From Richmond in Virginia in 2015 to the hot desert of Doha last year up to the North Sea of Bergen yesterday: the continents and the scenarios change but the winner of the world championship race is always him, Peter Sagan who hits a historic trio, the the first rider to achieve it in three consecutive seasons, three road rainbow jerseys that place the Slovak alongside Alfredo Binda, Rik Van Steenbergen, Eddy Merckx and Oscar Freire. For Sagan, a new look with almost shaved hair and victory with an emotional dedication to Michele Scarponi, was also personal revenge after a season without success in the great spring classics and marked by his expulsion from the last Tour for the impropriety against Mark Cavendish in the Longwy sprint.
Three world championships all won thanks to an exhilarating final rush, in Richmond the Slovakian champion had shot Mikael Matthews in the ball, in Doha Mark Cavendish and Tom Boonen, yesterday in Bergen with a phenomenal backstroke he blew the iris from the home favorite, the Norwegian Alexander Kristoff. Third, bronze medal, was Australian Matthews. Fourth Trentin, a place off the podium but which makes the blue expedition to Norway less unsuccessful.
For almost six and a half hours well camouflaged in the peloton, practically forced to race alone against numerically more solid teams – from Spain, Italy, France, Belgium and Holland – Sagan showed up at the crucial moment, in the adrenaline rush of the final sprint recovering in the last meters Kristoff and then resisting his extreme return attempt. In practice, the world championship in Bergen, which recorded a huge crowd after the public flop in Doha, lived and will be remembered only for the heart-pounding duel between Sagan and Kristoff.
For the rest a lot of boredom waiting for an action of some weight that never happened. Even the route, fascinating from an environmental point of view, did not present any difficulties that could make a selection. It is also understandable why for years the winners of the grand tours have been almost completely absent from the world championships which are too flat. In Bergen there were no Nibali, Aru, Quintana, Froome, who said goodbye to Norway after the third place in Wednesday's world time trial race which saw the triumph of Tom Dumoulin.
