2019 Season Awards - Best GC Rider
Welcome to part 5 of the 2019 Season Awards. Today we will look at the best riders for General Classification. Last year we saw the British domination of Grand Tours, but this year we have three first time winners from three different countries.
Here are the nominees for the Best GC Rider of 2019:
Egan Bernal
The Colombian wonder kid has taken part in 5 stage races in 2019, of which he has won three (Paris-Nice, Tour de Suisse and Tour de France). He was also 3rd in Catalunya and 4th in his home tour at the beginning of the season. Nobody doubts his climbing prowess, but he has shown he can also put in a decent time trial and he also has a mature head on his shoulders. He's had a magnificent year despite breaking his collarbone and having to change his original plans to ride the Giro instead of the Tour.
Richard Carapaz
Carapaz is a pure climber who was able to win the Giro in spite of losing a ton of time in the three time trials. He may have benefited slightly from the staring contest between Roglic and Nibali. Apart from Giro he also won Vuelta Asturias, finished 3rd in Vuelta a Burgos, but was ruled out of Vuelta in the last moment due to an injury.
Tadej Pogacar
Last year's Tour de l'Avenir winner didn't need a lot of time to transition to the pros. We were all scrambling to change our VDS team lineup after his stunning performance in the Algarve in late February. He also won Tour of California, finished on the Vuelta podium, 4th in Tour of Slovenia and 6th in Itzulia Basque Country. A more impressive neo-pro campaign you'll be hard pushed to find.
Primoz Roglic
Roglic is the only rider with 2 Grand Tour podiums this year, having finished 3rd in the Giro and winning the Vuelta. He has done three weeklong stage races and he has won all of them (UAE Tour, Tirreno-Adriatico, Tour de Romandie). His combination of climbing and time-trialing skills is very difficult to beat for the pure climbers.
Geraint Thomas
If there is one thing Geraint can do very well, it is timing his peak form. He was pretty much invisible for most of the season, but was able to put up a very strong defense of his Tour de France title. In the end he only lost out to his younger teammate. The only other noteworthy result is a 3rd place from Romandy. He failed to win a single race this year.
Your move guys. Vote and also check out the previous categories: