The coronavirus has been a very strong blow to the sport. It has affected, and paralyzed, from the most modest to the most media, such as the Olympic Games or the Tour de France, and therefore the Massi-Tactic has been no exception. The most ambitious bet ever made by women’s professional cycling in Catalonia. In its second year in the categories, the team born of the structure of the CC Baix Ter had been reinforced with cyclists of higher level than in the season of the premiere, and had arrived names like those of the Canadian Gabrielle PIlote-Forin, the Irishwoman Lauren Creamer or the Girona girls Ariadna and Mireia Trias, who were returning home after passing through the Basque Sopela. It was a 2020 with high expectations that the spread of the covid-19 cut short when, just as recently, the Massi-Tactic had run two races in Valencia (Cycling Week and Tour of the Valencian Community). Since then, nothing. Foreigners returning home, confinements everywhere and lots of races erased from the calendar. Appointments in China, Belgium, France … that had to be canceled, or, at best, rescheduled for the fall. Now, when professional sport is trying to raise its head again, Massi-Tactic will try to “compete in as many races as possible to save the season”. The first three, between tomorrow and Sunday, will be three one-day races in Navarre and the Basque Country.
“It is the ICU that is marking what tests can be disputed, but in the end it will be the government of each country that will take its measures,” said the president of the CC Baix Ter, Sergi Güell, on a return to normalcy that will begin in Pamplona and Durango, but could not continue as planned in August with the Tour Norurega, this one of the UCI Pro Tour Calendar, and with the Spanish Championship in Jaén. At the moment the Tour of Norway has already been canceled. Looking ahead to the autumn, there are still many World Tour events that had to be postponed to last spring, such as the Women’s Giro and most Belgian classics (Arrow Walloon, Tour de Flanders, Liege-Bastogne-Liege …).
For the time being, however, the reality of the pandemic does not allow plans to be made in the medium term and the objectives of the Massi-Tactic will be spent tomorrow in Pamplona (Emakumeen Navarra Klasikoa), tomorrow again in the Navarrese capital (Clásica Femenina Navarra) and Sunday in Durango with Durango-Durango Women’s Award. For these three tests, the Massi-Tactic can count six runners in each test. For the Women’s Classic of Navarre, Manel Gonzalo and Àngel González have Gabrielle Pilote, Lauren Creamer, Belen López, Mireia Trias, Mireia Benito and Karolina Perekitko: for Friday at the Clásica Femenina, Gabrielle Pilote, Lauren Creamer, Belen López, Nerea Nuño , Mireia Benito and Patricia Ortega; and, finally, on Sunday in Durano, the same six tomorrow in the Women’s Classic of Navarre. By calendar, on Saturday there is another test in the Basque Country (in San Sebastián), but this one has been canceled.
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