All of the above-mentioned are Grand Tour riders who, I assume, will eventually target the Tour de France. The 23-year-old Riccitello is scheduled to ride the Vuelta this year and INEOS has not yet published is plans for Onley and Vauquelin, both of whom shone in last year’s Tour. Add them all to the usual suspects, including Red Bull’s exciting young German rider Florian Lipowitz, and we’ve got what looks like a thrilling Grand Tour year ahead of us. And add to that the fascinating duels that this new landscape has set up – in addition to the old mano a mano a mano between Evenepoel, Jonas Vingegaard (Visma–Lease a Bike) and Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates–XRG) – and we may witness the most exciting racing season in quite some time.
A grudge match?
The excitement has already begun, with Evenepoel currently facing off against UAE’s future superstar, Isaac del Toro, in the UAE Tour and Ayuso riding against former UAE teammate João Almeida in the Volta ao Algarve em Bicicleta, or Tour of Algarve, which kicks off on February 18. Ayuso’s departure from UAE was anything but amicable, with the 23-year-old Spaniard labeling the team a “dictatorship” while riding in the Vuelta, ostensibly as a super-domestique for Almeida. But despite promising to be a good boy and help the team after he had won a stage, he reverted to form and did minimal work for his leader – and won a second stage.
That left poor Almeida riding against Vingegaard largely on his own. It’s a testimony to his strength as a rider and his professionalism that he managed to finish second while keeping his dissatisfaction mostly to himself. The 27-year-old Portuguese has been a sterling servant for Pogačar and the team and deserves to win some glory this year.
He finished second in this race last year, again to Vingegaard, and should be considered the favorite as he has one race under his belt, while this is the season’s first outing for Ayuso. I wonder how much ill will remains between the two riders after the Spaniard’s histrionics in the Vuelta. Does Ayuso bear a grudge against UAE for what he considers unfair and “dictatorial” treatment? Does Almeida harbor ill will against Ayuso for abandoning him? Ooh, it’s almost like a soap opera.
A quality lineup
But Almeida and Ayuso aren’t the only riders of quality in this edition of the Algarve. This is a loaded field that includes the aforementioned Riccitello, Lipowitz, Onley and Vauquelin as well as Thymen Arensman, who won two huge stages in last year’s Tour for INEOS Grenadiers. Onley, Vauquelin and Arensman are potential Tour de France riders, but the latter is wearing the number 1 (actually 51) in this race, which denotes him as leader. He is 26, Onley and Vauquelin are 23, so perhaps INEOS wants the youngsters to mature a year or two before tackling Pogačar et al. Whatever the strategy, this should be a fascinating race.
There is only one long climb in the race, the category 1 Alto da Foia (8.8km @ 6,2%), atop which stage 2 ends. Sunday’s final stage presents a series of short, very steep climbs and ends at the summit of Malhoa (2.7km @ 8.9%), the kind of climbs at which Almeida does not excel. It should make for some fascinating racing.
Oh, I forgot to mention the participation of the French wunderkind Paul Seixas, who is 19 and is already inspiring French dreams of a future Tour de France victory, after a drought of more than 40 years. He won last year’s Tour de l’Avenir, finished third, behind Pogačar and Evenepoel, in the European Road Race Championship and finished seventh, in the same time as del Toro, Thomas Pidcock (Tudor Pro Racing) and Egan Bernal (INEOS Grenadiers), in last year’s Il Lombardia.
He just might be the real deal, but at 19 he is still growing and Decathlon CMA CGM is probably looking to the 23-year-old Riccitello to carry the torch for now. Still, Seixas adds a lot of interest to this edition of the Algarve.
As does the presence of the numerous top sprinters in the race. Jasper Philipsen and Kaden Groves (both Alpecin–Premier Tech), Arnaud de Lie (Lotto Intermarché), 21-year-old Paul Magnier (Soudal Quick-Step), Jordi Meeus (Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe) and Pascal Ackerman (Jayco AlUla) form a line-up that is of unusual quality for a 2.Pro-level race. The two stages suited to sprinters have a lot of bumps in the road, which favors the sprinters with some climbing ability, such as Pedersen, Groves and Meeus, who won last year’s green jersey.
