Presentation UAE: The Col du Granon as fuel in 2023 | cycling

The rich get richer.

The fact that UAE sleeps on a piggy bank to make you dizzy is of course no state secret.

But who, with the countless monster contracts in mind, can also pluck Adam Yates, Jay Vine and Tim Wellens, will arouse a lot of jealousy from other teams.

List the 30 riders and you have to look with a magnifying glass for a band member with a clear profile as a servant.

But more than in recent years, revenge will mainly serve as extra petrol in the Emirates.

The yellow boom on the Col du Granon has not yet been digested.

Oil on the fire.

Most important UAE victories in 2022:

2 stages and overall victory in the UAE Tour (Pogacar), Strade Bianche (Pogacar), stage in Paris-Nice (McNulty), 2 stages and overall victory in Tirreno-Adriatico (Pogacar), stage in the Giro (Covi), 3 stages in the Tour (Pogacar), 2 stages in the Vuelta (Soler and Molano), GP Montréal (Pogacar), Tour of Lombardy (Pogacar)

As a Sunday child, Tadej Pogacar seemed to be hopping through the cycling season. At just about every top appointment, his name was filled in at least in pencil.

Until he hit his limits on that infamous Wednesday in July. And also had to conclude that his team – partly victimized by corona – is not untouchable.

Several pain points were exposed.

With that French lesson in the backpack, it’s looking forward to how the spread for the grand tours will be drawn.

Last year the Giro was for Joao Almeida, Juan Ayuso went on a journey of discovery in the Vuelta.

Brandon McNulty and Rafal Majka couldn’t fend off all the yellow attacks, with Adam Yates and Jay Vine the wine cellar – remarkably late during the “mercato” – has been replenished.

With their rather surprising arrival, Yates and Vine seem to show their colors: their own chances are drying up, the red carpet for Pogacar may no longer contain a single disturbing substance.

The reliability certificate of FC Pogacar has been thoroughly renewed.

But for glutton Pogacar, a season consists of more than those 21 stages on French soil.

His introduction to the Flemish landscape was very much appreciated, although the aftertaste was sour due to his beginner’s mistake in the Minderbroedersstraat.

Pogacar is aiming for a second tasting menu on Flemish soil and can finally count on extra manpower in addition to Matteo Trentin.

Tim Wellens does not have a pure cobblestone profile, but of course knows the pitfalls well enough.

In the wake of the Truiense helmsman, Pogacar should be able to make his mark from the Strade Bianche over the Tour of Flanders to Liège-Bastogne-Liège.

Or was the course adjusted after the Tour and has Pogacar learned that his barrel is unfortunately not bottomless?

Choosing is losing, but sometimes you actually win at the important moments by canceling an appointment or by using your powers just a little less exuberantly.

It’s not fair by any means, but it’s fate that every champion faces sooner or later.

Success gets used to and becomes routine for the consumer, who tends to remember a rare defeat better than yet another explosion of power.

Link Pogacar to 2022 and everyone will remember the Col du Granon, not his cabinet pieces in Siena or Lombardy.

His mistakes on the Poggio and in Oudenaarde may still be covered with the cloak of love, his swan song in the Alps much less so.

Did the Icarus fly too close to the sun at Pogacar in July? Until that infamous Alpine ride, he was constantly flexing his muscles, when perhaps he should have let common sense prevail.

Dose your efforts and go into saving mode in time. That seems like the logical advice, but that tip goes against the character of Pogacar, instinct driver pur sang.

It is a complex balancing act, but for a champion like Pogacar, unfortunately, only yellow in Paris counts.

A chef d’oeuvre en route – or two or three if possible – does not outweigh that.

It is perhaps no coincidence that Pogacar – as Wielerflits knows – is aiming for a return of sports director Allan Peiper, who was absent in 2022 due to illness.

Peiper was the tactical mastermind behind the stunt in 2020 at La Planche des Belles Filles.

No matter how much the Giro tries to seduce the Slovenian cannibal, he won’t bite for the time being.

That smooths the path again for João Almeida, the Portuguese who, as it were, hates tailgating uphill and invariably forms an island on every col.

Making the leap from the top 5 to the top 3 is already the first step in his multi-year plan.

Juan Ayuso already rounded that cliff in September. The Spaniard has just outgrown his teenage years and finished 3rd in the Vuelta.

His contract until 2028 suggests that he is the heir to the throne or the spare part of Pogacar even more than Almeida.

Also in 2023, the Vuelta will work like a red rag to a bull at Ayuso.

As far as the rest of the counter is concerned – good for 48 victories in 2022, shared victory with Jumbo-Visma – it remains to be seen whether the old Marc Hirschi will be brought back to life.

After his stage victory on the Passo Fedaia, Alessandro Covi lost regularity in his performance, Sjoerd Bax cashed in on his amazing autumn with a top transfer, with Brandon McNulty it can freeze and thaw and at UAE they are mainly looking out for Finn Fisher-Black after a lot of misery can meet already high expectations.

The team management is faced with the challenge of drawing a hierarchy in that wealth: in 2022 it was occasionally a mess. Too much every man for himself.

One-day races or stage races: UAE is satisfied with nothing less than the driver’s seat.

Although Pogacar is lucky that he occasionally takes a seat in the back seat.

His contract ends in 2023:

among others Matteo Trentin, Pascal Ackermann, George Bennett, Marc Soler, Marc Hirschi, Jan Polanc

bron: procyclingstats.com