Tour de France experience excites Strong for road challenge in Glasgow

Despite three world championship medals on the track including a rainbow jersey, Southland professional Corbin Strong will instead focus on this weekend’s road race at the historic UCI Cycling World Championships in and around Glasgow.

He is part of an 86-strong New Zealand cycling team include Para cycling, to compete in the championships that comprise 13 disciplines and 200 events over 11 days in Scotland, starting on Thursday.

The 24-year-old Strong is buoyed by his euphoric Grand Tour debut at the Tour de France with his pro team Israel Premier Tech and is excited to now join with his Cycling New Zealand team for the 271km world championship road race on Monday (NZ time).

The New Zealand team comprises WorldTour riders George Bennett (UAE Team Emirates) and Laurence Pithie (Groupama-FDJ) and Bolton Equities Blake Spoke riders James Oram and Ryan Christensen.

Caption: Corbin Strong, in action on the Champs Elysees in the Tour de France, switches his attention to the New Zealand team in next week’s road race at the UCI World Championships in Glasgow. Photo: Israel Premier Tech.

The men’s road race starts from Edinburgh with 130km to Glasgow where they will complete 10 laps of a 14-km circuit around the city, using many of the roads used for the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

“It looks like a nice circuit to me,” said Strong from his base in Andorra. “It is hard to know how a one-off race like this will go. The world championship race is a big challenge for kiwis ,especially a circuit like this with so many corners in the city circuit.

“I am confident of my form and my ability to be up there and ride a good race but positioning is going to be a key,” said Strong who is excited about his kiwi teammates.

“Laurence Pithie has been in really good form this year and an exciting young rider and George Bennett with all his experience is a key. We’ve got a strong team but much smaller than the major nations.”

Strong said he has recovered well from the Tour de France which was an enjoyable experience where he picked up two top-10 finishes including the final sprint on the famed Champs Elysees.

“It was surreal, especially starting in the Basque country where the fans were incredible. It was everything I had dreamed of, the atmosphere especially.

“We were there to target stages – not with a pure sprinter or the pressures of a pure GC guy. On a couple of days that I really targeted and the team helped me, we did okay. I think I can be proud that I was close to the front with a couple of top-10s.”

Strong was pleased that he was able to negotiate his way over the mountains without any real threat of missing the time cut-off.

“The second to last day was a really hard mountain day. I commented that it would be a relief to get back to the team bus. I was riding with a Norwegian who said that I should make the most of these last two climbs, not just think about the end.

“I am so glad he told me that because the atmosphere on those last two climbs was incredible. It was cool to have a moment to take it all in, that I could be proud of myself, and that I was going to finish the Tour. And I would like to think that I was not just a number in the peloton.”

He got a surprise when he reached the remarkable final 60kms circuit around the famed Champs Elysees and its equally famed cobbles.

“No-one warned me just how intense the cobbles are on the Champs Elysees. As soon as we hit them, I thought this is a lot harder than I was expecting. It was full noise on those cobbles and I was proud of how I raced in that final sprint.”

Strong has recovered well and looking forward to the world championships.

“It looks like a course that a sprinter can potentially survive on, although bike-handling on the circuit with so many corners will be a challenge.

“Hopefully I can do a good ride and stay near the front and put in a good performance wearing the kiwi fern.”

The junior women and men will race solely on the Glasgow circuit over five laps and nine laps respectively on Sunday with the elite men’s race the following day starting in Edinburgh.

The men’s under-23 road race on 12 August is over 168km from Loch Lomond with seven laps of the Glasgow circuit, with the elite and under-23 women on 13 August over the same route with six loops of the city course.

The time trials are staged in and around the medieval town of Stirling with Para cycling and Under-23 men on 10 August, women junior, under-23 and elite on 11 August and junior and elite men on 12 August.