Climbing, cobbles, altitude – Are the Rwanda World Championships already won, or will the peloton tear up the script in Kigali?

There is no disputing that the 2025 UCI Road World Championships will be a landmark moment in cycling, held for the first time on African soil from September 21-28 in Rwanda's capital city of Kigali. Known as 'the land of a thousand hills' because of its stunning mountainous backdrop, it is no surprise that this will also be one of the toughest races in the event's centennial history.

The 3,350 metres of elevation gain in the elite women's 164.4km race, held on city circuits, and the 5,475 metres in the elite men's 267.5km race, which includes a longer extension loop, feature cumulative ascents, cobblestone climbs, and an altitude of between 1,493 and 1,771 metres at their highest points.

The courses call for a special type of rider who is an exceptional climber, but who is also explosive and technically savvy, and so, at first glance, offer little room for surprises.

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A closer look at the additional variables reveals that the composition of pelotons and competing national teams, along with targeted reconnaissance, acclimatisation, and understanding the local roads and racing environment, could significantly influence a script torn up in Kigali.

A race of attrition

The courses are expected to favour the powerful climbers, and neither the elite women's nor elite men's race is expected to be an open affair, but rather could end up coming down to varying degrees of selection.

The elite women's race will feature 11 laps of a 15.1km city circuit for a total of 164.4km and 3,350 metres of elevation gain, with its highest point at 1,493 metres. There are two climbs on the circuit: the Côte de Kigali Golf climb, 800m at 8.1% halfway around the local circuit, and the decisive Côte de Kimihurura climb, 1.3km at 6.3% on the circuit close to the finish, which is cobbled.

A deeper dive into the course design shows a Classics-style women's race - think along the lines of GP de Plouay, Amstel Gold Race and possibly even the Richmond World Championships (but at altitude).

"I like it. It's really nice. It's the type of route that suits the type of rider that I am; explosive and cumulative, so I liked it. I was happy when I saw it," said Ashleigh Moolman Pasio, who will represent South Africa in the elite women's race and previewed both courses during a training camp last November.

"It's definitely going to be a race of attrition because there isn't a lot of recovery. We are racing on a city circuit which has two climbs that aren't particularly big or long, but they keep coming in close succession, so there isn't a lot of recovery in between … this will be constantly up and down."

The elite men's race features the same 15.1km city circuits, nine at the start and six at the end, along with the additional challenge of a mid-race extension loop that boast three more climbs; Côte de Péage, which is 1.8km at 5.9%, Mont Kigali is the longest climb at 5.9km at 6.9% and peaks at 1,771 metres altitude, and the famed Mur de Kigali, which is only 400m but features unruly cobbles and is punishingly steep with an average of 11%. The peloton will race a total of 267.5km with 5,475m of elevation gain.

"The extension part of the loop is pretty insane, and it changes the whole nature of the course. So it would be more of a pure climber," she said. "The climb in the middle, for the men's course, is really something, and it is a proper climb."

Asked if she would have liked to have seen the extension loop added to the women's course, Moolman Pasio said, "In the case of a women's race, it would be beneficial to someone like me because it would be more selective, of course, but having said that, I still believe the women's course will be hard enough as it is."

Multiple-time Tour de France stage winner Biniam Girmay will represent Eritrea at the World Championships, likening the elite men’s course to that of the Monument Liège-Bastogne-Liège.

“I know Kigali well, especially some of the roads we do in [Tour du] Rwanda and at the African Championships, many of the climbs,” he said. "So, Liège-Bastogne-Liège but with some cobblestones, it's like Liège-Bastogne-Liège climbs, which are longer, so these are shorter and steeper and with pavé, but it is also technical roads. So, very technical and intense for 260km, and then add the altitude.”

Girmay said the course will not suit his abilities as a rider, but that he will be supporting his teammates at these Worlds. “For me, the World Championships are actually the only chance to wear the Eritrean jersey. It's always great to be able to represent for my country,” he said.

“It would be great if I could get into the breakaway. It's been a long time since I was in an early breakaway. It would be great if I could show my worth while I'm there. It will be a nice experience. I do want to do 'something.' It's a tough course, especially on the local lap, so we will see what I am capable of doing to give support.”

'They're like you would ride on in Belgium' – Unruly cobbles add extra challenge

There are two notable cobblestone sections incorporated into the course design, and having ridden on them both, Moolman-Pasio compared them to some of the famous cobbles of the Spring Classics from races like the Tour of Flanders and Omloop Het Nieuwsblad.

"They are cobbles. There is a lot of Belgian history in Rwanda, maybe not all good history, to be honest, but I believe there is a Flemish influence to the cobbles. They are like you would ride on in Belgium," she said.

The first of the cobblestones is positioned along the Côte de Kimihurura ascent featured on both the elite women's and elite men's races at the end of the city circuit, which has the potential to make for a captivating finale to both races.

Moolman Pasio compared these cobblestones to those of the Bosberg, a cobbled climb that has been part of the Tour of Flanders final, and also features in Omloop Het Nieuwsblad.

"The [Côte de Kimihurura], the final climb before the finish, would be more comparable to Bosberg because you can see quite far ahead. It is not twisting and turning, so you can see far ahead. It is not the worst of Belgian cobbles, but they are still like Belgian cobbles," she said.

The men will also contest with the Côte de Kimihurura cobbled ascent on each lap of the circuit, but they also face another set at the Mur de Kigali, which Moolman Pasio said was among some of the roughest cobbles she has experienced.

"It will be different for the men's race because they also have the terrible cobbles on the Mur de Kigali, that are comparable to some of the worst cobbled climbs like the Koppenberg, or even worse than the Oude de Kwaremont, to be honest," she compared to both ascents of the Tour of Flanders. One of the more important factors concerning these cobbles, she said, will be each rider's choice of tire pressure.

"I am quite glad we don't have to do those ones. The steepness of the climb would be well-suited to me but for a small rider, you would have to think of your tire pressure for those cobbles, and the men are only doing it once, so that is a challenge; if you have this one climb, and it is in the middle of the race, you can't really compromise your tire pressure too much but then it does make the climb difficult."

Cobbled climbs plus altitude equals a delicate balancing act

Cobbles, climbs, and now altitude; and you end up with a delicate balancing act when it comes to training and preparation for these Rwanda World Championships.

The highest points of the race: 1,493 metres for the women and 1,771 metres for the men, might not seem high when compared to the 2,000 metres-plus high mountain passes of the Grand Tours, but Moolman Pasio argued that anyone hunting the rainbow jersey will have been acclimating at those specific altitudes.

"The interesting thing is that you need to consider altitude as part of your preparation. It's not the highest, but you definitely need to acclimatise to be good on a course like this one. It's not necessarily super high altitude, but everyone who is going there to be competitive will be doing altitude training right now (early-mid September - ed.) because we want to be acclimatised. We will need to be doing explosive efforts consistently between 1,400 and 1,500 metres [for women's peloton], so you need to be acclimatised to that elevation," said Moolman-Pasio, who spent time training at a similar altitude in Font-Romeu, near Andorra in the Pyrénées ahead of the Worlds.

She also noted some of the additional obstacles of higher-speed interval training while at altitude, and some of the compromises a rider would need to make to get the best of their altitude camp.

"It's an interesting one because, often, a challenge of being at altitude, doing training at altitude, is that you can't necessarily train as explosively as you would be able to at sea level, so that it's going to be the challenge; how everyone manages training for an explosive course but at the same time acclimatising to altitude. That can be a sensitive or delicate balance; to recover well enough and make sure that you are not putting yourself into a hole and overtrain."

While some athletes have gone to Rwanda to preview the course since it was announced last year, Moolman Pasio believes that most of the contenders who compete on the WorldTour, mainly in Europe, will have opted to prepare at altitude destinations closer to home.

"I'm training at Font-Romeu altitude in France, close to Andorra. I was specific about this choice because I didn't want to be on a super high mountain where you had to either drive down to get to a lower altitude or constantly climb up a long mountain to get home," she said.

"We are not preparing for a Grand Tour - and it's a bit different for the men because they have a longer proper climb in the middle - but for the women, we are training for a Classic-style course, but we need to be acclimatized to the altitude.

"So, it was intentional not to go to Andorra, but to go to Font-Romeu, where the altitude is a little bit less at 1,800 metres, enough to acclimatize but still in a good location where I can prepare well and train explosively."

Rwanda has a multitude of suitable places to train and prepare for these Worlds, too, and some athletes and competing nations will have taken advantage of their resources to prepare along the abundance of mid-altitude locations near Kigali.

Moolman Pasio believed that some athletes might have preferred to train closer to home to avoid the hassle of extensive travel and the risk of contracting a stomach bug from contaminated water while abroad. She noted the importance of opting instead for bottled water as a precaution.

"That was the reason, for myself, I decided to come early [November 2024], to explore my options, there are great places to train in Rwanda, and to acclimatise but the risk was too high with water quality, and even malaria, and that type of stuff, so I decided to do a more conservative approach like most European countries," she said, pointing to her own experience with a stomach bug during her final day of training last November in Kigali.

"That will be a challenge for everyone, that is very real; you have to be careful with the food and water because you really could get sick if you're not careful."

Attendance, local knowledge and massive crowds

There are variables such as the peloton size and attendance, local knowledge of African racing that Moolman Pasio factors into her predictions for the elite women's and elite men's road races.

She noted that due to some nations opting not to send full teams, the make-up of the peloton might feel more like the Olympic Games, where quotas determine the number of riders competing for the various nations, and make the size of the fields much smaller than in WorldTour races or previous World Championships.

While the start lists for the two elite road races have not yet been confirmed, Moolman Pasio said it will be interesting to see which nations control the races; where it might typically be countries like the Netherlands, Belgium or Italy, for example, these races could play out in a whole new, and somewhat unexpected way.

"I'm uncertain about what the peloton will look like in Kigali, because some nations are only sending two riders, and we are not going to have the same sort of field we are accustomed to in Europe or other World Championships in terms of the strength in numbers that other dominant cycling nations usually have," she said.

"I think it will be more of an Olympic Games feeling with the teams being smaller. I'm yet to see a start list, but there will be reduced numbers and a slightly different feeling. In that respect, it could be interesting in terms of the control of the race.

"In the past, on a course like Kigali, you wouldn't worry too much about an early breakaway because it would come back at some point, because the stronger nations would be organized and bring it back. But now we need to think more along the lines of the Tokyo Olympic Games, because it is possible that a break goes away and we don't have the same organized teams or team numbers to bring it back."

Moolman Pasio also pointed to the handful of nations that will be aiming to make the most of these Worlds, that will undoubtedly want to form early breakaways in both the elite women's and elite men's road races, but also in the other categories competing during the week.

"It is a selective course, in that it will accumulate over time, so that will be interesting. There will be plenty of African nations that are there to have the best race they can and put on a show, and there will be plenty of riders in an early breakaway," she said.

"It will be interesting to see how that game is played between the more dominant cycling nations and the more opportunistic nations, of which I would place the African nations, because they will be looking for opportunity."

While there are a handful of favourites that are competing, riders like defending champion Tadej Pogačar of Slovenia and double Olympic champion Remco Evenepoel of Belgium, or former Tour de France winner Demi Vollering from the Netherlands and reigning Tour champion Pauline-Ferrand-Prévot from France, these Worlds might indeed cater to several riders from African nations, including herself and Kim Le Court-Pienaar from Mauritius. And while Girmay is a confirmed starter, he has stated that he will be working to support his Eritrean teammates.

"It's always nice to have one symbol in your continent and country, and at the end of the day, it is important to think about the future of cycling in Africa and Eritrea," said Girmay, while pleased Rwanda will host this event, also would have preferred a course design that offered an opportunity to more riders.

"It's nice to be there to represent and to show them respect and to show them that it is possible, if they give 100% and work hard, it is possible. From my side, it is nice to give people hope and to tell them that anything is possible."

Moolman-Pasio explained, too, that while the course suits her, she will also have more experience in racing in Africa than some of her top competitors.

"It's not home because I am from South Africa, but I will have more experience and be more accustomed to racing in Africa because of having done the African Championship titles, and stuff like that. I really feel like it does seem like a home advantage racing in Rwanda," Moolman-Pasio said.

The organisers of the Rwanda Worlds have built a city circuit, not just to challenge the pelotons, but to host millions of fans who are anticipated to come out to watch, all week, and especially the elite road races on the final weekend.

"It's just Africa, and the crowds are going to be an experience for everyone. It will be crowds like Flanders, but African crowds, a different flavour," she said. "There is a vibe that you just don't get in Europe ... and I love that vibe; it's more of a hustle happening. In Europe, things are very controlled; that is the difference, and we thrive in that energy. It will be a real vibe, but a totally different vibe, because we are Africans. It will be a different atmosphere, but a vibrant atmosphere."

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