After Tuesday's time trials, the junior events at the Road World Championships continue on Thursday with the race to crown the junior road race world champion.
For their road race, the junior men take on the same route the under-23 women will race over earlier in the day, riding 10 laps of the Montreal circuit the Championships is based around.
Covering 134km, the entire race climbs well over 2,500m, the start of each lap ascending steeply, with gradients into double digits. The lap includes two other steep, but shorter digs, the last of which tops out just inside the final 4km, the route then dropping down until we reach the same finish line used for the time trials, and its final uphill 600m, where the optimistic may be tempted to open their sprint too early.
The Belgians would have been expecting to do well, but the loss of Seff Van Kerckhove is likely to affect them, leaving the in-form but inexperienced Vic De Smet to compete against the stronger, more mature squads.
It’s a long race, the longest the vast majority of riders will have done, and that physical maturity will be essential for those hoping to contest that brutal final sprint.
Despite this being his first World Championships, there are few riders who suit the Montreal course better than Brandon Fedrizzi, the 18-year-old’s two most recent victories coming over similar distances and profiles.
He’s been consistent all year, winning 12 races, including those two recent successes within in the last four weeks. Both of those came on longer distances than this week’s race and on courses with hilly finishing circuits. In both cases he won a two-up sprint.
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Fedrizzi will also benefit from a strong Italian team and may well be pulling on rainbows on Thursday.
Benjamin Noval (Spain)
Benjamín Noval will lead the Spanish team Montreal (Image credit: Getty Images)
One of the most highly regarded juniors in the sport, Benjamín Noval has a palmarès to justify the billing.
A GC rider of the future, Noval has 16 wins to his name this year alone, those coming from only 29 days, however, much of his success has come in Spanish national level races, though he did win GC at the Ain Bugey Valromey Tour in July.
Last year's World Championships was disappointing for the now 17-year-old, and he will hope for retribution before turning pro with Netcompany-Ineos next year.
Another rider hitting form just at the right time is Great Britain’s Finlay Storrie. Riding for JEGG-SKIL-DJR, the junior team supported by Visma-Lease a Bike, the 17-year-old won a stage a lumpy stage of Affoltern am Albis in Switzerland just a few days after winning the junior Druivenkoers.
That Belgian race was the flattest of this year’s wins for Storrie, who has a big kick at the end of a hilly race, and there are plenty of top 10 placings for the young Welsman, who hails from the same Maindy Flyers kids’ club as the likes of Geraint Thomas. He is a first-year junior though, and that inexperience may well prove a hindrance in a long race with so much at stake.
Vic De Smet (Belgium)
(Image credit: Soudal-QuickStep)
The in-form rider in the junior category, both on the road and against the clock, De Smet leads a strong, if slightly depleted Belgian team after the withdrawal of Seff Van Kerkhove.
De Smet has had a storming first year in the junior category. Even if he failed to win in either June or July, he won every other month, and on a variety of terrains, though he tends to go well on hilly courses.
His most recent victory came at the start of September, where he won the bunch kick which decided the hilly fourth stage of the Giro della Lunigiana, where he was third overall.
Ones to watch
Patrik Pezzo Rosola (Italy) – One of Italy's hugely strong junior set up, he gives the team options
Michael Hettegger (Austria) – 13th in last year's race, he's not a serial winner, though can pull a big ride out of the bag.
Enzo Hincapie (USA) – Kicked on after an anonymous ride last year, the current US junior road champion
Maj Bohak (Slovenia) – hitting form at the right time with top rides already this month already
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A recent addition to the Cyclingnews staff, Owen Rogers is an experienced journalist, working as a freelancer covering the sport for various magazines and websites for more than 10 years.
Initially concentrating mainly on the women's sport, he has covered hundreds of race days on the ground and interviewed some of the sport's biggest names.
Living near Cambridge in the UK, when he's not working you'll find him either riding his bike or playing drums.
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