Israel - Premier Tech have shared their lineup for the Giro d'Italia and they include riders who will seek stage wins. The overall classification is an unlikely goal, with Michael Woods being the team's headliner who can possibly aim for both.Woods has won stages at the Tour de France and Giro d'It...

CyclistIm really looking forward to this next chapter: Tao Geoghegan Hart Q&AWhat do you remember from your race-ending crash in the Giro dItalia last year?Directly from the moment that Giro crash happened, I understood everything. There were five seconds of ambiguity where I had hope and thought, You need to jump up and go, this is the Giro, youre flying. And then I remembered what I felt when I touched the ground. It was a situation I never imagined Id be in. I had always walked away from some decent hits.Of course, it was horrible to be stuck in hospital for two weeks. And its really hard to be in a wheelchair, not able to walk. But I always had short-term goals I could chip away at. The rehab, the surgery, everything went smoothly.After suffering a complex femur fracture, you didnt race for the rest of 2023 and focussed on recovery. How has this experience changed you?Its a new chapter of my career for many reasons. The crash is, of course, one thing, but Ive also changed teams [from Ineos Grenadiers] after seven years. Lidl-Trek is only the second WorldTour team of my career. There are new adventures and experiences going on. Related Posts Sitting pretty in pink: How Tao Geoghegan Hart climbed to the top This Giro dItalia showed us a new fun and exciting side to Ineos Grenadiers, fingers crossed its here to stay Next Big Thing: Tao Geoghegan Hart profile (2013) It was interesting to be quite outside of cycling for half a year. For a long time I didnt see anyone to do with the sport. Well, I saw Dylan [van Baarle] while I was recovering in Amsterdam; we had a coffee one afternoon. I was working with people that didnt follow the Tour de France. I was really outside of cycling and that was just a good period for me not that I needed it or searched for it, but I made the most of it. Doing that was the best way to come back really fresh now. Im looking forward to this next chapter.What are your hopes and expectations for 2024?Its quite a clean slate. Similar to any time of my career, its about being the best I can be. In the Giro I was so happy because I felt I hadnt really started the race yet and we were halfway through. I was just waiting to show what I wanted to show. It was all trending in the right direction, and thats the best feeling in the world when youve worked five months with a nice group of guys around you, spending four weeks at a time together at altitude, sacrificing things, putting the hours in.With this team, there are big changes. Lidl is a huge and really ambitious company. Theres a lot of amazing history, a lot of people have been together here a long time. Ive been racing with Mads Pedersen since we were under-16s. I think he gets a lot of credit, but he should actually get more.Tao Gheoghegan Hart celebrates with his Ineos Grenadiers teammates after his victory at the 2020 Giro dItalia. Photo: Chris AuldFor what he does?The way he won the Bemer Cyclassics in Germany, you dont see that in cycling anymore. It was like Cancellara in Milan-San Remo of yesteryear. Hes 28 and hes won in every Grand Tour and is doing the Classics. Its really underestimated how hard that is.When you turned pro with Team Sky, it was an established squad that had won multiple Tours de France. Lidl-Trek also wants to become a superteam. How do you see yourself as an asset?Honestly, I think thats a little bit contentious because everyone starts from zero every winter. Fortunes change fast. On the top of that climb before I crashed, I felt so good and fresh. In one second [clicks his fingers], its another story. Its like that; teams and sponsors come and go really fast. Every WorldTour team is only as good as the riders its bringing in, the future its creating and the contracts its signing. So in that respect I want to bring my personality, my experience and my outlook for life.You took a few months out. Did the fact you knew you were switching teams give some time to adjust a bit?No, it was strange because I felt really away from cycling. I didnt feel like I was changing, to be honest. And it was also sad because I didnt have a chance to say goodbye and thank you to a lot of people [at Ineos]. 2014 was the first time I did a training camp with a lot of those riders and staff. Thats a decade; my whole adult life.For a long time last year I didnt feel emotionally involved with anything in cycling. I was really focussed on crazy, tiny things you cant imagine.I couldnt bend my knee very far for months. I was living day to day by measuring how many degrees I could bend it. It would improve by two or three degrees after a two-hour painful treatment and lose a degree in the night. So if you cant walk, its impossible to imagine jumping on the bike to do four hours easy, riding 250 watts. I couldnt even pedal.Whats it like returning to the normal goal of being a professional cyclist after spending so many months focussing on one thing?The training is second nature for me. I love being on my bike. Its more the other stuff. I need to get the mindset back a bit more into nutrition. But Im not too far from where I was this time last year. I really expected some big setback or flare-up and Ive had nothing. That speaks a lot for the work I did in Amsterdam to be ready. Career highlightsAge 29Team Lidl-TrekNotable results20231st, Tour of the Alps, two stage wins20201st, Giro dItalia, two stage wins20192nd, Tour of the Alps, two stage wins20181st, Stage 3 (TTT), Critrium du Dauphin20161st, Road Race, National Under-23 Road Championships2nd, Time-Trial, National Under-23 Road Championships This article originally appeared in issue 151 of Cyclist magazine. Click here to subscribe Related Posts Sitting pretty in pink: How Tao Geoghegan Hart climbed to the top This Giro dItalia showed us a new fun and exciting side to Ineos Grenadiers, fingers crossed its here to stay Next Big Thing: Tao Geoghegan Hart profile (2013) The post Im really looking forward to this next chapter: Tao Geoghegan Hart Q&A appeared first on Cyclist.

Soudal - Quick-Step want to perform in the overall classification of the Tour de France, and will take a GC block to help Remco Evenepoel. For the Giro d'Italia, the team gives freedom to some of it's other leaders such as Tim Merlier and Julian Alaphilippe to seek their own victories.The Belgian t...

VF Group - Bardiani CSF - Faizan are one of the many teams to reveal their lineup for the Giro d'Italia at the start of this week and they are led by a veteran and a novice. Domenico Pozzovivo looks to leave his mark on the race's history.And the Italian will do so. After racing the Giro for the f...

Get there before the crowds, the A470 is going to be huuuge!BikePark Wales has just reopened its most iconic trail, the A470 Line, and this time around its 30% longer, packs Continue reading

With the Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team announcing their lineup for the first Grand Tour of 2024, GC hope Ben O'Connor is confirmed for a first Giro d'Italia showing since 2020 and the Australian is starting full of optimism.I would love to do that. That would be, as a personal ambition, somethin...

It was an early Monday morning. The Hudson River was like glass:And the pickleball courts of suburbia were as yet untrodden by New Balances:It was across this placid landscape that one semi-professional bike blogger pedaled a now-silent carbon and titanium racing bicycle:Im pleased to report that the crank transplant I mentioned yesterday has so far proven to be a success. For one thing, the external bottom bracket is noticeably stiffer than the ISIS unit it replaced, and the improvement in power transfer is immediately noticeable:Just kidding, of course, its a fucking crank. However, it is a lot quieter, and so it definitely feels more efficientbecause, as Ive noted before, sound probably informs the way our bicycles feel a lot more than we realize or admit.But yes, the crank should serve quite wellat least until such a time as I arrange with Classic Cycle for a long-term replacement with a level of cachet befitting such a rarefied bicycle:As an unavowed Hollowtech II apologist, Id say that with bottom bracket already in situ, sliding a Dura-Ace 7800 in there would be the most simple and mechanically elegant solution, even if its not consistent with the otherwise 7700 drivetrain.Meanwhile, last week I touched on the state of the cycling industry, and it seems as though Rapha North America is the latest victim of the recent downturn:Its easy to blame post-COVID-19 market volatility:But in the case of Rapha I wonder if its simply because theyve been out-Rapha-ed by all these upstart brands. As a solitary aging loser, I do virtually all of my cycling alone, and in places most other people dont ride. (To wit: suburbia in the early morning, see above.) However, with a spiffy carbon-and-titanium Fred Sled under my auspices for the foreseeable future Ive been steering myself onto the popular roadie routes now and again lately, and so I see what These Kids Today are wearing while out on the bikeand theyre not wearing Rapha. No, Raphas what that Primal Cranken Stein jersey used to be like 20 years ago:[Primal Crankin Stein jersey: the most Jewish-sounding cycling jersey produced by any company to date, second only to the Pedalin Lipschultz.]Yeah, thats right; it used to be that wearing Rapha marked you as a member of the cycling cogacenti cognascenti cool people. But now it just marks you as a noob. Today, wearing Rapha on your road or gravel bike is just a notch or two above riding in Sponeed half-shorts while sporting a pie plate:No, today the hot young chamois-diapered jet-setters are wearing brands like MAAP:By the way, if you dont know what MAAP stands for, youre a loser like me, because it doesnt stand for anything:Well color me RWDDCed*.*[Funnily enough, RWDDC doesnt stand for anything, but Im playing around with different meanings at the moment, and I kind of like Riddled With Da Douche Chills.]Anyway, if you see a fit young cyclist clad in muted tones and hunched over an indistinguishable Canyon/Factor/S-Works/Whatever, six times out of ten he or she will be wearing MAAPwhich is not to say the clothing isnt relatable. I mean, dont you dress like this when you commute to work?Theyve really nailed their marketing too, because everything about their models conveys the sheer joy of cycling, and one look at them just makes you want to hop on a bike:He looks like hes in the middle of a therapy session and he just realized that the guy who used to hang around the house a lot when he was in the 6th grade was having an affair with his mother.But MAAP is practically Old Navy compared to Pas Normal Studios:These are actual images from their Alt collection:And this is an image from a recent Pas Normal Alt group ride:Just kidding:That last one was the New York Dolls circa 1972.But the other two were totally realIn any case, back in the 1990s there was a look the media dubbed heroin chic:It was really less about heroin than it was about what happens when eating disorders and being attracted to minors collides, but in any case it was a distant memory until Pas Normal decided to bring it backfor cycling of all things, which is a pursuit best suited to the hale and hardy, not the wan and anemic:Shes so despondent shes allowing the contents of her water bottle to dribble all over her right foot. This is something no cyclist does no matter how tired they are.Oh, and Pas Normal also has you covered off the bike with their Gym and Training collection:Its the wardrobe of choice for the weak and ineffectual person who cant even get his pelvis up off the ground when attempting a push-up.Oh, and check out the fucking Children of the Corn:As you can see, in this marketing environment, Rapha never stood a chance. Really the only way to one-up these companies is to model your clothes with actual cadavers.Shit, I think I just designed Pas Normals 2025 collection.

With the latest reports suggesting Demi Vollering's transfer to FDJ - Suez can be considered all but officially confirmed, another rumour mill has begun regarding who Team SD Worx - Protime will target to replace the Tour de France Femmes champion.Names such as Katarzyna Niewiadoma and Cecilie Uttru...

Electric mountain bikes (e-bikes) let you go further and faster in the same time as a regular mountain bike, which makes them perfect for the hectic pace of modern life.Specialized Turbo Levo Comp 2023Stating the obvious: the best electric mountain bike will be flipping great! We had so much fun with this best-of list were embarrassed to call it "work".

Allan Shaw and Jenny Tough recently teamed up for their first ultra-distance bikepacking event as a pair, racing side by side in the 2024 GranGuanche Audax Gravel in Spain's Canary Islands. In this piece, Allan shares his perspective on chasing ferries across five islands together and reflects on how racing in a pair differs from going it alone. Find his story and a set of 35mm film photos here...The post GranGuanche: Two Friends Chasing Ferries appeared first on BIKEPACKING.com.