The International Challengers

Winning the World Championship road race takes superhuman stamina and a will of iron. We check the favourites’ form cards

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PETER SAGAN

SLO | Age: 29

Days of racing: 68

Peter Sagan has won over 100 races and achieved all manner of feats over the course of his illustrious, prolific career, but few if any of those victories mean more to him than the hat-trick of World Championship road race successes between 2015-17.

That extraordinary run saw him become the first man in history to win three successive world titles. Now, he’s aiming to break another record by winning an unprecedented fourth rainbow jersey, which would put him ahead of Alfredo Binda, Rik Van Steenbergen, Eddy Merckx and Oscar Freire on the all-time list.

The varying manner in which he won his previous three gold medals reflects his staggering talent. His maiden victory four years ago in Virginia came about from a solo attack on the final lap of a hilly course in Richmond. The following year in Doha, he successfully negotiated some early crosswinds to come out on top in a reduced bunch sprint ahead of Mark Cavendish, no less. Then in2017 he used both his talents for sprinting and surviving short, steep hills to triumph from a select group that made it to the finish together.

After growing accustomed to the honour of wearing the rainbow jersey during this time, he’s desperate to reclaim it from Alejandro Valverde, who triumphed on a route in Innsbruck last year that proved too hilly for the Slovak.

“On paper, Yorkshire is much better suited to me than the last one,” he told La Gazzetta dello Sport at the start of the season. “But to win the Worlds so many things must happen: good form, good luck.”

Does he have the form? It’s hard to know given how little he’s raced since winning the green jersey at the Tour, after which his directeur sportif Jan Valach told Slovak newspaper Pravda he “needed some rest”.