World Cycling Championships 2019 Yorkshire: Favourites ITT – men

The route in Yorkshire features a little bit of everything. It is far from flat and the same time riders who are able to push big power through their pedals will find some sections to their liking. The versatile and promising course should fancy top favourite Primoz Roglic. Just looking at his results, the Slovene is the strongest time trialist of 2019. He won two time trials on the Giro d’Italia, (the only) one on La Vuelta, and and powered to an ITT win in the Tour de Romandie. Furthermore, he pocketed the GCs of the Tirreno-Adriatico, Tour de Romandie, UAE Tour, Vuelta España and finished third on the Giro d’Italia. Those are impressive credentials.

Defending champion Rohan Dennis is somewhat of an enigma this season. He disappeared from the Tour de France just before the individual time trial in Pau and, even more disturbing, instead of winning six ITTs in 2018 he turned out on top only once in 2019. It had been rumoured that the Australian is not happy with the material of Bahrain Merida. Whatever the case, Dennis will not be oozing confidence when he clicks into his pedals.

And what about that youngster from Belgium? Remco Evenepoel stormed to victory in last year’s Worlds Championships ITT for Juniors. He skips the U23 category and aims for a top 5 with the Elite riders. Or so he says. Don’t be surprised if he actually aims higher.

Victor Campenaerts is another strong contender for Belgium. Last April, he broke the hour record that was set by Bradley Wiggins in 2015. The hour record was Campenaerts’ major goal, but the two-time European champion certainly won’t mind winning the world title in Yorkshire

Favourites World Championships ITT 2019

*** Primoz Roglic, Victor Campenaerts
** Rohan Dennis, Kasper Asgreen, Remco Evenepoel
* Tony Martin, Maciej Bodnar, Chad Haga, Filippo Ganna

Another interesting read: starting times