Pinarello Q36.5 Pro Cycling switches Briton’s schedule as he continues recovering from viral illness ahead of the Tour de France
As we see so much in pro cycling, you can only plan so much. During the course of a year, so much can happen that means teams need to constantly adjust riders’ seasons. Wout van Aert, for example, started Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes with seemingly innocuous wounds. He even won a stage, had to drop out and now is forced to miss an important training camp leading up to the Tour de France.
According to his team, the wounds he suffered from a crash while training on his TT bike aren’t healing. Hopefully he will be OK for the Tour de France, but it’s a bummer to miss the altitude training that so many riders rely on now for stage race prep.
Pidcock’s schedule change
Tom Pidcock is another rider who has been forced to juggle his Tour prep.
According to his team, the Brit will not race the Tour de Suisse after a mild viral infection disrupted his preparations at Q36.5 Pro Cycling’s altitude training camp in Spain.
Piddy missed several days of training while at Sierra Nevada. That prompted the team to revise his June schedule to allow for additional recovery and training before the Tour.
Tour de Suisse starts Tuesday
Instead of lining up at the Swiss stage race, Pidcock is expected to return to competition at the Andorra MoraBanc Clàssica on June 21, provided he has fully recovered. Although it’s a tough little one-day race, it’s certainly not the same as doing a five-day stage race.
One of the riders doing it for the first time as part of his Tour prep is world champ Tadej Pogačar. Other big names include Mathieu van der Poel and Primož Roglič.
The change means Pidcock will miss Q36.5’s “home” race, but he has already returned to his home base in Andorra, where he will continue training on the roads he knows best.
The Tour de Suisse gets underway on Tuesday with a tough opening stage in Sondrio. It’s also on Flobikes.com, but Canadian Cycling Magazine will also have full reports.