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Sunday, November 10, 2024
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2024 Tour de France | 2024 Giro d'Italia
When facing a difficult task, act as though it is impossible to fail. If you are going after Moby Dick, take along the tartar sauce. - H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
Bill & Carol McGanns book The Story of the 2024 Tour de France: The Happy Warrior Triumphs is available as a Kindle eBook. To get your copy, just click on the link on the right.
Upcoming racing:
- November 17: Flandriencross
- December 15: Namur
Latest completed racing:
- November 3: European Cyclocross Championships
- November 1: X20 Trofee Oudenaarde-Koppenbergcross
- October 27: Superprestige Overijse-Vlaamse Druivencross
- October 15 - 20: Tour of Guangxi
- October 20: Japan Cup Road Race
- October 20: Veneto Classic
- October 16: Giro del Veneto
- October 13: Chrono des Nations
The team posted this:
Italian powerhouse Vincenzo Albanese is excited to step up his game and top the solid list of results he has earned during his first eight years as a pro with some big wins in EF pink.
“I'm very happy to become a part of this team,” Vincenzo says. “And I'm very, very motivated for next year. I will do my best.”
2022 Tour du Limousin stage four. Vinzenzo Albanese is first.
Vincenzo lives in the hills around Florence but is most at home when he is racing over the Belgian cobbles, rattling up bergs and sprinting into corners in the wind. He will be a strong asset during our spring classics campaign. This year, Vincenzo finished in the top ten at 19 races, including the E3 Saxo Classic, Binche-Chimay-Binche, and the Circuit Franco-Belge. Earlier in his career, he won the Trofeo Matteotti and a stage of the Tour du Limousin.
That victory fuelled his will to win.
“My best, most beautiful cycling moment so far came two years ago when I won at the Tour du Limousin in France,” Vincenzo says. “I attacked in the last kilometer and arrived alone with five or six seconds on the main group. I will never forget that last kilometer. I want to win more races.”
That has been Vincenzo’s goal ever since he was a child.. He has been racing since he was six years old and can navigate a peloton like it is his second nature.
“I knew I wanted to become a pro from the age of 16, more or less,” he says. “One year, when I was under-23, I won seven races, including a stage at the Tour de l’Avenir and a professional race I did with the national team.”
That performance earned him his first contract and kick started his racing career. Vincenzo has since developed into a consummate professional. He is a consistent performer who is ready to work for his teammates across all terrain from the start to the end of the season. He has ridden the Giro d’Italia four times and, though he loves his national grand tour, now wants to bring his three-week racing strength to the Tour de France to help his new EF Education-EasyPost teammates and go for a stage win.
“My very big dream for next year is to ride the Tour,” Vincenzo says. “I have done the Giro, so the big goal this year is to make it to the Tour. I would love to do the Tour, win a race, and ride well at the classics.”
EF Pro Cycling founder and CEO Jonathan Vaughters is expecting big things from Vincenzo in the years ahead.
“Vincenzo Albanese is a very consistent racer who can earn results for us from the start to the end of the year,” Vaughters says. “He has the strength to make it into the finales of the big classics and mix it up in hard grand tour bunch sprints. Our younger riders are going to learn a ton from his racecraft. Vincenzo knows how to keep a cool head when it gets chaotic in the peloton and put down his power when it counts. We think he is knocking on the door of a big win.”
Going into 2025, Vincenzo is more motivated than ever. After an offseason spent at home in Tuscany, fishing for sea bass and red snapper off the island of Erba, enjoying some games of football with his mates, and touring the local vineyards with his girlfriend, he is already working hard to get in racing shape for the spring classics.
“For me, this will be the first time I will have the chance to race for a very big team,” Vincenzo says. “It will be a great experience, and I want to make the most of it. I am excited to join an American team and about our program and the trust that the team has put in me for the next year.”
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Here’s the team post:
Behind every strong rider stands an equally strong team. In our series "Staff Stories," we introduce you to the people who ensure that Lotto Dstny runs like a well-oiled machine every day. Today: sports manager Kurt Van de Wouwer.
A development team with 35 victories? That's no coincidence. The performances of our young riders are not only due to their strong legs but also the result of years of scouting, looking around, and tracking youth categories. At Lotto Dstny, this responsibility naturally falls to Kurt Van de Wouwer (53). Van de Wouwer was a professional rider with Lotto for eight years. After hanging up his bike at the end of 2006 and spending a few years working with a youth team, he returned to Lotto in 2011, this time as a sports director.
Kurt Van de Wouwer in 1994
Two years ago, he took on an additional role as sports manager, responsible not only for recruitment but also for the composition of Lotto Dstny's three teams. "And for planning race programs," says Van de Wouwer. "Who rides where, who is part of the team. Making sure the pieces fit together, in other words."
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Youth development is one of Lotto Dstny’s flagship projects. This season, the development team achieved a remarkable 35 victories. With Jarno Widar, the team produced the very first Belgian winner of the Giro Next Gen, and Steffen De Schuyteneer, an under-23 rider, claimed victory in China among the pros. In recent years, numerous talents have also moved from the U23 squad to the professional peloton. "Of course, recruiting riders is a matter of budget. Everyone knows who the top talents are. You could just buy them, but we don't have the budget for that. So, we have to look elsewhere. The ability to spot talent in the vast pool of young and very young riders doesn’t come overnight," says Kurt Van de Wouwer. "You need years of experience in youth cycling to understand how things work. Only then do you have an edge. I've been at it for years. I attend youth races—though, these days, I often lack the time—but I have my sources and have built a vast network over the years."
"A good rider needs the complete package: results, of course, but also their racing style and mentality. We also look at physical parameters. Everything has to align, and even then, pitfalls must be avoided along the way. Young athletes who turn pro at an early age and earn a lot of money... it’s not easy to stay grounded. Over the past 17 years, it's only gotten harder. The spotlight is so intense on youth today. They mature at a younger age, which works up to a certain point. But there's a danger when things become too professional too soon, and the fun starts to fade. The shelf life is shorter."
Van de Wouwer has been doing his job with heart and soul for years. "The best part? Seeing riders you’ve known since their youth flourish. Watching young men or women you recruited find their way to the top. There aren't many. I'm very realistic. Of the roughly one hundred pros, ten drop out each year, and only ten new ones come in. But to see that our team consists of 95 percent riders from our own youth program... that brings tremendous satisfaction."
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Fouquenet’s Team Arkea-B&B Hotels posted this news
Amandine Fouquenet scored her first success of the season in the Pierric cyclo-cross, round 3 of the French Cup.
Amadine Fouquenet
Amandine Fouquenet:
"The race didn't get off to the best of starts. I fell, but I didn't panic. After that, I rode my race. I found myself alone in the lead after Célia Géry dropped out. I kept my pace right to the end, even though there was a fierce battle behind me in the final laps. Winning my first victory of the season here, not far from Brittany and the headquarters of the Arkea-B&B Hotels team, is good for my confidence. Technically I'm feeling much better and it confirms my first good results of the autumn. My aim now is to recover well and try to do the same again tomorrow."
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