What. A. Race. In sports, you often encounter the notion of recency bias—when you see a game, a race, an event so incredible, you say, “Wow, that was the best ever!” But on Saturday, Mathieu van der Poel’s Milan-San Remo victory was one for the ages.
The most boring race that became the most exciting
It’s a strange but incredible race—seven hours of racing that comes down to the last half hour. And it’s been this way for years. Former winner Maurizio Fondriest said that although it’s a different cast of characters, the reality of the parcours is the same.
“There are always just two roads to victory: either you are a sprinter who can hold on a bit on short climbs of about six minutes, riding above your threshold, after which all you have to do is sprint,” he said, mixing past and present riders. “Or else you are an extremely explosive rider, like Saronni, Bettini, Alaphilippe, Pogačar, van der Poel or Tom Pidcock. These are riders who have a vicious change of rhythm and can treat the Poggio like a 500-600m uphill sprint.”
The Cipressa, allora
Which made Saturday’s race even that much more legendary. Pogačar attacked on the penultimate climb—the Cipressa—instead of waiting for the more fashionable of late, Poggio. The winner, Mathieu van der Poel, appreciated this aspect. When the Slovenian attacked, only he and Ineos Grenadiers rider Filippo Ganna could hold on. The latter—a very strong but heavier rider—showed extreme panache in doing so.
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“It’s unique and historic that we rode away with three men on the Cipressa. People will be talking about this for a long time, which is why it might be in the top three,” he said. “I used to watch races like this on TV, and the Cipressa wasn’t really a climb where the race was decided.”
Van der Poel won his second Milan-San Remo after a thrilling battle with Pogačar and Ganna, outlasting them in the sprint on Via Roma. The race began in wet conditions before improving along the Ligurian coast, where attacks and team tactics shaped the final selection. Pogačar made his move on the Poggio, but van der Poel and Ganna held on, with the Italian rejoining just before the final kilometre. In the end, van der Poel’s decisive attack secured victory, while Ganna took second place.
The former (and yet current) world champion expanded on how this historic win occurred. “No, that was certainly thanks to…
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