Road Cycling 2020 Tokyo Olympic Review

Men’s Road Race

It was a slow start to the race. An early breakaway established an advantage of over 15 minutes and the rest of the field considered them no danger. Geraint Thomas (Great Britain) and Nairo Quintana (Colombia) were damaged in a crash early on. The first escape from the peloton came from Remco Evanpoel (Belgium), Vincenzo Nibali (Italy) and Eddie Dunbar (Ireland) but the Danes pulled it back. Another escape came from Michael Woods (Canada), Tadej Pogacar (Slovenia) and Brandon McNulty (United States) but they were hauled in by a smaller group of thirteen. The group saw numerous attacks launched including McNulty with Richard Carapaz (Ecuador) and Jakob Fulsang (Denmark) on his own. The attack of McNulty and Carapaz opened up a gap and by the time Wout Van Aert (Belgium) opened an attack on the downhill, it looked too late. He dragged a group along with him though and they looked at each other, the chase often lacking impetus. Carapaz saw the gap closing and with 6km to go launched a solo attack which McNulty could not follow. McNulty had emptied and instead went backwards, with Carapaz pulling away whilst the chase group marked each other. He got a victory by a minute, slowing down with his arms aloft as he crossed the line. Behind him, it came down to a bunch sprint and was decided by the two favourites in Pogacar and Van Aert.

🥇Richard Carapaz 🇪🇨

🥈Wout Van Aert 🇧🇪

🥉Tadej Pogacar 🇸🇮

Women’s Road Race

As with the men’s race the day prior, a small breakaway did manage to escape but the peloton largely ignored it. Two big favourites did tangle, with Annemiek van Vlueten (Netherlands) and Emma Jorgensen (Denmark). Despite the crash, van Vlueten launched a solo attack with 53km to go. Leaving the breakaway alone would cost the peloton, Anna Kiesenhofer (Austria) still was five minutes ahead of the peloton with 30km to go, a minute ahead of Omer Shapira (Israel) and Anna Plichta (Poland), with Van Vlueten stuck in no man's land. Eventually, Van Vlueten was joined by a small peloton looking to get together and chase down a medal however it seemed too late. It was, Kiesenhofer cruised home to grab an unlikely gold medal. With 4.5km to go, the peloton caught up to Shapira and Plichta, meaning the silver and bronze were in play. Van Vlueten would again attack with 2km to go looking to get silver, where she was followed by Elisa Longo Borghini who won another bronze medal.

🥇Anna Kiesenhofer 🇦🇹

🥈Annemiek van Vlueten 🇳🇱

🥉Elisa Longo Borghini 🇮🇹

Men’s Time Trial

Remco Evenepoel (Belgium) was the first rider many considered a genuine contender for the medals and immediately set a benchmark, going 35 seconds than anyone had before. Not far behind him on the course was Rigoberto Uran (Colombia), who at halfway was within 0.5 of the leader. At the finish line, he had taken the lead by 2.58 seconds. The first big hitter was Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands) who took a massive advantage at halfway. Next to come through with a good time was Primoz Roglic (Slovenia), who led him by eight seconds. Rohan Dennis (Australia) followed not far behind Dumoulin. Stefan Kung (Switzerland) and Wout Van Aert (Belgium) were within touching distance but made no impact on the top three, whilst Felipe Ganna (Italy) went ahead of Dennis. Dumoulin took a massive lead when coming over the line with a minute advantage. Roglic incredibly took a minute out of Dumoulin setting a time of 55.04.19. Dennis came through in third. Stefan Kung came through and missed third place by 0.4. The exertions of Wout Van Aert over the last month probably cost him, as he came over the line in fifth. Ganna could not improve, coming over himself in fifth, just 1.84 behind Dennis in third.

🥇Primoz Roglic 🇸🇮

🥈Tom Dumoulin 🇳🇱

🥉Rohan Dennis 🇦🇺

Women’s Time Trial

It felt as though the race did not begin until Annemiek van Vlueten (Netherlands) started. She led at checkpoint one by a long way, followed by Grace Brown (Australia), who was only six seconds slower. At the second time check, van Vlueten had improved her gap to 28 seconds on Brown. Chloe Dygert (United States) started incredibly slowly, 51 seconds down at the first checkpoint, whilst Anna van der Breggan (Netherlands) was 18 seconds down. The leader after fifteen finishers was Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio (South Africa). At the second checkpoint, Dygert was over a minute behind van Vleuten, whilst van der Breggan was 29 seconds behind. Amber Neben (United States) took over a minute out from Moolman-Pasio, only for van Vleuten to best her time by over a minute. Brown was next to finish and went into the silver medal spot. Marlen Reusser (Switzerland) managed to improve past Brown. Dygert could only get into seventh, whilst van der Breggen came home 62 seconds behind her compatriot.

🥇Annemiek van Vlueten 🇳🇱

🥈Marlen Reusser 🇨🇭

🥉Anne van der Breggan 🇳🇱