Absolute belter or explosion at a paint factory? Lotto's striking new kit divides opinion; "Rubber on rubber for that friction feel": How NOT to fit brake pads; Tadej Pogačar blitzes iconic Paris-Roubaix Strava KOMs + more on the live blog

"A tribute to the past, a statement for the future." That's the tag line for this striking kit that Lotto's men and women will be wearing this weekend at Belgium's biggest race, the Ronde van Vlaanderen. 2025 marks four decades of the country's lottery supporting the team, hence their name, an achievement "unmatched by any other cycling team in the world".

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by Lotto Cycling Team (@lotto.cyclingteam)

As the team said in its announcement for the kit, "What began in 1985 as a bold move by the National Lottery to promote the Lotto brand has grown into a household name in the peloton, and that legacy lives on through the next generations. Lotto has played a pivotal role in shaping professional cycling, from the development of young cycling talent to fueling Belgian cycling culture to contributing to legendary victories."

What do we reckon? Hot or not? One member of the road.cc team (a self-professed staunch believer in no team kit unless you're in the team, no less) said he'd wear this "all day and then to bed". You can indeed wear it all day and then to bed as Lotto Cycling Team are selling these for €74.95 online now.

 

 

 

 

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Another, who shall not be named but might possibly be quoting himself here, is in the other camp and reckons it looks like Lotto "let a kid go wild on Paint" or an "explosion at a Dulux factory" and that they've got "a sudden desire to play Tetris". It should be said, this second source has zero fashion sense and does not have the faintest idea what looks 'cool' or 'in'.

Obviously no opinions in the middle are allowed and you must either absolutely love it or hate it...

SuperSurvey

A bike shop in Northern Ireland was "totally destroyed" by a "devastating fire", its owners have announced on social media. Sharing a picture of the site, Claudy Cycles wrote on Facebook: "Folks, this morning our shop suffered a devastating fire which unfortunately has totally destroyed our premises. It will take some time for us to get back on our feet again, we will keep everyone posted. Thank you, we appreciate all the support."

Elsewhere on Strava today: "Things don't always go your way... but a flat white and peanut butter brownie can make up for a lot" (according to Google Translate)...

Sports director Grischa Niermann was out on the bike too, the manager having told WielerFlits he blames himself for yesterday's debacle.

"I am responsible for the tactics. Wout had the confidence to win the sprint, but in hindsight I should have made the decision that they had to attack one by one to get Powless off," the sports director said.

"It was on a plate for us in the last kilometers. It can happen that he had cramps in the sprint. So it is my mistake and responsibility to anticipate that in order to win the race. I didn’t do that.

"Of course it would have been great if Wout had won and if the chasers weren’t so close behind, it wouldn’t have been a risk to attack. That would have been possible at the end, but we had confidence that Wout would win the sprint. Now it’s clear that you can see strange things after such a long final. Nine times out of ten Wout wins, but not this time. That’s no excuse.

"There is a lot of disappointment among us. They rode a perfect race until the last straight. But normally Wout wins that sprint. He had very good legs and also rode a great race. You don't think of this scenario. The easiest scenario to win is that someone rides to the finish alone. That's how we've done it in recent years. That was a big mistake."

Rim brakes vs disc brakes? Nah, rim brakes vs disc brakes vs whatever this is (rim brakes+ perhaps). 

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by trench_tales (@trench_tales)

Thankfully this bike made it to a shop and a mechanic before we found out what happens when you take your brake pads vertical. 

Trench Tales shared the snap on Instagram, the people behind it (documenting life in the trenches as a bike shop mechanic, what they call "the abyss, gazing back") suggesting its not exactly a "DIY pro move".

"Rubber on rubber, for that friction+ feel," they wrote, describing the "fine example of silky smooth brake modulation and supreme stopping power... also, lovely cutaway."

The post is complete with the obligatory hashtags: #quickstop #yourbikehatesyou #bikeshopbingo and someone described it in the comments as a "700c disc brake". 

"If it ain't braking, don't fix it," someone else added, a third comment suggesting that increasing the tyre pressure would add modulation and "it ain't stupid if it works (it probably didn't work)". We reckon it would bring you to a stop (at some cost to your poor tyres), hopefully not via a blowout. Anyway, good thing this one got to a mechanic before we had an answer to how many stops can a tyre take?

The real question is if it's better or worse than this Trench Tales calamity from last month?

> "No housing? No problem": Cyclist baffled why brakes no longer work after shocking DIY cable botch job – then complains that mechanic who fixed issue charged him too much

What Miller said!

How it started:

How it finished:

To be a fly on the wall with Visma-Lease a Bike last night. The team so dominant in the classics so recently has fallen on tougher times and went into yesterday's Dwars door Vlaanderen under pressure to get back to winning ways before Flanders and Roubaix. There's a quite enormous amount of scrutiny and expectation from the Belgian press and fans around Wout van Aert, a generational talent who was expected to follow Tom Boonen's footsteps and win all the classics (multiple times).

Now 30 and Van Aert is still missing a Tour of Flanders or Paris-Roubaix title from his palmares and, having spent the entire spring thus far at altitude in preparation for the big ones, suffered a slow return to the cobbles at E3 Saxo Classic last Friday. It's to all that context, and with Mathieu van der Poel and Tadej Pogačar absent, that Van Aert and Visma-Lease a Bike went into yesterday's race needing a win to hush the noise. You all know what happened next...

The other two Visma riders in the four-man break were honest in their interviews afterwards, Matteo Jorgenson calling it "the wrong decision" to ride for a sprint, Tiesj Benoot adding that "in hindsight, it was a stupid decision".

The Belgian told Eurosport's cameras afterwards: "I think we wanted Wout so badly to win after everything that happened last year [DdV the race where Van Aert suffered a horror crash that ruled him out of the rest of the classics season].

"Consequently, we took too much risk to bring Powless to the sprint. In hindsight, it was a stupid decision. Of course, it escalated. Matteo had won last year. I had spent three weeks on Mount Teide with Wout, and maybe I wanted him to win more than winning myself. But we should have made a different decision."

> Absolute scenes at Dwars door Vlaanderen! Neilson Powless 'does a Stannard' and shocks the world by beating Wout van Aert in three-on-one sprint and derailing dominant Visma-Lease a Bike display

When asked about what Van Aert told him after the race, Benoot said: "Those are words I cannot repeat on camera. We regret it, but we rode strongly for the first time this spring. We made a difference like we have done in the past. So I am also proud, which gives me confidence, although we will feel more in the coming days than we do now."

Credit where it's due for the honesty in what must have been the worst interviews of their careers. In a weird way, you get the feeling now that the cycling public want Van Aert to win Flanders or Roubaix more than ever, even if yesterday didn't help the immense scrutiny in Belgium.

Soudal Quick-Step's admin had some fun at least.

Demi Vollering took to Instagram afterwards to pen some thoughts too:

Yep, I was also laughing a bit when I first heard and then saw that Visma lost while being in the break with three, but after watching it back once more and hearing Wout's interview, I changed my mind.

We should not forget that we are all human. We love a bit of drama. We love underdog stories. Wout is human as well. This guy has been through a lot! And everyone has had their opinion about him. We all judge too early, especially too easily. We are tempted to forget everything he has been through, and we probably don't even know half of it because we cannot look inside his head or understand what it does to him mentally.

Hearing him say that he was egoistic and that it is not who he is was painful for me, because we forget so easily what stress, doubt, and all the mess thrown at him actually do to him. For me, it is completely understandable that he lost himself a bit.

When people have so much to say about you, it is easy to start feeling lost. And it is probably something you do not even notice. It creeps in very quietly. You train a bit harder, focus a bit more, and before you know it, you are lost in your rituals, running on autopilot, trying to prove everyone wrong, trying to get just a bit closer to your dreams.

And before you know it, you make the wrong decisions and you cramp up. Maybe it was not the body. Maybe it was the mind that got too excited. But you did not stay true to yourself, so this win was not meant to be. It is a lesson. A wake up call for Visma and Wout, but not just for them. It is a lesson and a wake up call for all of us.

He is human. We are all human. I think I have been in his situation. You think you are making the right decisions, but under too much pressure, under too much focus, you cannot see it any more. And we will never realise it in that very moment…

Is there a more ominous sight in cycling?

No, not the new merch... Tadej Pogačar smashing iconic cobbled Strava KOMs in training ahead of the world champion's tilt at the Flanders-Roubaix double this month. What's more, once the Hell of the North recon was done he pushed on over the border and took in the Oude Kwaremont and Paterberg too, completing his 212km at an average speed of 37.6km/h. 

Pogi doesn't upload his rides to Strava as much these days, but this one was — a warning shot to the rest of the peloton, Mathieu van der Poel and Co.?

We already knew he could ride the Roubaix cobbles, his exploits on the Tour de France stage back in 2022 evidence enough of that, so nobody should be surprised the UAE Team Emirates star can set some blistering times in training, the big test will come in the chaos of next Sunday's fight for position, crash fest, mechanical madness and puncture lottery... although given these times, Pogačar will be confident.

The world champ casually swept up the Strava KOMs for Auchy-lez-Orchies, Mons-en-Pévèle and Gruson, setting the second fastest time (one second off Wout van Aert's 2023 best set mid-race) on the iconic Carrefour de l'Arbre. He's ready.

On the Arenberg, Pogačar set a PR but didn't trouble the fastest times on Strava, although maybe he was just more bothered about getting the shot, this video later uploaded to his Instagram.

Pogacar dans la Trouée d'Arenberg.

Sortie de 203 bornes, trois KOM chopés (dont Mons-en-Pévèle), deuxième meilleur chrono dans le Carrefour de l'Arbre...

Il est prêt. pic.twitter.com/b1dlyTWBiW

— Dans la Musette (@DansLaMusette) April 2, 2025

L'Équipe were on the ground to see it go down. How good do those rainbow bands look on the cobbles?

 

 

 

 

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Once he was done with Roubaix, Pogačar headed on to Flanders, finishing his ride with the double ascent of the Oude Kwaremont and Paterberg because... why not when your name's Tadej Pogačar? No big efforts here, 'just' his third fastest time up the Kwaremont, flying up the famous climb at close to 30km/h. See? No big efforts.

After that it was on to Waregem where Dwars door Vlaanderen had ended earlier in the day. He probably thought he could win that too if he got there quick enough... the next two weeks are going to be absolutely brilliant, aren't they?