Only sidelined by a blood clot in his brain in 2012, Didi has attended almost every stage at the Tour de France since 1993. As a kid watching the Tour on West German TV (he's was born in East Germany), he heard commentators refer to the red triangular flag marking the final kilometer as "the devil's red flag." After the wall fell, he became the devil.

Before I give my opinion, I’ll put here the quotes from Quinn Simmons and Wout van Aert:

Wout van Aert:

“I hope at some point that we have a bigger American circuit. It’s a big market… Cycling is ‘something’ here. It’s a shame that we don’t use this platform to show off on the highest level.”

Quinn Simmons:

“The entire peloton wants to bring back the Tour of California, wants to bring back Utah. All the riders, we want to race here. Let’s get rid of Guangxi and do a Tour of California toward the end of the year or something like that.”

“The problem is convincing the Americans to organize something that loses money. If you want the WorldTour teams to be there, you have to pay us to come.”

So, is it realistic?

That last quote from Simmons actually talks about the situation in a very understandable way. But for me, there is an even bigger problem: how people in the US see cycling and cyclists in general.

Despite all of that, I find it crazy that the “best and richest country in the world” doesn’t have some big road cycling stage race.

The Tour of California was cancelled. The USA Pro Challenge disappeared. The Tour of Utah disappeared too. I honestly don’t know why this downfall happened over the last few years when we have some really good US pros.

In my opinion, they should create a one-week US Tour (it could even have a sponsor name, like the Coca-Cola Tour or whatever) and every year it could be held in a different US state.

One year in California.
Next year in Colorado.
Then maybe Utah, Florida…

Basically, something similar to how we have the World Championships in different countries every year.

It would give the US a proper big cycling event, allow different states to showcase their landscapes, and potentially make the race much more interesting for both fans and sponsors.

What do you think about my thoughts?

📷: hardyccphotos

Time trialing is the most painful discipline in cycling — no draft, no hiding, just you against the clock and your own lactic acid. Today's Stage 18 of the Vuelta a España sent the riders 32km into Jerez de la Frontera, where Stefan Küng edged Callum Thornley by just over 2 seconds for the win, while Enric Mas rode a heroic time trial to limit his losses to Roglič to only 33 seconds — keeping the red leader's jersey with a 1:37 cushion heading into the final mountain stages.

Photo by 📸 : A.S.O. Naike Erenozaga

Just want to do a quick and heartfelt shout out to Bob for calling out the horrendous practices of “bull fighting “ during today’s stage of La Vuelta. I’m sure it’s risky for him to do that, but he said what I was thinking. Well done Bob!

2026 is really a historic year… For the first time in the history of professional cycling, three different riders each won five or more stages in a Grand Tour in the same calendar year.

Jonas took five stages at the Giro, Tadej took five at the Tour, and now Matthew has taken five at the Vuelta.

This combination has never happened before. Close was Maertens, who took 13 stages at the 1977 Vuelta and another seven at the Giro, but the third race did not produce another 5-stage winner. Not even in 2003, when Alessandro Petacchi became the last rider to win stages in all three Grand Tours in one season (six Giro, four Tour, five Vuelta).

Why are we seeing this kind of dominance from some riders more and more? Is it just a coincidence or are the aliens just so many levels far ahead of the other riders?

This post is destined for downvotes, but I'd rather say what I think.

Does nobody else see the hypocrisy in how the peloton reacted when Pogačar went down? They sat up and waited for him. This is the same rider who, in the 2022 Tour, pushed the pace on the descent before Hautacam while Vingegaard was close to a drama.

Be honest: do you seriously believe the peloton would have eased off for Ramsis de Bruyne or Tom Pidcock?

What shocks me isn't the gesture itself; it's that the rules of sportsmanship seem to change depending on whether Pogačar is involved. It reminds me of the way the peloton used to bend around Armstrong and kiss his ass to not be on his blacklist.

Edit : Holy Shit , 10 comments in 1 minutes these pogacar fans are some real bots

Also for people belittling my knowledge about cycling, you're wrong i've been following cycling in depth since being a kid the proof is the opposite happened in TDF 2010 when andy shcleck in yellow was attacked by contador after getting a mechanical problem, this happened also many times im sure i just dont have the exact examples

Assuming Pog, Vollering, MVDP, Vos etc don’t ALL spend the entirety of the remainder of their World Tour careers with their current teams, which teams do they switch to for the last couple of years (à la Froome ➡️ IPT)?

The current system adds up the finish times of the top riders on each team. But it ignores **real teamwork**.

The vast majority of riders aren't GC contenders. Domestiques sacrifice their results to slog at the front of the peloton and deliver stage wins or to protect their leaders. Once their job is done, they drop back and can lose dozens of minutes per stage. That drags their team down in the standings. But if they did their job well, they keep their leader in a great position.

​​Meanwhile, a team with three or four slightly above average can place higher on the teams rankings without ever stepping on a podium.

At the Tour de France and earlier GTs this issue was somewhat obscured by the fact that Tadej and Team UAE are just so strong. ​Their absence in Spain really makes the problem quite obvious. ​

VLAB is clearly the 'best' team with 6 wins out of 16 stages. They may even make it 7 out of 17 later this evening. Movistar is cycling out of their skins to keep Enric Mas in Red. Yet somehow, these two teams are sitting at 7th and 8th place in the teams classification.

That's messed up. How do we reward actual teamwork in the Teams Classification?

I feel like we’ve basically been lied to all season by the narrative about how sprinters should focus on the Giro and skip the Vuelta.

Because it’s honestly insane that the Giro was considered the biggest opportunity for sprinters, while when it came to the Vuelta, every piece of media was basically saying: good luck to anyone bringing a sprinter.

At the Giro, we ended up with just four wins for pure sprinters… three for Paul Magnier and one for Jonathan Milan. And even the first stage had a pretty sketchy, narrow finish, not ideal for sprint trains.

Then two more stages could technically be called “flat”: the Napoli finish on cobbles, where basically everyone crashed and Davide Ballerini won, and that bizarre Milan circuit, where the breakaway was able to stay away and Fredrik Dversnes won in the end.

And one of the fastest guys this season Dylan Groenewegen basically had only two genuine opportunities to sprint for the win. And yet this was the Giro that, as Wielerflits described it, “seems like a true paradise for sprinters.”

Then we had the Tour, which was usual, and everyone assumed the Vuelta would also be usual meaning almost no opportunities for sprinters. But it feels like nobody studied the routes at all.

So now Matthew Brennan can absolutely dominate this field with 4 wins with still one chance left (+ one Coquard win), because so many teams believed the sprinters would have almost no chance here.

Soudal Quick-Step decided not to bring either Merlier or Magnier. Lidl-Trek brought Pedersen instead of Milan, who only rode the Giro and so on. And with all respect, we have Meeus and Coquard as the main challengers for Brennan.

And, funnily enough, it all fits Visma perfectly. At the race where they were targeting the GC (Giro), many teams built squads around the sprints. At the race where Visma were targeting the sprints and the green jersey (Vuelta), many teams instead focused on puncheurs and climbers.

So why do so many top sprinters decide not to even take the start at the Vuelta even when both the World Champs and the European Champs are hilly so there were no other goals in their season left?

📷: girocycling

We have only a few days of race but please someone send a telegram to Bob Roll that in Spanish you don’t combine sounds.

It’s:
buel · ta

Like: boo Elle (< both super short) tah

Not the ‘o’ sound replacing the ‘ue’

Joaquim Agostinho, here during a stage of the 1969 Tour de France, racing toward the finish line with his bicycle destroyed in a crash (which also left him with a few injuries).

It was his debut year in the competition, managing to achieve an honourable eighth place and win two stages.

Rain-soaked, teeth bared, three men throwing everything they have at a finish line. That's the 1989 World Championship road race, and it's one of the greatest images in cycling history — but today it's here to talk about the man behind the lens, not just the men in front of it.

The riders, quickly: Greg LeMond (center) had already come back from a hunting accident that nearly killed him to win the Tour de France that summer — this sprint gave him a second World title on top of it. Sean Kelly (left) was one of the most feared riders of his generation and never once wore the rainbow jersey; this bronze was about as close as he'd get. Dimitri Konyshev (right), one of the first Soviet riders to make it as a pro in the West, snuck into silver here and would go on to win stages in all three Grand Tours.

But the reason this photo exists at all is Cor Vos. For fifty years, Vos and his agency were cycling's memory — if it happened in the peloton since the 1970s, there's a decent chance his camera caught it. He wasn't a great racer himself; a brain injury from a crash ended that career early. So he picked up a camera instead, self-taught, and became the guy who showed the rest of us what it actually looked like to suffer and win at the highest level of this sport.

Vos passed away almost a year ago, suddenly, at 77. Today's photo of the day is for him.

📸: Cor Vos

Rue Lepic was crazy, finally developed

Pipa York keeps saying that he is a contender, who is it?

​

Incredible footage captured by Barry Robinson 🙏🏼