{"id":5398,"date":"2023-08-17T14:47:12","date_gmt":"2023-08-17T12:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/?p=5398"},"modified":"2023-08-18T14:47:34","modified_gmt":"2023-08-18T12:47:34","slug":"sagan-to-race-mtb-in-2024-with-specialized-factory-racing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2023\/08\/17\/sagan-to-race-mtb-in-2024-with-specialized-factory-racing\/","title":{"rendered":"Sagan to Race MTB in 2024 with Specialized Factory Racing"},"content":{"rendered":"

After finishing a distant 63rd in the Elite Men\u2019s MTB Cross-Country World Championship in Scotland on August 12, 7:14 behind winner Tom Pidcock, Peter Sagan will leave road racing and resume his MTB career.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

He told Cyclingnews<\/a> that in 2024, he will race with the Specialized Factory Racing team with the aim of making it to next year\u2019s Paris Olympic Games in the mountain bike cross-country category. The MTB world championship race was merely the first step towards that objective.<\/p>\n

But it won\u2019t be easy making it to Paris next year. Sagan\u2019s native Slovakia is 37th in the UCI nations ranking<\/a> in the MTB discipline, and only the top 19 nations start. In addition, his road racing career is not over yet. \u201cI have to still finish on the road this year with Team TotalEnergies,\u201d he said.<\/em> \u201cI have to do Plouay [the Bretagne Classic \u2013 Ouest-France on September 3], and in the middle of September, I have another race, and finish with the last race in (the Tour de) Vend\u00e9e [on October 1] in France.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the 33-year-old Sagan finally does leave road racing for good, it will mark both a return to his cycling roots and the end of one of the most remarkable careers in the sport. In 2008, he won both the Junior European and World Championships in MTB cross-country.<\/p>\n

\"Peter<\/a>
Sagan will leave road racing and resume his MTB career. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The following year, he transitioned to road and ended up winning the Tour de France \u0160koda Green Jersey a record seven times, a total of 18 Grand Tour stages, including 12 in the Tour, three consecutive World Road Race Championships, as well as a number of one-day Classics, such as the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. He also won the Tour de Pologne, in 2011, and the Tour of California, in 2015. In his career, Sagan won an impressive 121 races.<\/p>\n

The partnership between Sagan and Specialized began in 2015 when he joined Tinkoff-Saxo. It continued when he moved to Bora-Hansgrohe two years later and it was maintained when Sagan went to TotalEnergies. He rode Specialized bikes in four of his seven Tour de France green jersey wins and all three Road Race World Championships. Sagan and Specialized also work together on Specialized brand bikes, shoes and apparel, after the company launched its Sagan Collection<\/a> of products for public sale in 2018. Since then, Sagan has been a very prominent spokesman for the company, appearing in numerous commercials, including the very unusual \u201cthe Earth is flat\u201d ad<\/a> from 2019.<\/p>\n

Even if he had been successful on the junior level, changing disciplines so late in his career will make it difficult for Sagan not only to make it to the Olympics but also to make a mark in MTB. But he is only 33 years old; the Swiss rider Nino Schurter won three of his ten MTB cross-country world championships at 33 and older. And Sagan is a remarkable talent with a fierce desire to win. If anyone can pull it off, it\u2019s him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After finishing a distant 63rd in the Elite Men\u2019s MTB Cross-Country World Championship in Scotland on August 12, 7:14 behind […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":5407,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-5398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-the-latest"],"yoast_head":"\nSagan to Race MTB in 2024 with Specialized Factory Racing - \u0160koda We Love Cycling - United Kingdom<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2023\/08\/17\/sagan-to-race-mtb-in-2024-with-specialized-factory-racing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sagan to Race MTB in 2024 with Specialized Factory Racing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"After finishing a distant 63rd in the Elite Men\u2019s MTB Cross-Country World Championship in Scotland on August 12, 7:14 behind […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2023\/08\/17\/sagan-to-race-mtb-in-2024-with-specialized-factory-racing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling - 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