Sean Kelly believes Il Lombardia 2026 could prove to be a defining moment for professional cycling. Paul Seixas became the youngest winner in the history of the Monument with a dominant solo performance, but Kelly also highlighted the riders five-minute pre-race protest over safety concerns as an e...

Paul Seixas has yet to decide which Grand Tours he will ride in the 2027 season. After ending a remarkable year with victory at Il Lombardia and fourth place at the Tour de France, the young Frenchman will take a few weeks off before planning his next season with Decathlon CMA CGM. One option is to...

Walter Fowler knew that, as long as he completed two laps of the track, he would become world champion.He was, after all, the only rider competing in the 500m time trial in his 90-94 age bracket. In fact, he was the only person over 90 competing at all at the UCI Masters Track World Championships in London last week.I always am the oldest on the list at the Worlds, said Fowler, who turned 92 earlier this year. And even still, he adds, there were several riders, all the way down to 75-79 [age bracket], that were slower than me. Fowlers time of 50.06 seconds delivered him a new world best, if only for the fact that nobody his age had ridden the event before. He had to ask for special dispensation from the organisers to allow him to race alone in his age bracket, and after fighting off some dodgy health issues, gave himself only five weeks to train. In that time I concentrated entirely on a single objective: the 500m. No other distance. All that mattered was having a good start, a good middle, and a good finish, he told Cycling Weekly.Unfortunately, I did get a good start, but I started to die in the middle and second laps. But thats always been my character ever since I started back in 2008. Ive always had a fast first lap. A post shared by Prof. K. (@prof_k_cycling)A photo posted by Fowler has now won four Masters world titles since his championships debut in Sydney, Australia almost two decades ago. His latest rainbow jersey, won last Thursday inside the Lee Valley Velodrome, earned him a 30-second applause more than half the time his entire effort took during the medal ceremony. He then held both his hands in the air and bowed to the crowd, before another rider approached him for a selfie. I do seem to have raised enthusiasm in a lot of the cyclists, who are probably coming up to the point where theyre wondering, Will I be able to continue much longer?, Fowler said. Theyre then able to see, Well, if Walter Fowler can do it at 92, then I certainly can at 88. Its useful in inspiring people. Fowler, too, has his own inspirational figures. Speaking to Cycling Weekly two years ago, he explained he was aiming for the 90-94 Hour Record, held by American Carl Grove at 34.498km, but has since changed his mind its exceptionally fast, so it may not be in my interest to flog myself for it, he said. Instead, he is chasing the trail blazed by Frenchman Robert Marchand, who set the first Hour Record in the 100-plus age category, did the same in the 105-plus, and died aged 109 in 2021. Fowler would first like to take the 95-99 age group record. I dont make a great fuss about it, but its just a quiet resolve that I shall be going on to challenge the 100 result, he said. Hell be able to do so in 2034. In the meantime, he has already marked next years Masters Track Worlds in his diary, and is planning a tilt at the 2km individual pursuit, as well as defending his 500m title. Ive had the pursuit world title at other, younger age groups, so I know I can do it, he said. Three minutes is the sort of target for me. Ive done three minutes before and had a record at three minutes. Whether I can make that same amount, I dont know, but thats not the point; the point is to try my best and get myself fit enough, he continued. I dont consider that to be overdoing it.

British track sprinter Matthew Richardson has been withdrawn from the upcoming World Championships and is under investigation over reports of "serious misconduct". The Track World Championships run from Wednesday until Sunday in Shanghai, and mark the start of the qualification for the 2028 Los Ange...

Gravel national champion and Ribble Outliers rider Jenson Young tells Cycling Weekly about his experience in the weekend's Gravel World Championships in Australia, where he recorded, he says, his biggest result of the year.The 25-year-old joined a breakaway early in the race, which covered 144 kilometres and featured technically challenging pea gravel."To be honest, I didn't really expect much out of it. But I ended up going on the attack from the gun, pretty much. There was a group of six or seven of us, which was quickly down to three. We stayed away a long time I think I got caught by the chasing group at 110k or something like that. "The group that caught us, I think there were 12 of them. All the hitters were there, all the top guys riding, which was mega. I was just suffering with a bit of a bad back that far into the race, and on one of the big climbs, with 20k to go I got dropped from that group. I just paced it and held my position. I was 14th in the end."At the start I said top-20 would have been a mega result the course is not that suited to me with how hilly it was. But actually, the way I raced it and being in the breakaway, it was a much better result than it looked on paper. "The course [with its pea-gravel] is honestly like nothing I've ridden before. There's no other course similar to it really, so it was good experience. The rain had washed the slippy, dusty layer off the top, so it actually got a lot grippier for my race. The women on the Saturday had wet conditions, which made it a bit muddy, but it had dried up a little bit for us. I think our race had the best conditions it could have been for the kind of gravel it was."I think the season before the Worlds went so much better than I expected, winning the National Champs, a UCI race [Graen Cymru] and plenty of top-10s. So the Worlds was a bonus, really I didn't expect anything out of it. I wanted to go and race in Australia and enjoy it, and then it actually turned out to be probably my best race of the season. To come 14th, it's a bigger ride than anything else I've done, really. "True, it wasn't accessible for many people. I think they picked the furthest point away from anyone really to do a gravel race. But I can see why they did it. It was such a good course and race, and well organised. I wouldn't have wanted to go unless I thought I had a chance of doing well, just because of the cost."The quality was really good in the field. That just shows that all the top riders are willing to travel. In the elite race, we had just over 100 riders, and looking at the start list, every one of them could have got a top 20."I was sleeping all right, but [with the jet lag] I didn't feel great on the bike for a couple of days. And then a couple days before the race, I got a bit of a cold, so I had that through the race I've still got it now. So, feeling pretty rough with the cold, it made the ride even more unexpected. I felt rough in the race, but actually went all right."[Next] I might do the [cyclo-cross] National Champs and maybe a couple of races around it, just to get ready. I've chatted to my coach about that, and I think we're happy to do it. Then it's straight into another gravel season in February."Jenson Young was talking to James Shrubsall

Team Visma | Lease a Bike sprinter Fabio Jakobsen took a 16th place finish in his return to the WorldTour at the Tour of Guangxi on Tuesday. But the modest finish among the sprint contenders doesn't reflect their confidence in the Dutch sprinter. After a disappointing 18 months with injuries and ill...