Strade Bianche may have become one of the most popular events on the cycling calendar but Patrick Lefevere believes it has gone too far, criticising the organisers for 'messing up' the race.
The route for the 2026 Strade Bianche has seen a slight reduction in the overall distance and the number of gravel sectors, but that's "too little, too late" for the former Soudal-QuickStep team manager.
The modern Classic over the white 'sterrato' tracks of Tuscany was first held in 2007 and was for many years one of the most open races of the Spring, with cobbled Classics riders competing against climbers. However, in the past few years the distance has risen above the 200km mark and the elevation gain has gone from less than 3000 metres up towards the 4000m mark.
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"Race organizer RCS should explain it to me sometime: Why did they mess up Strade Bianche so badly? Lefevere wrote in his weekend column for Belgian newspaper Het Nieuwsblad, on the day of the 2026 edition.
"Everyone who organises a race wants the top riders at the start. Only Strade apparently doesn't need them. The balance of that race was so good; if you made a Venn diagram of all the cobbled races and hill-climbing Classics, Strade would be a perfect cross-section. A race where [Mathieu] Van der Poel and [Tadej] Pogačar competed on equal footing – every organizer's dream.
Van der Poel and Pogačar did battle in a memorable 2021 edition, which the Dutchman won ahead of Ardennes specialist Julian Alaphilippe and former Tour de France champion Egan Bernal.
Pogačar was seventh that year but returned in 2022 to win with a long-range solo, and has repeated the feat every time he has turned up since, winning in 2023 and 2025 with apparent ease.
Even with some distance and some early gravel sectors scrubbed off compared to the past three editions, Pogačar remains the overwhelming favourite for Saturday's race, while Van der Poel has not bothered to turn up for a third year in a row.
"RCS and many of their colleagues apparently have the delusion that the race is more important than the riders," Lefevere wrote. "Every year, the elevation gain in Strade has increased. This year, it's been brought back down, but it's too little, too late. Van der Poel doesn't ride anymore because even he can't win anymore.
"If the Classics riders don't have a chance to win, they won't come. So today we're looking at the Tadej Pogačar show. The last three times Pogačar raced in Strade, he won. No sport benefits from predictability."
Lefevere also reiterated his distaste for gravel in general, raising question marks over safety. The long-running Belgian team boss, who retired last year, has regularly spoken out against gravel's creeping infiltration into road racing.
"Strade completely overplays its hand. It's the photographers' favourite race, with the cypress trees, the flying dust, and the riders who arrive at the Piazza del Campo like forced labourers from the road. But in the peloton, Strade has also acquired another reputation: a crash course that can jeopardise your season."
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