I’d be very, very surprised if Mr. Pidcock showed up for his usual ass-whooping at World Cup races this year. I never know what to think when he does that. Shows up seemingly on a whim, often not even riding his mountain bike before practice, and wins, and easily it seems. On one hand, I say “may the best man win” in any race. 99% of the other racers are full time XC professionals, train accordingly, and seem to not be able to keep up with Pidcock as soon as he gets to the front. How can that be? On only a few occasions did he not win when he does this. He’s usually on the podium though.
On the other hand, I think it’s not fair to the full timers. Which is of course stupid. If he can get in the race fair and square, and can win, then so be it. Everyone else needs to train harder I guess. His desire to triumph on the road seems to have finally taken him out of the cyclocross and mtb races. He did zero CX races, and I don’t blame him really. No one on this earth was going to beat MvDP this year. So he’d have been racing for 2nd and 3rd places I guess.
But, is this new dedication to the road world, on new bikes, and a newly solidified team, going to actually pay off? He’s still racing against Tadej, MvDP, WVA, and all the other beasts on the road. I will be rooting for him, for no good reason other than he has a connection to XC and he has mega talent on a bike. And I like to root for the under dogs I guess.
We’ll see soon enough.