Cyclocross stars Alvarado and Cant invited to Paris-Roubaix
ASO has announced the wildcards for the first women’s Paris-Roubaix, and included on the list is the Ciclismo Mundial team of cyclocross stars Sanne Cant and Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado.
The two former world champions could join a handful of other top-tier cyclocross racers at the inaugural Roubaix, a race that has proven to be an excellent crossover point between road and cross.
Also on the wildcard list are two French teams, Arkéa and Stade Rochelais Charente-Maritime, the Dutch teams Jumbo-Visma and NXTG Racing, the Belgian team and Doltcini-Van Eyck Sport, plus Cogeas Mettler Look (RUS), Drops-Le Col (GBR) and Hitec Products (NOR).
Ciclismo Mundial is the UCI women’s team of the Roodhooft brothers. They own cyclocross teams Alpecin-Fenix, IKO-Crelan and Team 777. On the team are also Annemarie Worst, Inge van der Heijden, Manon Bakker and Yara Kastelijn.
The nine Women’s WorldTour teams received an automatic invite to Roubaix, as do the numbers 10 through 15 on the UCI ranking: A.R. Monex Women’s Team (formerly Astana), Ceratizit-WNT, Lotto Soudal, Parkhotel Valkenburg, Tibco-Silicon Valley Bank, and Valcar-Travel & Service.
Alvarado and Cant won’t be the only cyclocross racers who could line up for a Sunday in Hell. On Jumbo-Visma we find seven-time world cyclocross champion Marianne Vos and on Trek-Segafredo the current world champion Lucinda Brand. American Clara Honsinger, fourth at the cyclocross world championships, could line up for Paris-Roubaix with Team Tibco and Hungarian champion Blanka Vas with Doltcini-Van Eyk.
Eight of the top ten riders on the UCI’s individual cyclocross ranking could line up at the inaugural Paris-Roubaix. Only Maghalie Rochette and Denise Betsema are not eligible to ride because as of today they are not part of any of the aforementioned teams.
For the men’s race, there are no surprises with the usual suspects getting a ticket to race. Alpecin-Fenix and Arkea-Samsic automatically qualify as Europe Tour winners of 2020. B&B Hotels, Bingoal-Wallonie, Delko and Total Direct-Energie, of former winner Niki Terpstra, will also line up for the Hell of the North.
Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert are both expected to line up as current and former cyclocross world champions. From the UCI cyclocross top ten also Quinten Hermans and Corné van Kessel (Intermarché-Wanty) and Tom Pidcock (Ineos-Grenadiers) could possibly ride Paris-Roubaix on April 11.
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