And the 46.1km course seems tailor-made for him, especially as he has become an excellent climber. The race starts in the Zürich Oerlikon outdoor velodrome and passes Lake Greifensee. Midway through the race the riders will be faced with a series of short climbs, the most testing of which is 2.4km long at an average gradient of 4.9%, with a short 0.6km ramp at 8.5%. The final 12km are flat and should see the fastest speeds of the day.
After the Olympics, Evenepoel rode the Tour of Britain, just to stretch his legs. He should be in the best form of the year, meaning in the best form of his career. Barring accident, illness or mechanical malfunction, it’s hard to see anyone in the race beating him. But if he has a bad day, the race is filled with plenty of fast riders that could take advantage of his misfortune.
Filippo Gana, for example. The Italian finished second to Evenepoel in the Olympics ITT and has been training hard since dropping out of the Renewi Tour before the time trial three weeks ago. He’s not the climber Evenepoel is, though he’s no slouch, and at his best he is as fast, if not slightly faster, than the Belgian. I consider him the best of the rest.
Primož Roglič is coming off a high after winning the Vuelta a España, in which he hardly broke a sweat. Despite his complaints during that race, he seems to have fully recovered from the broken vertebra he suffered in the Tour de France. Despite his 34 years, he is still a strong time trial rider and should gain time on all the riders on the hills. He is probably not fast enough to win, but has a good chance for a podium finish.
Britain’s Joshua Tarling is very fast, but he has had a hard-luck year, missing out on an Olympics podium by a hair due to a mechanical issue. He will lose time on the climbs, but perhaps not enough to miss out on a step on the podium.
The 26-year-old American Brandon McNulty has had an excellent time trial year, winning ITTs in the UAE Tour, Paris-Nice, the Tour de Romandie, the U.S. National Time Trial Championship and the Vuelta. But he finished fifth in the Olympics ITT, behind some of the riders mentioned above.
Finally, riding in a home world championships is like Red Bull, it gives a rider wings. Which means that Stefan Bisseger and Stefan Küng should be flying. The 30-year-old Küng won the Vuelta’s final-stage ITT, the first Grand Tour stage victory of his career, so he comes into the race with a lot of confidence. If he has kept that form, he could be a spoiler.
Bisseger, 26, has had a bad year, without a victory, finished behind Küng by more than a minute in the Swiss national championships and then was a mediocre 12th in the European championship ITT. Unless he has been saving himself for this race, he looks like a big outsider.
The 29.9km course for Saturday’s Elite Women’s ITT World Championship has the same profile as the men’s course, with the same short climbs, but they come earlier in the race. The Australian Grace Brown, who won the Olympics ITT, would appear to be one of the favorites, as she is retiring after this year and would love to bow out wearing the rainbow jersey. She finished second in the preceding two ITT World Championships and would also love to put an end to that also-ran frustration.
But there’s a problem named Chloe Dygert. The 27-year-old American is the defending champion (she also won in 2019) and looked to be on her way to the gold medal in Paris when she crashed, ultimately finishing third. She will have revenge on her mind and, if she manages to stay on her bike, is the likely winner of the race.
Unless, of course, Demi Vollering – last year’s Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift winner, and arguably the best rider on the women’s tour – is on a big day. The 27-year-old Dutch rider suffered a heart-breaking loss in this year’s TdFF, by 4 seconds to Kasia Niewiadoma, and would love to soothe her pain with a world championship. She did beat Dygert in the TdFF time trial, but that was over a short course. Can she produce the same performance over a course that is nearly five times longer? We’ll see.
My personal favorite for the victory is Belgium’s Lotte Kopecky, the reigning world road race champion, who has had another terrific year. Less than two weeks ago, she won the European ITT championship by a whopping 43 second over the three-time ITT world champion Ellen van Dijk. Her sixth-place finish in the Olympics ITT should be discounted because she crashed. She is fast, powerful and, at 28, in her prime. She also seems to win almost whatever she sets her mind to – and I think she wants to win this very much.
