Cycling: After the women and the youngsters, the elite men will compete in the individual time trial world championships in Bergen today. The starting field is peppered with candidates for the three medal positions. Can Tony Martin defend his title and celebrate his fifth World Cup triumph?
Mount Floyen makes the difference
At 13:05 the first professional will roll off the starting ramp in Bergen. Then it's about gold, silver and bronze at the 2017 World Championships. There are only a few flat sections on the 31,1-kilometer course. The course seems to be chasing the riders up and down all the time. At the very end comes the hardest part. Mount Floyen is 3,4 kilometers long and has an average gradient of 9,1 percent. The classic time trialists could reach their limits here at the latest. The profile should primarily suit all those who have their qualities both in time trials and in ascending terrain. This could become a problem for the German title defender Tony Martin.
Our prognosis: Tom Dumoulin celebrates his first world championship title
Tony Martin is a self-declared Norway fan. Nevertheless, he assesses his chances of successfully defending his title as low: "The best legs in the world won't change the fact that I'm not a world-class climber." The German knows that the profile is anything but accommodating. The same applies to the Tour de France stage winner Maciej Bodnar (Poland), European Champion Victor Campenaerts (Belgium) and the Swiss Stefan Kung. The profile suits the time trial world champion of 2015 much better, Vasil Kiryienka (Belarus), and his Sky teammate Chris Froome (Great Britain). Also the newly crowned team time trial world champion wilco kelderman (Netherlands), former ski jumper Primois Roglic (Slovenia) and the Australian hope Rohan Dennis should be happy about the last increase. However, the profile seems to be tailor-made Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands) to be. The winner of the Giro d'Italia is perhaps the best time trialist in the world anyway and he has also become one of the best pros in the field uphill. We therefore bet that Dumoulin will grab the rainbow jersey. For Tony Martin, the maximum can actually only be bronze, because Chris Froome will have planned at least silver.
The start times of the individual time trial
13:05:00 LUTSENKO Alexey
13:06:30 SÜTTERLIN Jasha (Germany)
13:08:00 WAIS Ahmad Badreddin
13:09:30 KHAN Awais
13:11:00 TAN Gabriel
13:12:30 ZHUPA Eugert
13:14:00 BRITTON Robert
13:15:30 ZOIDL Riccardo (Austria)
13 HANSEN Lasse Norman
13:18:30 RYBARUK Kostyantyn
13:20:00 EN PLUS Laurens
13 VANGSTAD Andreas
13 COSTA Rui
13:53:00 HOLLENSTEIN Reto (Switzerland)
13:54:30 ROSSKOPF Joseph
13:56:00 EVTUSHENKO Alexander
13:57:30 TACIAK Mateusz
13:59:00 TRATNIK Jan
14:00:30 IZAGUIRRE INSAUSTI Gorka
14:02:00 GEOGHEGAN HART Tao
14:03:30 BIZHIGITOV Zhandos
14:05:00 ARNDT Nikias (Germany)
14:35:00 JASER Nazir
14:36:30 MUHAMMAD Arsalan Anyum
14:38:00 TEOH Yi Peng
14 BURROWES Jermaine
14:41:00 MARTIN'S SANDOVAL Uri
14:42:30 HALILAJ Redi
14:44:00 CHEUNG King loco
14:45:30 ASADOV Elchin
14:47:00 NDAYISENGA Valens
14 LAMPAERT Yves
14:50:00 KONOVALOVAS Ignatas
15:20:00 TVETCOV Serghei
15:21:30 SEPULVEDA Eduardo
15:23:00 TESHOME Meron
15:24:30 BOND Hamish
15:26:00 HOULE Hugo
15:27:30 SMIT Willem James
15:29:00 PÖSTLBERGER Lukas (Austria)
15:30:30 MADSEN Martin Toft
15:32:00 GRIVKO Andrey
15:33:30 KELDERMAN Wilco
15:35:00 PANTANO GOMEZ Jarlinson
16:05:00 ROCHE Nicolas
16:06:30 GRUZDEV Dmitry
16:08:00 BARTA Jan
16 HAGEN Edvald Boasson
16:11:00 CAMPENAERTS Victor
16:12:30 OLIVEIRA Nelson
16:14:00 GOUGEARD Alexis
16:15:30 MOSCON Gianni
16:17:00 LUDVIGSSON Tobias
16:18:30 KÜNG Stefan (Switzerland)
16:20:00 KIRYIENKA Vasil
16:50:00 VAN GARDEREN Tejay
16:51:30 ZAKARIN Ilnur
16:53:00 YOUNG Bob
16 BODNAR Maciej
16:56:00 ROGLIC Primoz
16:57:30 DENNIS Rohan
16 CASTROVIEJO Jonathan
17:00:30 FROOME Chris
17:02:00 DUMOULIN Tom
17:03:30 MARTIN Tony (Germany)