Remco Evenepoel<\/a> (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) is back and raring to go, having taken a break from competition after his second overall in France and then his victory in the San Sebastian Classic.<\/p>\nHe\u2019s been doing a form-building altitude training camp in Livigno, Italy, including a 6 hour 45 minute monster taking in the Mortirolo, Passo Gavia and the climb to Mottolino.<\/p>\n
Now he\u2019s ready to test that form in Qu\u00e9bec on Friday and Montr\u00e9al on Sunday.<\/p>\n
The Belgian is driven by the thoughts of reclaiming the road race world title he won in 2022, and adding a record fourth TT gold.<\/p>\n
If it all adds up, he will have the chance of doing something no other male rider has done before at the elite worlds: winning both the road race and TT in the same year.<\/p>\n
But that\u2019s next week: before then, shining on Friday and Sunday will be what he is aiming for.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s not the only one.<\/p>\n
Pidcock building towards another world title<\/p>\n
Tom Pidcock has already taken one world championship in recent weeks, the XC MTB worlds in Val di Sole, Italy.<\/p>\n
He underlined on Sunday how well he has made the switch back to road racing, winning the GP Industria & Artigianato after a solo attack in the hilly finale.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s in fine form and, like Evenepoel, has exactly the sort of punch needed to win on the hilly Canadian circuits.<\/p>\n
So too do Isaac del Toro (UAE Emirates-XRG) and Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM), third and fourth overall in the Tour.<\/p>\n
![\"Isaac](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2290965464.jpg\"\/)
Isaac Del Toro was the strongest rider in the Tour of Germany (Photo: Uli Deck\/picture alliance via Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Del Toro beat the 19 year old to the podium by just over two minutes, marking a successful end to his first-ever Tour campaign.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s since competed in the Lidl Deutschland Tour and shone, winning the prologue, taking second on two other stages and winning the overall.<\/p>\n
Poga\u010dar\u2019s injury means that UAE will hope Del Toro can deliver in his stead.<\/p>\n
Others who could impress are his former teammate Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek), seventh in the Tour, former Montr\u00e9al and Qu\u00e9bec winner Michael Matthews (Team Jayco AlUla), his Tour stage-winning teammate Mauro Schmid, 2025 worlds bronze medalist Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) and a trio of strong US riders, namely Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike), Brandon McNulty (UAE Emirates-XRG) and Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek).<\/p>\n
The latter\u2019s Canadian teammate Derek Gee-West will be highly motivated on home soil, as will returning former pro Michael Woods, who is riding for Canada. He was an unexpended call up to the nation\u2019s worlds team and will do both of the WorldTour races this week.<\/p>\n
Power and perseverance a requirement<\/p>\n
There will be plenty of scope to compare the form of the big guns: Friday\u2019s Grand Prix Cycliste de Qu\u00e9bec will, as ever, test punchy climbing ability while not being so difficult as to disadvantage versatile fastmen such as Matthews. Last year riders completed 18 ascents of a lap taking in the C\u00f4te de la Montagne. The same climb will feature 20 times this time around as part of a 10.3km circuit.<\/p>\n
The total race distance will be 206km and there will be 2,780 meters of climbing.<\/p>\n
Sunday\u2019s Grand Prix Cycliste de Montr\u00e9al is far hillier \u2013 riders will notch up 4304 meters of climbing through 16 laps of a 13.4km circuit.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a race even better suited to the strong climbers, with Poga\u010dar winning twice in recent seasons and also being the strongest last year, but allowing McNulty to take the victory.<\/p>\n
While some riders\u2019 form is still building for the worlds, they will still go all out in the search for a confidence boost and also to have a competitive practice run in Montr\u00e9al.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Evenepoel, Del Toro, Seixas, Van der Poel, Pidcock, Jorgenson and more big stars clash Friday, Sunday as worlds…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":840790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,125876,79,355961,355960,329034,329035,355962,70096],"class_list":["post-840789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-parent_category-road","tag-science","tag-tag-grand-prix-cycliste-de-montreal","tag-tag-grand-prix-cycliste-de-quebec","tag-tag-paul-seixas","tag-tag-remco-evenepoel","tag-tag-uci-road-world-championships","tag-type-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/840790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Remco](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2287392912.jpg\")
<\/p>\n