The women’s and men’s road individual time trials (ITT) of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 will be held on the same 32.4km course, on Saturday 27 July, the first day of medal competition.
The strongest rouleurs will take the road for the eighth Olympic ITT in a row since the specialty returned to the programme in Atlanta 1996. Three years ago, Dutchwoman Annemiek van Vleuten and Slovenia’s Primož Roglič powered to gold in Tokyo.
Rendezvous at Invalides
The ITTs will start from the Esplanade des Invalides and finish on the Pont Alexandre III bridge, after a 32.4km circuit heading to the centre and east of Paris, with a ride through the Bois de Vincennes.
Both women and men will take on the same, mostly flat, course, with just 150 metres of elevation. They will visit iconic sites such as Saint-Germain-des-Prés, Place de la Bastille, Vélodrome Jacques Anquetil, Château de Vincennes, INSEP (the National Institute of Sport, Expertise and Performance) and Place de la Nation. The two checkpoints for timings are set at kilometres 13.1 and 22.
The action will unfold from 14:30 until 18:30 CEST. Women will be the first to set off, with 40 riders representing 25 nations plus two athletes riding as Individual Neutral Athletes (Athlètes Individuels Neutres - AIN). They will be followed by the men, with 38 riders representing 26 nations, plus one rider from the Refugee Olympic Team (l'équipe olympique des réfugiés EOR) - Amir Ansari, born in Iran, who grew up in Afghanistan and fled to Sweden - and one AIN athlete. Starts are set for every 90 seconds.
The stars to watch: Dygert, Evenepoel, Ganna, Kopecky…
The individual time trial is a brutal test that can only reward the cream of the crop. And the talent in the field has been extremely impressive lately. Notably, a year after the exhilarating UCI Cycling World Championships in Glasgow and across Scotland, all six riders who stood on the Elite ITT podiums in Stirling are ready to do battle again.
Will the USA’s Chloé Dygert add the Olympic Games gold to her many conquests? The American 27-year-old is a two-time Elite UCI World Champion (2019 and 2023) in the specialty, and she’s used to Olympic Games glory on the track, with a silver medal in the team pursuit in Rio 2016 and a bronze in the same event in Tokyo 2020. Dygert will pursue gold both on the road and in the velodrome of the Olympic Games Paris 2024.
Last year at the UCI Worlds, Dygert got the better of Australia’s Grace Brown (silver) and Austria’s Christina Schweinberger. Dutch power shall be on display at the highest level, with the likes of Ellen van Dijk and Demi Vollering to represent the Oranje. Germany’s Mieke Kröger is also expected to show her power on the track and on the road, alongside her countrywoman Antonia Niedermaier, the reigning Women Under 23 UCI ITT World Champion. And when it comes to shining in both environments, eyes naturally turn to Belgium’s Lotte Kopecky.
In the Men Elite category, the reigning UCI World Champion, Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel, is a pure specialist of the road, and he recently won stage 7 of the Tour de France, a 25.3km ITT, en route to his first overall podium finish in the French Grand Tour. In Paris, he’ll be joined by his countryman Wout van Aert, as well as another hero of the recent Tour, Eritrea’s Biniam Girmay.
Also in the men’s field, riders who developed their power on the track are set to come to the forefront in the ITT, including Switzerland’s Stefan Bissegger and Stefan Küng… And most notably Italy’s Filippo Ganna (silver medalist in last year’s ITT at the UCI Cycling World Championships) along with Great Britain’s Joshua Tarling (bronze). The roads of Paris await them for a stellar battle.