The second act of the Canadian WorldTour races sees Wout van Aert, Tadej Pogačar, Michael Matthews, Peter Sagan, Biniam Girmay and Alberto Bettiol clash at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal on Sunday.
It is their final face-off before this year’s World Championships in Australia and the hilly Montreal circuit race should give a real indication of their rainbow jersey hopes and each riders’ strengths and weaknesses. Their next battle will be on Sunday September 25 as they fight for the rainbow jersey.
The many European riders who travelled to Canada for the two races transferred from a misty Québec to Montreal via bus on Saturday morning. They soon got out on their bikes for a ride to shake out their legs and to take a look at the hilly 12.2km circuit around Parc du Mont-Royal that gives its name to the city.
On Friday Benoit Cosnefroy (AG2R-Citroen) surprised everyone with a late solo attack and superb effort to win the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec. The bigger names were all left to fight for the podium places and regret missing out on victory.
While the Québec race suits the aggressive baroudeur riders like Cosnefroy or fast finishing Classics riders like Matthews, the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal is more like an Ardennes Classics and so is expected to produce more open racing and much earlier.
The 221.4km race distance includes 4842 metres of elevation, almost 2000 metres more than the Québec race. The 12.2km circuit has considerable cycling heritage. It saw Eddy Merckx and Geneviève Gambillon win historic rainbow jerseys at the 1974 World Championships and two years later Bernt Johansson beat Giuseppe Martinelli at the Olympic Games. There was no women’s race while the Soviet Union won the 100km team time trial. Montreal has bid to host the 2026 Road World Championships in the hope of celebrating the 40th anniversary of the 1976 Olympics.
The 12.2km circuit around the Parc du Mont-Royal features three climbs and a short kick up to the finish line, for a total of 263m on each lap.
The riders climb for 1.8km at 8% to the summit of the Côte Camillien-Houde in the centre of the park, then drop down to city streets before climbing the Côte de Polytechnique (780m at 6%, including a portion of 11%).
There is a 800-metre kick-up on Boulevard Mont Royal three kilometres from the finish and a sweeping descent and a U-turn into the rising finish straight on the Avenue du Parc.
An aggressive finale
When the…
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