Pablo Torres performed better than anyone on the Les Karellis climb, attacking midway and securing the biggest win of his career by dropping Jarno Widar and Joseph Blackmore, who were faster in the final meters yesterday.
After La Rosiere on Stage 3, today it was a chance for the U23 riders to show their w/kg ability on Les Karellis as it was regular and well suited to top climbing performances. The stage started with a long climb up Tignes and Col de l’Iseran. The GC group did the high altitude climb in 43 minutes with 4.7 ᵉW/Kg, which would be equivalent to 5.2 ᵉW/Kg at sea level. Mats Wenzel before Les Karellis had spent 3,103 kilojoules for 3:30h at 12.98 kj/kg/h.
In the earlier part of the climb Diego Pescador and later Michael Leonard attacked but they were not the biggest threats to Jarno Widar. After a good performance yesterday Spanish wonderkid Pablo Torres was feeling better and with 6 km to go he attacked from the GC group and no one could respond. Torres quickly caught and dropped Leonard, riding for his biggest win yet in career. Joseph Blackmore after a good performance on the shallower La Rosiere was struggling on Les Karellis as he is not a pure climber. The race favourite Jarno Widar finished 45 seconds behind Torres between two Visma Lease a Bike Development team riders Darren van Bekkum and Tijmen Graat.
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Torres’ performance was exceptional for an 18-year-old, as he did 6.29 ᵉW/Kg for 31:24 min to take the leader’s jersey, which is equivalent to 6.55 ᵉW/Kg at sea level. Torres is a first year u23 rider who was born in November and therefore is almost the same age as the oldest junior riders. Given this strong performance, the young Spaniard might move from the UAE development team to the main team in 2025.
Before the race, Torres might not have received as much hype as other teenage talents like Paul Seixas, AJ August, Jørgen Nordhagen, Jarno Widar, and Albert Withen Philipsen, but his climbing perrformance at Karellis has outshone any performance by any of them in a race so far. Widar, Van Bekkum, and Leonard all pushed 6.06 – 6.08 ᵉW/Kg on the climb, which might have been sufficient in previous editions of the Tour de l’Avenir, even when Tadej Pogačar won in 2018 without a stage win, but the younger generation continues to improve. The most talented first-year U23 riders are now proving they can compete against the older U23 competitors.
Such a great way to prove that it isn’t about the drugs riders take….
Do you think that even if there was doping in the elite races, U23 riders wouldn’t?