World Championships Road Race 2026 Preview
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What is the overall layout and difficulty of the men’s World Championships road race?
Welcome back to the Lantern Rouge Cycling Podcast for the preview of the World Championships Road Race Men and Women's brought to you by Join Cycling. We are in Montreal for a circuit. We're starting in Brossard. We do, for the men, 100km of flat, enter the circuit, and then have 173km of what we saw in Montreal. So if you want a preview of this, go and watch the GP Montreal Classic, which was last Sunday. The difference is... That was a full, just a full circuit race. They didn't have the 100Ks of flats. So I would argue this is for the first time ever. The GP Montreal is harder than Worlds.
Yeah, it's fascinating, right? Because the parkour itself is longer, but there's less laps, and a notable amount of less laps, to the point that you've only got 12 laps of the Camillien-Oued climb. And it's not the hardest climb in the world, but it's hard enough to maybe cross from the classics kind of riders to the puncture-climbing kind of riders. Does that make sense?
Yeah, I mean, the... Typically, we saw in Montreal back in the day, you did see a Van Aert mixing it up, and then Pogacar beat him in a sprint, and then the race changed, and I would say cycling changed, and you now see in Montreal really just like the GC riders. It's even the punchers struggle in Montreal against the top GC guys.
By the way, Patrick, I was thinking about this last night in bed. Sorry, I'm addicted to cycling, but... when exactly what was the day that cycling changed the exact day
the
day cycling changed uh winter before 2024
i i'm leaning more towards 2021 the terreno stage That blew up completely with Van der Poel going early because he was cold. That, to me, feels like a tipping point where we went from not necessarily going for long solos to long solos, no?
Nah, because he collapsed.
Yeah, but he still won the race.
Yeah, but he was on 30 grams of carbs an hour, so he could have been caught.
For me, that's the moment where that started happening.
Yeah, true. And I think it's slightly more changing that like the best riders in a race more just if there's any form of hard part of the race, doesn't matter where it is, they will just put their team to make it incredibly hard and just go from that point because they're like, I'm not going to bonk anymore. So I've got to make use of this steep climb. I don't care that it's 100 k's from the finish. And the result of that is that I think like the... the 73 to 77 kilo classics guys just on these sort of circuits have it's tough for them britain's different that's why i really like the british course love and perfect course so lervin and harrogate are not harrogate um glasgow are different but this is harder than that the climb if we really dive into the intricacies of the climb
The Vaux-Million-Hood, it is, yeah, 1.6 Ks at 7.5%. The last 400 meters is 9%. Then it kicks down and there's like a pretty wide road. It's not that hard where Sykes has tried to drop. Del Toro, it's like a little kicker, but it's all about that climb. The circuit itself, it's not technical. It's a big road. Draft's important. Moto drafting is really important. And even though it's not technical, there was still moto drafting in GP Montreal, which is like, I can excuse, you know, your Tuesday afternoon operator on a descent of Trofeo L'Aguelia when it's like one Fiat Panda wide, not getting out of the way, but on the circuit here, they really should be out of the way, hopefully. But yeah, it's... 12 laps, less elevation gain.
That's what I was like with speaking of the modern era. How much is 100Ks of flat when the early break is just being controlled by Belgium at a moderate tempo? How much is that really tiring these guys anymore?
I don't think that really affects my expectations for the final few laps, but I still think that the 12 laps of that climb were hard enough for the actual on-paper favorites, which is the Paul Seixas, Del Toro, Remco crop of the group, for them to make a difference. And that's why it's captivating to look at the strategies of the different type of riders at this race.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the overall layout and difficulty of the men’s World Championships road race?
0:00–10:54
2
How do the key climbs and flat sections shape race tactics for the men’s event?
10:54–21:11
3
Who are the top favourites for the men’s race and what are their odds?
21:11–29:40
4
How does the absence of Pogacar change the dynamics for the men’s contenders?
29:40–38:28
5
What strategies are Belgium, Italy and France likely to use in the men’s race?
38:28–47:29
6
What is the course layout and key features of the women’s World Championships road race?
47:29–57:10
7
Who are the main favourites in the women’s race and what are their betting odds?
57:10–1:05:57
8
What are the final predictions and rider picks for both the men’s and women’s championships?
1:05:57–1:13:12