Top stars Tadej Pogačar, Primož Roglič, Jonas Vingegaard and Isaac del Toro have been confirmed as the four riders who will participate in the first-ever edition of the Andorra Cycling Masters race on October 19.
Presented as part of the countdown to stage 7 of the Vuelta a España, which started in Andorra la Vella, the Andorra Cycling Masters is set to have a two-part format, firstly an uphill time trial and then a city centre circuit.
Probably the most striking aspect of the new race is that it will only have four riders on the start list: Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and teammate Del Toro, Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) and Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike).
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While logically not classified as a UCI-ranked event, organisers say that the idea was to try for a new approach to racing, both on and off the bike, that will give the broader public both a race to watch and plenty of behind-the-scenes viewing.
"We've been looking for a while at a way of creating an event that is cycling-based but which doesn't occupy the same space as stage racing or criteriums," organiser David Quintana told Cyclingnews.
"The idea was to put four of the very best riders together but without teams and so on, racing directly against each other.
"That way the public could see who, each season, is the champion of champions."
Andorra Cycling Masters itself will last for around two hours in total, making it hard to see how definitive such a verdict could actually be. But in any case, the idea of pitting the top names against each other is perhaps the most original element in the new event.
"We just want to have the four top names, nobody else involved, no teams and so on. It's born from the idea of trying to decide who's the very best.
"So we want to do it on neutral terrain, seeing the four racing against each other, alone and unassisted but with fans cheering them on from the roadsides and in the streets of Andorra."
The race will have a collective 'GC' comprising the times from the time trial and the city centre event. However, according to Quintana the details of the second race have yet to be confirmed and worked out with the Andorra local authorities..
"What we want to be sure about is that in each lap of the second, city centre race there are different points systems in play throughout, so we'll see how we can work it out and keep people hooked to the event all the way through the event and it doesn't just come down to the final dash for the line."
Apart from its longstanding relationship with the Grand Tours and Volta a Catalunya, not to mention now-defunct races like the Vuelta a Aragon and Barcelona-Andorra Classic, Andorra is showing an increasing interest in its own road events. This year has already seen the emergence of the country's first ever own UCI-ranked event, the Andorra MoraBanc Clássica, won by Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek).
However, while the racing in the Andorra Cycling Masters is limited to one day, Quintana claims the event will effectively last two because a key ingredient will be the countdown "from the moment the riders arrive in Andorra."
"We'll be with them, filming them, seeing how they interact with each other and so on. So as a spectacle, it'll start the evening before. The important thing is that the fans can see their idols up close."
