After 2018 and 2022, faking a mild interest in the football World Cup, it was convenient for this year’s event to be on the other side of the world. Not having to watch – out of sight, out of mind – it’s doing the trick.
As luck would have it, one of the most beautiful sporting events (outside darts) doesn’t relocate every time it takes place, as France is the only country where one of the grandest spectacles on the planet could ever happen.
July wouldn’t be the same without dozens of pairs of lycra-clad legs powering through the incredible French countryside, and sport wouldn’t be sport without Le Tour de France, a grand race to which Kazakhstan has made a rich contribution over the years, since the inception of the first incarnation of XDS-Astana Team.
Overall wins in 2009 with Alberto Contador and 2014 with Vincenzo Nibali have been the highlights of the team’s near two decades in professional cycling, not to mention the day Sir Mark Cavendish finally eclipsed the greatest of all time, Eddy Merckx, by taking his 35th stage win in the light blue of one of our proudest sporting exports.
Team Astana has also picked up notable victories in other races, including Il Giro d’Italia, in itself a major tour, but as the greatest of all is but a few days away, saqtimes.kz is proud to report that XDS-Astana Team will contest another Tour de France, the opening stage taking place in Barcelona on 4 July. Note that Le Tour does pass through neighbouring countries from time to time.
The overall winner is expected to be the majestic Tadej Pogacar, who, barring accidents, seems set to equal the record five victories also held by Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault, and Miguel Indurain. Brit Chris Froome has four, but has by now pedalled out of sight in such a way he won’t make it to five.
The XDS line-up has now been announced and, as reported by Qazinform, includes Davide Ballerini, Aaron Gate, Sergio Higuita, Max Kanter, Harold Tejada, Mike Teunissen, Simone Velasco, and Nicolas Vinokourov. The latter rider is the son of the legendary Alexandr, Kazakhstani gold medallist in the 2012 London Olympic Road Race and himself a strong competitor in many Tours de France. He is currently the General Manager of the team his son rides for.
Cycling as a total sport is more than simply getting from A to B, and the fact that some of the elite multi-stage racers don’t always clean up in the Olympic Games is evidence that the demands of different events suit a range of riding ability.
Any Tour de France will feature riders who are out-and-out sprinters, the brave souls who battle to the finishing line at high speed to win glory for themselves and their teams. Then there are one-day stage specialists who tend to target flatter and longer stages, plus time-trialists, whose best day of the three-week race tends to be the shorter flat-out sustained solo efforts against the clock.
Climbers contest not just the overall victory, but the lesser competition known as King of the Mountains, and no Tour de France has ever concluded without the winner coming from a small group of riders whose exploits up the iconic climbs of either the Alps or the Pyrenees have gained them time on the General Classification.
Add to this the domestiques, team riders who perform a series of riding tasks to help the whole team in this deceptively complex sport, such as carrying drinks to team leaders, leading out sprints, and perhaps pacing top riders back to the main bunch after a crash or puncture. They may even give up their bikes in the case of a mechanical problem.
The team leader (of which there are sometimes two) is the rider whose remit is usually to fight for overall victory, as was the case with Contador and Nibali. The Tour de France is so tough that even one bad day in the saddle can spell the end of a rider’s chances of winning.
Last year’s winner, Slovenian Tadej Pogacar, largely sealed the win by taking one mountain stage a few minutes ahead of his Danish rival, Jonas Vingegaard, who could only watch as his young rival powered on up the slope at a speed that would stun anybody not familiar with the immense power of these athletes.
XDS Team Astana has selected a group of riders who tick all these boxes, collectively, and while none of their cyclists lists among the overall favourites for victory when the race arrives in Paris, their participation is yet another year to be proud of for Kazakhstani cycling and sports fans.
For devoted cycling enthusiasts, July, therefore, promises excitement and the guarantee that the XDS-Astana riders will be battling all the way for stage wins, days in the leaders’ jerseys, or, who knows, even another overall victory on 26 July on the Champs-Élysées.
