Innsbruck to host 2018 World Champs

[MatParker117]

The Austrian city of Innsbruck will host the UCI Road World Championships in 2018, cycling’s governing body announced on Monday, with a course for climbers likely to be created.

Reports that surfaced in October suggested organisers of the winning bid had put forward a road race course that would include around 4,000m of climbing.

Mountains are not hard to find in the Austrian ski resort – host of the Winter Olympics in 1964 and 1976 – giving the climbers the chance to battle for the rainbow jersey for the first time in a number of years.

Doha 2016 and Bergen 2017 will suit the sprinters in the peloton, with more hilly routes coming in 2013 (Florence) and 2014 (Ponferrada)


Read more at http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest-news/innsbruck-to-host-2018-uci-road-world-championships-209598#52MfSiu1swmGiB5c.99

Should be a good course for the Yates Twins, Landa, Aru etc...

 

[May0maniac]

Good, if the course is going to be as hard as they say it should be an awesome WC.

 

[jens_attacks]

Mikel landa in rainbow jersey!

 

[Brullnux]

Bergen I heard was almost as tough as Florence 2013, so I don't know if it's accurate saying that it will be a sprinter's WC. But Innsbruck sounds extremely fun.

 

[Breh]

Ponferrada had over 4000 altitude meters. Would be surprising to see pure climbers contending for the win.

 

[fauniera]

Re:

Bergen I heard was almost as tough as Florence 2013, so I don't know if it's accurate saying that it will be a sprinter's WC.

According to this they designed a parcours suitable for Kristoff and EBH. Certainly much easier than Firenze.

 

[togo95]

Re:

Ponferrada had over 4000 altitude meters. Would be surprising to see pure climbers contending for the win.

Depends on the course, but I think they are considering putting a serious climb on the circuit. It could very well be for the climbers like Yates bros or Bardet.

 

[Rollthedice]

Valverde's last chance.

 

[Gigs_98]

Thomas rohregger who is planning the course even talks about 5000 meters of climbing. I hope they wont make the course too hard but generally I really like hard courses for wc RR's, so it could be great

 

[classicomano]

I hope they make a *** juggernaut course that will be hell for everyone from kilometer 0. Its been 20 years since we got something like that. Id say its about goddamn time.

 

[robin440]

Bernhard Kohl comeback + win

 

[barmaher]

A ball breaking route will be required if Qatar and Bergen develop into the snooze-fests that seem likely. The thoughts of Cavendish matching Merckx's record of rainbow jerseys is truly frightening.

 

[Guybrush]

Cavendish is done, it's all about Ewan-Gaviria by now

 

[Red Rick]

4000m of climbing is *** low for a place like Innsbruck

 

[Tonton]

Re:

Good, if the course is going to be as hard as they say it should be an awesome WC.

I hope you get to design it .

 

[May0maniac]

Re: Re:

Good, if the course is going to be as hard as they say it should be an awesome WC.

I hope you get to design it .

Nope, but from what I've read in various interviews with Thomas rohregger, he's planning the course, it's going to be really hard, like Gigs already mentioned he talked about 5000m of altitude gain for the mens elite race, they want to host a WC for the climbers.
The Igls climb is already been confirmed on the official website, the climb will start near Schloss Ambras and they go up to the Igls Bobsled.
Schloss Ambras is famous for having the famous portrait of Vlad Tepes

Source:
http://www.innsbruck2018.at/von-der-strecke-schloss-amras/
Edit: The climb up to the Igls Bobsled would be 7.6km at 5.7% with a few short ramps around 9%.

 

[Ruudz0r]

Re: Re:

Good, if the course is going to be as hard as they say it should be an awesome WC.

I hope you get to design it .

Nope, but from what I've read in various interviews with Thomas rohregger, he's planning the course, it's going to be really hard, like Gigs already mentioned he talked about 5000m of altitude gain for the mens elite race, they want to host a WC for the climbers.
The Igls climb is already been confirmed on the official website, the climb will start near Schloss Ambras and they go up to the Igls Bobsled.
Schloss Ambras is famous for having the famous portrait of Vlad Tepes

Source:
http://www.innsbruck2018.at/von-der-strecke-schloss-amras/
Edit: The climb up to the Igls Bobsled would be 7.6km at 5.7% with a few short ramps around 9%.

I also saw an interview with Rohregger about this a while back, if I remember he was talking about a circuit with two climbs in it do you know if that is correct?
I dont remember what other climb he was talking about, but I hope its a shorter and steeper one, will be an awesome WC, though I would have preferred if Colombia would have gotten it.

 

[May0maniac]

Apparently the contracts with the municipalities that sorround Innsbruck haven't been signed jet, so the rest of the circuit isn't confirmed, but the article that I postes suggests that the Igls climb will be at the beginning of the crcuit, The spectators on the climb should be able to reach the finish line with a bike before the riders.
A short 2nd climb on the northern side of the City would be cool, but the tram lines in the City could be a little bit of a problem, so I don't now if they'll ride through the whole city or if the whole circuit will take place on the southern side of Innsbruck.

 

[Gigs_98]

If I'm right Rohringer said the second climb will be the Höttinger Gasse, but I could be wrong because that street is extremely narrow. It's located on the northern side of Innsbruck and is about 400 meters long and 7.5% steep so not really what I would hope for. However maybe they go full zomegnan and climb on after the Höttinger Gasse and then use the Innsbrucker Höhenstraße as a descent back to the city. That would give us a 2.8 km long climb with an elevation gain of 11.5%

Although I would generally like such a brutal climb I fear it wouldnt cause good racing especially if it is the last climb of the race. Moreover its extremely unlikely to happen because the climb is on a rather narrow street and there are so many streets around Innsbruck which would work perfectly for such a race that I very much doubt this climb could be part of the route. However I'm pretty sure that there will be at least one small climb on the northern side of Innsbruck which also means that there will be at least two relatively long flat sections in the course. And as far as I know it is also confirmed that the start of the race wont be in Innsbruck but in a famous skiing resort (most likely Kitzbühel) so the first about 90 kilometers will be flat as long as they don't put another climb in this section which I don't expect.

 

[May0maniac]

Yeah, the Höttinger Gasse is really narrow, a friend of mine lives there. The Höhenstraße up to the Nordkettenbahn is in fact a pretty awesome climb, but I don't know if they are willing to go full Zomegnan.
In the end avoiding the tram lines shouldn't be a huge problem, even with a 2nd climb on the northern side of Innsbruck

 

[barmaher]

If I'm right Rohringer said the second climb will be the Höttinger Gasse, but I could be wrong because that street is extremely narrow. It's located on the northern side of Innsbruck and is about 400 meters long and 7.5% steep so not really what I would hope for. However maybe they go full zomegnan and climb on after the Höttinger Gasse and then use the Innsbrucker Höhenstraße as a descent back to the city. That would give us a 2.8 km long climb with an elevation gain of 11.5%

Although I would generally like such a brutal climb I fear it wouldnt cause good racing especially if it is the last climb of the race. Moreover its extremely unlikely to happen because the climb is on a rather narrow street and there are so many streets around Innsbruck which would work perfectly for such a race that I very much doubt this climb could be part of the route. However I'm pretty sure that there will be at least one small climb on the northern side of Innsbruck which also means that there will be at least two relatively long flat sections in the course. And as far as I know it is also confirmed that the start of the race wont be in Innsbruck but in a famous skiing resort (most likely Kitzbühel) so the first about 90 kilometers will be flat as long as they don't put another climb in this section which I don't expect.

So basically you are saying they are going to fu.ck this up?

 

[Gigs_98]

If I'm right Rohringer said the second climb will be the Höttinger Gasse, but I could be wrong because that street is extremely narrow. It's located on the northern side of Innsbruck and is about 400 meters long and 7.5% steep so not really what I would hope for. However maybe they go full zomegnan and climb on after the Höttinger Gasse and then use the Innsbrucker Höhenstraße as a descent back to the city. That would give us a 2.8 km long climb with an elevation gain of 11.5%

Although I would generally like such a brutal climb I fear it wouldnt cause good racing especially if it is the last climb of the race. Moreover its extremely unlikely to happen because the climb is on a rather narrow street and there are so many streets around Innsbruck which would work perfectly for such a race that I very much doubt this climb could be part of the route. However I'm pretty sure that there will be at least one small climb on the northern side of Innsbruck which also means that there will be at least two relatively long flat sections in the course. And as far as I know it is also confirmed that the start of the race wont be in Innsbruck but in a famous skiing resort (most likely Kitzbühel) so the first about 90 kilometers will be flat as long as they don't put another climb in this section which I don't expect.

So basically you are saying they are going to fu.ck this up?

Not really, the 90 flat kilometers at the start can even be seen as something good because we will probably have only a bit less than 5000 meters of climbing on only 180 km's. Thats brutal. As Mayo said it I must have confound the höttinger gasse with something else because I really don't think they can make a WC road race in this narrow street, so we basically have no idea how long the laps will be. If the laps are rather short I fear we wont see a lot besides the climb to Igls but if they are long there has to be a lot more. Moreover I don't think flat sections are generally something bad. If the course is hard enough so the sprinters don't have a chance anyways, why not force the climbers to attack with a rather long way to go, like in this years olympic road race.

 

[Brullnux]

On the other hand the UCI has shown that it is willing to go on narrow roads: the first two climbs on this year's WC were very narrow, about the same as Höhenstraße. I think a long climb followed by a short wall will be the best option, like Firenze 2013 but with a harder climb instead of Fiesole. Even 400m at 7.5% will be tough after 270km (wishful thinking?) and 5000m of climbing. If there is any climb which is 500m at 9% or even just greater than 8.3% that would be perfect.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

If they are doing the Igls climb then it shouldn't be a problem really, even just a 400m climb would be just fine because climbing a legit cat.2 climb several times consecutively should cause chaos anyway. As for tramlines, they can probably stick guttering or temp concrete or faux-tarmac plates over them temporarily, like they do with the guttering in the Citadel de Briançon.

 

[lemon cheese cake]

Re:

If they are doing the Igls climb then it shouldn't be a problem really, even just a 400m climb would be just fine because climbing a legit cat.2 climb several times consecutively should cause chaos anyway. As for tramlines, they can probably stick guttering or temp concrete or faux-tarmac plates over them temporarily, like they do with the guttering in the Citadel de Briançon.

Or what they do at Schaal Sels:
https://youtu.be/Ozuly8N0z6k?t=35m13s