help him. “I have some key riders with special jobs. Me, I need to stay upright and cross the line first,” he said.

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RBA/AFP Photos: Bettini