{"id":6091,"date":"2024-01-12T10:31:16","date_gmt":"2024-01-12T09:31:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/?p=6091"},"modified":"2024-01-12T10:31:16","modified_gmt":"2024-01-12T09:31:16","slug":"which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2024\/01\/12\/which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four\/","title":{"rendered":"Which 2024 Races Will Feature Some (or All) of the Big Four?"},"content":{"rendered":"

If everything goes as planned, this year in road racing should be a watershed in the sport, with an unprecedented number of superstars racing against each other in some of cycling\u2019s iconic races. Most of these riders\u2019 schedules have now been made public so that we know which races to mark in red on our calendars. Here\u2019s a hint: many of them.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Certainly, no race will be preceded by greater anticipation than the Tour de France. With eight killer mountain stages, including the final-stage ITT from Monaco to Nice, and with two-time Tour winners Jonas Vingegaard<\/a> (Visma\u2013 Lease a Bike) and Tadej Poga\u010dar (UAE Team Emirates) riding against four-time Grand Tour winner Primo\u017e Rogli\u010d (BORA-hansgrohe) and the 23-year-old phenom Remco Evenepoel (Soudal\u2013QuickStep), who will be making his Tour debut, this should be a race for the ages.<\/p>\n

There will be many questions asked in the runup: can Vingegaard win the Tour without his super-talented lieutenant Wout van Aert who is riding in the Giro and the Vuelta but not the Tour? Can Poga\u010dar outclimb Vingegaard on the big mountains? Can Rogli\u010d compete with the best at age 34? As good as he is in one-day races, and he is probably the best, does Evenepoel have what it takes to win the Tour de France? And what about INEOS Grenadiers? Will they continue to play second fiddle to the stars or will Tom Pidcock and Oscar Rodriguez threaten the Big Four in the race?<\/p>\n

\"Vingegaard<\/a>
Can Poga\u010dar outclimb Vingegaard on the big mountains? \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Evenepoel has downplayed his chances in the Tour on several occasions \u2013 though he will have a strong domestique for the mountains in the Spanish veteran Mikel Landa. And he has already declared that he would be happy with a top 5 finish in the Tour. He then told Wielerflits,<\/a> \u201cThe answer to the question of whether I can win a Grand Tour is yes. In the last Giro, I was there for a short time \u2013 without illness. But the Tour is a different story. Going home with a stage win would be great.\u201d I think \u2013 and I hope \u2013 that he expects to win more than one stage.<\/p>\n

He will have the opportunity to race against some of his rivals before the Tour kicks off. He will take on Rogli\u010d in the eight-day Paris-Nice. Evenepoel will then face Poga\u010dar in the prestigious Li\u00e8ge-Bastogne-Li\u00e8ge, a much-anticipated showdown that came to a bitter end last year when the Slovenian crashed badly early in the race and had to abandon. Finally, Evenepoel will line up against Vingegaard and Rogli\u010d in both the Itzulia Basque Country and the Criterium du Dauphin\u00e9. That last race should be a key indicator of their respective forms for the Tour since it is run on June 2-9 and the Tour kicks off just three weeks later on June 29.<\/p>\n

Poga\u010dar will race against an old foe, Wout van Aert, in the Strade Bianche and, most significantly, in the Giro d\u2019Italia, as the UAE Team Emirates leader goes for the rare Giro-Tour double. And Evenepoel will be tested by his Belgian compatriot in the Volta ao Algarve in February.<\/p>\n

Schedules are, of course, subject to tweaks and changes caused by accident or illness. The schedules have also been affected by this year\u2019s Paris Olympics, with numerous riders going for gold in the ITT on July 27, just six days after the last stage of the Tour de France, and the road race on August 3.<\/p>\n

There should be a wealth of great racing in 2024. Let\u2019s cross our fingers and hope the weather cooperates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If everything goes as planned, this year in road racing should be a watershed in the sport, with an unprecedented […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":6094,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-6091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-the-latest"],"yoast_head":"\nWhich 2024 Races Will Feature Some (or All) of the Big Four? - \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\/2024\/01\/12\/which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Which 2024 Races Will Feature Some (or All) of the Big Four?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"If everything goes as planned, this year in road racing should be a watershed in the sport, with an unprecedented […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2024\/01\/12\/which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling - United Kingdom\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-01-12T09:31:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/18\/2024\/01\/Pogacar-Vingegaard-2022-Tour-profimedia-0708643066-CVR.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"990\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"660\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"evelynfindlay\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Siegfried Mortkowitz\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2024\/01\/12\/which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/uk\/2024\/01\/12\/which-2024-races-will-feature-some-or-all-of-the-big-four\/\",\"name\":\"Which 2024 Races Will Feature Some (or All) of the Big Four? 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