The sprint is launched: one more week of Tour, with some final tests at the same time such as the Italian Week, fundamental for our national track team, and then the Tokyo Olympics they will be reality. Let's do some calculations through the numbers of participants, which can tell us a lot about what kind of races we will see.
Let's start with an overview. The specific qualification regulation for the Games, established by the UCI based solely on ranking, rewards Australia, the only nation to be present in all disciplines and the richest contingent with its 38 elements. This is certainly thanks to a cutting-edge cycling movement and the results of the latest Olympic events are there to prove it, but also favored by obvious geographical reasons, with almost no continental competition considering that even the New Zealand it emerges only in specific tests.
Azzurri, ninth place (as a contingent)
Above 30 elements are also Netherlands (36) Germany (33) and France (32) Italy stands in ninth position, on par with Poland, with 23 elements, but on the other hand there is an entire sector that is not covered, that of fast track testsIt's a heavy hole, which shows how urgent it is relaunch the sector which in the last century was an almost constant reservoir of medals.
In the men's race, there will be 130 participants from 58 nations, with only 6 (Belgium, Italy, Holland, France, Colombia and Spain) with 5 elements per team. Italy will have the only Nibali coming from the Tour, other teams will instead try to exploit the condition acquired in France for the Olympic race: 4 riders for Colombia Quintana e Uranium, without the pink jersey Bernal; 3 for Belgium of Van Aert, with the addition of evenepoel; 4 for France of Gaudu e Martin, and then pogacar e Roglic (SLO), Birdsong e Asgreen (DEN), Doors e haig (AUS), Thomas and Simon Yachts (GBR) and so on. Only the road will tell how fruitful the combination will be.
Yes, but the Olympic race also has another feature. Alongside the big names, there are also representatives of lesser-known movements, who will meet at the start but then leave an increasingly smaller group behind. UCI rules have led nations like Eritrea, Algeria, and Turkey to have two representatives, just like other major countries like the USA and New Zealand.
Many almost unknown shirts
Among those who will have to "play alone" there will be Argentina, Hungary, Lithuania (i.e. countries present in the World Tour teams) and then Rwanda, Namibia, Taipei, Peru... This is why in presenting the Olympics, it is underlined that as soon as things start to get serious, the number of competitors competing for an important result will be limited, as in an Alpine stage of the Giro or Tour, but this will make the management of the race very different from any other.
The women's race the following day will have 67 competitors from 42 countries: here the selection will be even more marked, making the challenge between theHolland and the Rest of the World, with 4 orange champions to keep all the others at bay, but here too there will be more representative presences than anything else, such as Thailand, Trinidad & Tobago, Cyprus, Ethiopia, Paraguay.
Exotic countries on the podium? Maybe...
From this perspective, the track situation at the Olympics is more complex. Some countries, unknown on the road, such as Hong Kong or Malaysia, could play a very important role, especially in the speed events. It should be noted that specifically, Olympic track events have a much more selective access path than road events: there are no shortcuts linked to geographical affiliation or wild cards, only the ranking linked to the main events of the four-year period is valid, for this reason the number of presences is smaller on one hand but with a much higher qualitative rate
Track cycling is one of those disciplines where, by qualifying for the Olympics, a significant step towards medals has already been taken. Just look at the complex and lengthy qualification process for the pursuit quartets, with just eight at the start, truly the "crème de la crème." The overall quality is so high that, for example, prompted Canada to decide to forgo the women's all-American, despite being qualified, not having a pair up to the task according to the judgement of their technicians.
