Updated March 9, 2026 07:30AM
White Roads this weekend didn’t disappoint. Does it ever?
Tadej Pogačar blew the peloton’s doors off (again).
Paul Seixas raced all of France into a frenzy.
Demi Vollering, Pauline Ferrand-Prévotand a bunch of favorites saw their chances get lost in the craters of a rogue farm road.
Now we’ve wiped the white dirt out of our eyes and made sense of the racing, here are 3 hot takes from the bleached Tuscan dirt road.
Table of Contents
Race day no.1 for Tadej Pogačar, ridiculous solo raid no.1 for Tadej Pogačar.
It’s no surprise Tom Pidcock was down in the dumps Saturday afternoon after he was put through the wringer by Pogi and a bunch of UAE lieutenants so strong they could be leaders.
“I think you can feel a bit of sombreness here with everyone,” the very downbeat Brit said at the finish. “With UAE like that, there’s not much you can do.”
Pogačar’s 80km gallop across Tuscany on Saturday arrived just 6 days after Mathieu van der Poel made a miracle save and then rode the peloton off his wheel at Omloop Nieuwsblad.
On that day, UAE racer Florian Vermeersch caught shade for pulling with Van der Poel in the attack, and effectively towing the towering Dutchman to victory.
Unity vs. Pogačar and MVDP?
Will 2026 finally be the season where teams shift from “following our own plan” to actively foiling Pogačar and MVDP?
Will rivals collaborate to break a one-day duopoly that already seems absolute?
Riders have already hinted that drastic action might be needed to prevent another spring defined by two superstars.
This winter, classics ace Tiesj Benoot joined Uno-X’s young star Johannes Kulset in hinting at his discontent.
“We all have to stop riding at the front when Van der Poel and Pogačar are there,” Benoot told IDL. “I don’t understand that. In my opinion, that’s racing for second place.”
Could a cross-team collaboration have influenced the men’s Strade Bianche this weekend?
Arguably not. The parcours is too fiddly and downright hard for a collective to make an effective chase.
On Saturday, the bunch was in tatters after Pogačar launched his trademark move over the stones of the Monte Sante Marie. But when a chase pack did finally form, “group 2 syndrome” set in hard.
Any slim chance at the cycling “Slim Shady” being reigned in was wiped out when top riders like Pidcock, Matteo Jorgenson, and Ben Healy wouldn’t dare pull each other toward a potential podium position.
Who knows, maybe riders’ union president Adam Hansen will be presented with an anti-Pog petition some time soon.
Seixas needs to square-off against Evenepoel and Vingegaard
The Paul Seixas hype-train is hurtling so fast across the spring that it’s at risk of overheating the railings.
The scrawny French sensation has already been hailed “the chosen one,” and “one of the top 5 or 6 riders in the world” by veteran French racer and former team manager Marc Madiot in an interview with RMC. He’s been anointed with a front-page feature in French daily The Team.
There’s no doubt that Sexias has replaced Isaac del Toro as the new darling of the cycling world’s attention.
And rightly so. The 19-year-old’s romp across the Strade on Saturday showed his outrageous performance one weekend prior in the Ardèche was no fluke.
Even Pogi was impressed.
“He did a super good ride,” Pogačar said of Seixas after the race on Saturday. “He showed that he can ride under pressure, that he can deliver a result, and he has incredible legs.
“He’s a big machine,” Pogačar said.
It seems that Seixas’ breakout third-place finish behind Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel last fall at the European championships was only the start of a new era.
The new hierarchy behind Pogačar
Seixas reiterated on Saturday that he’s got the watts and the wherewithal to be promoted to the tier of riders who are “next in line” behind Pogačar.
He joins Del Toro, Evenepoel, and Juan Ayuso as the most likely rider to crack the Pogačar-Vingegaard lockdown on the Tour de France.
Now, maybe I’m hard to please, but I’m desperate to see how Seixas stacks up against his new peers.
His second-place finish between Ayuso and Joao Almeida last month in the Algarve provided some clue of cycling’s new power-ranking, but we’ve still got little indication of how Seixas fares in the biggest stage-racing brawls.
Because while Seixas stunned everybody but Pogačar in Siena, he’s sure not perfect. Positioning and tactics aren’t yet his forte.
The notoriously gnarly Itzulia Basque Country is the next race on Seixas’ calendar, and Del Toro, Ayuso, and old dog Primož Rog will be there.
Six days across the Basque hills will help us make sense of the new hierarchy behind Pogačar. It might well decide whether we see Seixas make his grand tour debut this summer at the Tour de France.
Buckle up, because the Seix-press is accelerating fast.
Chaos still rules the science of modern cycling
Strade Bianche showed how power meters, ventilation sensors, nutrition apps, unusual Whoop strapsand – most pertinently – GPS units can’t out-science chaos.
Strade Bianche Donne on Saturday was shaped by one wrong turn in what was one of the most “WTF” moments in recent memory.
Pre-race favorites Demi Vollering and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot were among the hitters who followed a misguided lead moto down a cratered farm track that looked like dirt road on steroids.
The group lost more than a minute to the leaders as they reversed out of the craziness, and the door opened for Vollering’s superdomestique Elise Chabbey to deliver the “W.”
A few hours later in the men’s race, the chase behind Pogačar could have played out differently if Pidcock didn’t suffer two mechanicals across the most crucial sector of gravel.
The racing Saturday was a telling reminder that not everything can be tracked, measured, and preempted in modern sport.
And ironically, “wrong turn-gate” at Strade Bianche Donne came just one week after the women’s race at the U.S. half-marathon championships ended in similar controversy.
Three charging front-runners ultimately finished 9th, 12th, and 13th after a guide bike accidentally led them off course in the final mile of the race in Atlanta.
One wrong turn is all it takes
It’s hard to say who was to “blame” for the riders taking the wrong turn Saturday in Strade.
Yes, they all have GPS units that can guide the route. But who would dare not follow an official moto in the heat of a race?
Ferrand-Prévot was at least able to laugh off the fiasco.
“I don’t know how this could have happened. There was a lot of dust. I had no idea if the leading group had ridden correctly. I didn’t know anything, and I still don’t, actually,” Ferrand-Prévot told reporters at the finish.
“I’m curious to see what happened,” she said.
Strade Bianche should offer succor to veteran cycling fans sick of power meters, race radios, and a dominant Slovenian.
In this era of superteams, supreme talents, and extreme sport science, racing still isn’t simply a fitness competition. One missed turn can still trump a winter of 30-hour training weeks, cherry juice, and 10 w/kg intervals.
