What saw Tadej Pogačar drawing a bullet train, Mark Cavendish a small green dragon, Sepp Kuss the katakana characters for the colour red and Giulio Ciccone the symbol for mountains? That's right, the Tour de France Saitama Criterium. This was before the actual race, of course, but just as relevant to competitive cycling.
If you're paid to fly to Japan and take part in a criterium for PR purposes, why not make the most of it? That was the approach of Pogačar and his fellow riders last week, as they got stuck into the events on the other side of the world, which really does mark the last drawn-out part of the road season. The plug had been taken out of the bath that is the calendar with Il Lombardia, which was ages ago, but all the water has now finally been drained; that does mean the plug will be put back in soon, though...
