{"id":463751,"date":"2025-09-30T18:40:18","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T18:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/463751\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T18:40:18","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T18:40:18","slug":"the-european-cycling-championships-suddenly-mean-something","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/463751\/","title":{"rendered":"The European Cycling Championships Suddenly Mean Something"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do the Euros even matter? This year they do, but there are growing worries about more protests after Israel vows to bring athletes to the annual event. <\/p>\n

\"Vingegaard<\/p>\n

Vingegaard and Pedersen, shown here at the Vuelta, are both lining up. (Photo: Dario Belingheri\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Updated September 30, 2025 10:04AM<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a long trip from Rwanda to the Drome-Ardeche regions of southern France, but both recently crowned world champions Tadej Poga\u010dar<\/a> and Remco Evenepoel<\/a> are making the journey to the Rhone valley, where the 2025 UEC European Road Championships<\/a> are being staged this week.<\/p>\n

Usually, the \u201cEuros\u201d play second fiddle to the worlds, but the combination of flight times, post-Vuelta fatigue and high altitude racing was enough to ensure a fair degree of \u201cno-shows\u201d for the first African Worlds.<\/p>\n

Instead, in a sign of the growing appeal of the Euros, there is a high-quality, elite field gathering in the Drome-Ardeche, a hilly, rural location, within reach of the mighty Rhone river and midway between French cities Lyon and Marseille.<\/p>\n

In the men\u2019s racing, alongside Rwanda medalists Pogacar and Evenepoel, are Vuelta hitters, including race winner Jonas Vingegaard<\/a>, podium finisher Jo\u00e3o Almeida, and points classification winner Mads Pedersen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The prospect of an in-form and motivated \u201cbig three\u201d \u2014 Poga\u010dar, Evenepoel and Vingegaard \u2014 going head-to-head on the winding, hilly and grippy roads through this rural region of stone farmhouses, quiet villages and steep climbs, could make for enthralling racing.<\/p>\n

Despite there being only two days between the worlds road race and the European championships time trial, Evenepoel\u2019s combination of planes and automobiles did get him to the venue in southern France on time.<\/p>\n

After Sunday\u2019s road race, Evenepoel remained in Kigali, and spent some downtime with his wife, Oumi Rayane. Following a session on the home trainer on Monday, he flew from Kigali to Addis-Abbaba, capital of Ethiopia.<\/p>\n

Next came a two-hour stopover on Monday evening, before boarding another flight that arrived in Marseille, just after 6 a.m. on Tuesday morning. Two hours later, he stepped out of a team car after arriving at his hotel in Privas.<\/p>\n

The Olympic champion had already won his first race against the clock and, less than 48 hours after taking silver to Pogacar in Africa, was on his time trial bike recce\u2019ing the French roads at 11 am on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n

The French may also hope to do better than in Rwanda, with Romain Gregoire, winner of this year\u2019s Tour of Britain, Paul Seixas, the recent Tour de l\u2019Avenir champion, and Tour de France Femmes winner Pauline Ferrand-Pr\u00e9vot<\/a> also strong contenders.<\/p>\n

Denmark, in particular, has assembled a strong team for the men\u2019s road race, with Vingegaard backed by Pedersen and Mattias Skjelmose, both of whom could be contenders if the Vuelta winner is marked out by rivals.<\/p>\n

Do the Euros even matter? This year they do
\n\"FerrandFerrand-Pr\u00e9vot is among many stars flying from Rwanda to France. (Photo: Dario Belingheri\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Over five days, 14 European titles will be up for grabs. As at the worlds, there are junior, U-23, mixed and elite categories, so even with some final tweaking still likely to start lists, there will be some familiar faces from the racing in Rwanda.<\/p>\n

Like the worlds and Olympic competition, cyclists compete with national selections rather than their full-time pro teams.<\/p>\n

First up, on October 1, is the men\u2019s time trial with \u2014 assuming all his flight connections work \u2014 Olympic and world time trial champion Evenepoel leading the way.<\/p>\n

The Belgian may still be smarting from the minor meltdown in Kigali that robbed him of the chance to go head-to-head with Poga\u010dar in the final laps of the men\u2019s road race, but with Almeida, Josh Tarling, Stefan K\u00fcng, and Filippo Ganna all racing on the mainly flat 24-kilometer course, Evenepoel is definitely the man to beat.<\/p>\n

Marlen Reusser<\/a>, dominant in the women\u2019s time trial in Rwanda, is expected to race, with Olympic silver medalist Anna Henderson also competing. 2024 Tour de France Femmes winner Kasia Niewiadoma and her successor, Ferrand-Pr\u00e9vot, are expected to be major protagonists in the women\u2019s road race.<\/p>\n

At just over 200 kilometers, the men\u2019s road race is less of a challenge than last Sunday\u2019s African marathon, although it still contains 3,300 meters of climbing, some of which \u2014 like the Val d\u2019Enfer, tackled six times \u2014 is familiar to the peloton from the spring one-day race, Faun Ardeche Classic.<\/p>\n

The women\u2019s road race is a punchy 116 kilometers, but includes over 2,200 meters of altitude gain. Racing in front of a partisan home crowd, Ferrand-Pr\u00e9vot may prove a lot more prominent than she was in a surprisingly muted performance in Kigali.<\/p>\n

Bracing for Vuelta-style protests
\n\"protestEveryone\u2019s bracing for a repeat of scenes from last month\u2019s Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a. (Photo: MIGUEL RIOPA\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

But while there is much to look forward to on the road, there are concerns about what might happen off the road, with Israel sending a group of riders to compete.<\/p>\n

In the aftermath of the Vuelta demonstrations by pro-Palestine protestors, French federation president Michel Callot has done his best to calm concerns of any repeat of the race disruptions experienced in Spain.<\/p>\n

Israel is understood to have sent 13 riders to France, competing in the junior, under-23, and men\u2019s elite categories.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe known which races and which categories the Israelis are competing in,\u201d he said. \u201cNone are racing in the time trial, so in terms of security, that\u2019s important.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Israeli Federation is a member of the UCI, so they have the right to compete. We respect the rules, and it\u2019s not our place to enter into the political debate.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the local authority, the Prefecture of the Ardeche, has \u2014 with 80,000 spectators expected \u2014 confirmed that they have stepped up security measures to deal with any protests.<\/p>\n

There were significant but peaceful protests nearby during the 2025 Tour de France, when the peloton raced from Bollene to Valence.<\/p>\n

Road blocks, drones and an increased number of police at starts and finishes are expected. According to the Prefecture, \u201cthe recent context internationally has led us to increase security measures and pay particular attention to any teams that might be under threat.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no doubt that the heightened tensions around Israel\u2019s continuing presence in professional sport \u2014 many leading French sports stars have now joined the \u201cAthletes 4 Peace\u201d campaign \u2014 make further protests a genuine possibility.<\/p>\n

However, at least this time, the organizers benefit from a circuit finale to the road races and the knowledge of what to expect in the aftermath of the chaos at the Vuelta.<\/p>\n

As for Vingegaard, Pedersen, and Almeida, they must surely be hoping that lightning can\u2019t strike twice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Do the Euros even matter? This year they do, but there are growing worries about more protests after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":463752,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4104],"tags":[4230,135594,79,145619,139797,155024,155025,155026,132984,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-463751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-parent_category-road","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tag-jonas-vingegaard","12":"tag-tag-mads-pedersen","13":"tag-tag-marlen-reusser","14":"tag-tag-pauline-ferrand-prevot","15":"tag-tag-uec-european-road-championships","16":"tag-type-article","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115294714478229329","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=463751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=463751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=463751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=463751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}