State of the Peloton 2026

[Rou]

View: https://youtu.be/ABIP9GE4Bm4?si=nQ-IMsb63K0FFGgO

After all this time there he is!
The LEGEND - Uncle Cycling himself!

 

[Ilmaestro99]

View: https://youtu.be/ABIP9GE4Bm4?si=nQ-IMsb63K0FFGgO

After all this time there he is!
The LEGEND - Uncle Cycling himself!

I did not expect the guy who knew about lazkano before the rest of us to look like the guitarist in a mastodon cover band.

 

[YellowSocks]

I did not expect the guy who knew about lazkano before the rest of us to look like the guitarist in a mastodon cover band.

Drummer, actually. Drum set on the left.

Where can I find this purple paint?

 

[Rob5091]

If I remember correctly, PCS had done the math on the overall speed of WT races during 2025, and it was the fastest ever. Well folks, hold onto your hats as it looks like that record will not last long -

https://velo.outsideonline.com/road...are-crumbling-and-pogacar-hasnt-even-started/

The Pro Peloton Has Gotten Even Faster in 2026 — Just Wait until Pogačar Starts Racing​

Cycling's hyper performance era isn't slowing down: Prestigious records are falling and 6.5w/kg is nowhere near enough in wild start to season.

 

[Red Rick]

but if correct, why is this the case now and not before? I can't imagine the topic scoring badly in the clickbaiting environment of today.

Doping talk is 'good' clickbait for unpopular champions. So when you suddenly have a fast turnover of the cohort of top riders, and most of them are very popular, doping is not going to be a very popular subject.

It's also simply that omerta is a way bigger influence than the need for engagement farming. Journalists will just get frozen out pretty hard by the rest of the cycling community if they're gonna make any serious innuendo. I would argue even the likes of Armstrong and stuff like that are only tolerated with their podcast because they're just glazing the new generation of riders rather than saying "lmao he's on better sauce than I was"

Cycling, more than maybe any other sport, learned the hard way to not catch your champions for PEDs. It got years of struggles for sponsors at the height of the anti doping fight. Then you got Sky, which was basically Armstrong all over again but in an era with the blood passport so performances were more believable altogether. You don't catch any big dogs for slightly long enough and then when some new nuclear fuel hits the peloton and you don't catch it you may as well look away.

And however ridiculous Armstrong and the likes of Froome were at the time, they got plenty of believers and defenders. Then you get guys as superficially likeable as Pogacar, and people will naturally want to believe. Evenepoel, Van der Poel and Van Aert being from traditional cycling nations also helps a lot. Roglic might have been perceived to be way more suss but he bottled the Tour the moment he looked like he was about to dominate.

As a rule, when people get emotionally invested into something, they won't think rationally, they'll think emotionally first. Pogacar comes in and basically boils the frog, so people slowly get conditioned to his dominance after they probably liked his first Tour win and the novelty of him also being a great classics rider. By the time he becomes completely unbelievable they're probably already completely invested in gargling his balls.

I would also add that especially Pogacar probably drags in a lot of new viewers from a demographic that likes cycling superficially and is likely invested into Pogacar first more than cycling as a whole.

It also takes way too much mental effort for absolutely no reward to consistently argue against the propaganda machine of "yeah we do 50 watts more now because we discovered food"

 

[topcat]

... completely invested in gargling his balls ...

A risky investment.

 

[Netserk]

Shouldn't the performances of Paul Seixas [...] just this week boost our confidence in the notion that the sport is pretty clean?

do you still think so ?

 

[Red Rick]

do you still think so ?

Aged like a beached whale that one.

 

[Pozzovivo]

Doping talk is 'good' clickbait for unpopular champions. So when you suddenly have a fast turnover of the cohort of top riders, and most of them are very popular, doping is not going to be a very popular subject.

It's also simply that omerta is a way bigger influence than the need for engagement farming. Journalists will just get frozen out pretty hard by the rest of the cycling community if they're gonna make any serious innuendo. I would argue even the likes of Armstrong and stuff like that are only tolerated with their podcast because they're just glazing the new generation of riders rather than saying "lmao he's on better sauce than I was"

Cycling, more than maybe any other sport, learned the hard way to not catch your champions for PEDs. It got years of struggles for sponsors at the height of the anti doping fight. Then you got Sky, which was basically Armstrong all over again but in an era with the blood passport so performances were more believable altogether. You don't catch any big dogs for slightly long enough and then when some new nuclear fuel hits the peloton and you don't catch it you may as well look away.

And however ridiculous Armstrong and the likes of Froome were at the time, they got plenty of believers and defenders. Then you get guys as superficially likeable as Pogacar, and people will naturally want to believe. Evenepoel, Van der Poel and Van Aert being from traditional cycling nations also helps a lot. Roglic might have been perceived to be way more suss but he bottled the Tour the moment he looked like he was about to dominate.

As a rule, when people get emotionally invested into something, they won't think rationally, they'll think emotionally first. Pogacar comes in and basically boils the frog, so people slowly get conditioned to his dominance after they probably liked his first Tour win and the novelty of him also being a great classics rider. By the time he becomes completely unbelievable they're probably already completely invested in gargling his balls.

I would also add that especially Pogacar probably drags in a lot of new viewers from a demographic that likes cycling superficially and is likely invested into Pogacar first more than cycling as a whole.

It also takes way too much mental effort for absolutely no reward to consistently argue against the propaganda machine of "yeah we do 50 watts more now because we discovered food"

Fair enough, these are possible explanations but they are not the obvious reality, at least not to me.

I agree that cycling has been harmed by this more than most sports. I also think it is basically the only sport that has seriously tried to confront the problem. Agree that popularity create protection from stakeholders, that has definitely been true in the past.

There are also several claims here that I do not think hold up very well.

The idea that top riders are more popular now and therefore face less criticism is only partly true. Maybe that fits Pogacar compared with Froome. But does it really fit Vingegaard compared with Nibali, Contador, Wiggins, or Quintana? Not in my view. Could name other examples. Dominance can create fans, but it also creates suspicion.

Some reporters do depend on access, yes., but maybe less than before. They often do not have much access to lose. Anyway, Walsh was not exactly welcomed into the Postal bus. Paul Kimmage was "not worth the chair that he was sitting on" and frozen out as well (I don't like his style either as well but still). That did not stop them. or others.

And Sky was definitely not the same as US Postal. Sky operated in grey areas like fake TUE concerns, the strange , inhaler abuse, tramadol use, and corticosteroids for weight loss. And some several other stories, most concerning perhaps the Testogel episode(?). What was that.. Still not in the same league as the practices of the 1990s and 2000s!

People are biased and that cuts both ways. Some people defend what they like. Others are eager to believe certain riders must be guilty because that fits what they already want to think. They are just as capable of emotional reasoning, imo.

It also takes just as much energy to keep arguing that the sport is cleaner than it used to be or maybe even very clean compared to other sports, especially when every strong performance is treated by some as automatic confirmation of guilt.

I am also not convinced by the training, nutruition, equipment arguements explaining the stark increase in level the last few years. I'm stupid but still, its weird!

 

[Red Rick]

Fair enough, these are possible explanations but they are not the obvious reality, at least not to me.

I agree that cycling has been harmed by this more than most sports. I also think it is basically the only sport that has seriously tried to confront the problem. Agree that popularity create protection from stakeholders, that has definitely been true in the past.

There are also several claims here that I do not think hold up very well.

The idea that top riders are more popular now and therefore face less criticism is only partly true. Maybe that fits Pogacar compared with Froome. But does it really fit Vingegaard compared with Nibali, Contador, Wiggins, or Quintana? Not in my view. Could name other examples. Dominance can create fans, but it also creates suspicion.

Some reporters do depend on access, yes., but maybe less than before. They often do not have much access to lose. Anyway, Walsh was not exactly welcomed into the Postal bus. Paul Kimmage was "not worth the chair that he was sitting on" and frozen out as well (I don't like his style either as well but still). That did not stop them. or others.

And Sky was definitely not the same as US Postal. Sky operated in grey areas like fake TUE concerns, the strange , inhaler abuse, tramadol use, and corticosteroids for weight loss. And some several other stories, most concerning perhaps the Testogel episode(?). What was that.. Still not in the same league as the practices of the 1990s and 2000s!

Maybe I'm wrong about popular champions getting less suspicioun, but I think it does affect the overall perception, and a lot of the overall discourse around doping will simply be about which rider is the absolute top dog in the sport. And maybe COVID was just such a hard reset that it sort of wiped the slate clean, maybe people just got bored in the end and were happy the Sky dominance was over. I pretty vividly recall some dread at Jumbo racing the 2020 Tour fully Sky style they were just so relieved they lost no matter how utterly bizarre Pogacar's MTT was.

Finally, I think it was also just a long time without big riders getting busted, which just makes it easier to believe, no matter how bizarrely fast they're going.

And people can call me a miserable, cynical ***, but when I look at the state of the world the notion that cycling would not be corrupt as so many other sports (or non sports) institutions is just utterly bizarre to me.

 

[Netserk]

And Sky was definitely not the same as US Postal. Sky operated in grey areas like fake TUE concerns, the strange , inhaler abuse, tramadol use, and corticosteroids for weight loss. And some several other stories, most concerning perhaps the Testogel episode(?). What was that.. Still not in the same league as the practices of the 1990s and 2000s!

why do you think that , it seems like you just assume they didnt use blood bags

 

[Pozzovivo]

Maybe I'm wrong about popular champions getting less suspicioun, but I think it does affect the overall perception, and a lot of the overall discourse around doping will simply be about which rider is the absolute top dog in the sport. And maybe COVID was just such a hard reset that it sort of wiped the slate clean, maybe people just got bored in the end and were happy the Sky dominance was over. I pretty vividly recall some dread at Jumbo racing the 2020 Tour fully Sky style they were just so relieved they lost no matter how utterly bizarre Pogacar's MTT was.

Finally, I think it was also just a long time without big riders getting busted, which just makes it easier to believe, no matter how bizarrely fast they're going.

And people can call me a miserable, cynical ***, but when I look at the state of the world the notion that cycling would not be corrupt as so many other sports (or non sports) institutions is just utterly bizarre to me.

I was among those that were just happy to see some other colors at the front in 2020 and happy to see that Pogacar managed to beat JV. Roglic bottled that final ITT. If he had been at the same relative level that he was for the enire tour against Ritchie Porte, he would have won. The tour was the worst race of the year during the sky years. Only 2019 stands out as really interesting.

I see your point but big riders not getting busted is a better sign than the opposite.

Agree with the last point, perhaps. But cycling also test (for whatever that is worth) much more per top athlete than all other sports.

Finally, you play the cynical curmudgeon very well. Allez!