Egan Bernal (Ineos) and Nairo Quintana (Arkea-Samsic) have real options wins the Adriatic Tyrrhenian, a competition that starts on Wednesday with a stretch of 156 kilometers, on flat ground, and that will end next Tuesday with a time of 10 km and that will have the participation of four more Colombian cyclists.
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Undoubtedly, the route suits them, and the conditions they showed in previous competitions put them as two Wasps that they will be the protagonists and that they have a lot to say in the race.
Both had experience in this regard. Nairo He competed three times and in two of them he was champion, 2016 and 2017 and was second, accompanying Alberto Contador, in 2014. half-mast competed in uniform Andron in 2017 and finished in the box 16 at 3 minutes and 20 seconds behind Quintana.
Of the two, the one who gets in better shape and will be the man he has to beat is BernHe, who this year participated in four races and in three of them was podium: 2 in the Tour de la Provence and in the Laigueglia Trophy and the third, last Saturday, in White roads. And in this last race he was full, in good shape, better than his rivals. He had the strength and strength to be in front, so in Tirreno Adriatico he will be fighting for the final victory.
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The Ineos runner regained his confidence, after the back injury that prevented him from successfully defending the Tour de France title and returned more recovered, after an intense physiotherapy work. Among the most important cyclists in the peloton, he is the one who made the best use of this first peak of high performance to fight races, and Tirreno fits in with his goals.
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Nairo it has three competitions: it was the ninth Tour of the Maritime Alps and VAR, 19 at Laigueglia and fourth at GP Industria & Artigianato, so you can see that he is growing and in these short races, which last a week, he can give it up and can fight with partial victories and the podium. boy He knows that these World Tour competitions are good opportunities to win, stand out and give the team a name.
Of course, there are strong rivals. Tirreno is the first face-off of the strongest cyclists in the peloton, with the exception Primoz Roglic, which runs in Paris Nice. And the most important thing is that the list includes several opponents that Bernal will have in the Giro d’Italia, such as Simon Yates, who defends the crown, Vincenzo Nibali, Romain Bardet, Thibaut Pinot, Mikel Landa, so scheduling will be important, even if it’s eight weeks before the start of the race.
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Tadej Pogacar, the current holder of the Tour de France title, will be the great rival of Egan and Nairo. He comes from winning the UAE Tournament and is also at a peak performance. It will be an important duel and a good option to see what they are up to this season. A victory will be a moral blow to your rivals.
The route will have a first high point this Thursday, Saturday and Sunday and will end the race with a short stopwatch, of only 10 kilometers, in which there will be no major differences. Yes, climbers will have to reach the specialists in at least 20 seconds on the last day, but here the problem is that Pogačar It goes up and the clock is ticking, so Bernal and Nairo will have to do the work to distance it on the climbs.
The other fight that Colombian cycling will focus on will be that of the pack with Fernando Gaviria, who will have rivals such as Davide Ballerini, Elia Viviani, Peter Sagan, Sony Colbrelli and Caleb Ewan, which will put him against the wall, although if the United Arab Emirates pilot gets in good shape, he will have no rival. It is a great unknown, Gaviria has not been strong for a long time. Álvaro Hodeg will be another Colombian card in the massive arrivals.
Sergio Higuita will be another letter. He will make his first race of the year, but he is a rider who is coping with this first part of the season in good conditions, as he did in 2020, when he won the national road race and was third in Paris Nice. The Colombian group completes it Daniel Munoz (Androni).
LYSANDRO RENGIFO
Editor THE WEATHER
And Twitter: @LisandroAbel