• 2023-05-06
• Tour de Hongrie

15 riders to watch out for at the Tour de Hongrie - Part I

In our latest series of articles, we've rounded up the riders who could deliver the biggest thrills and most extraordinary moments of the 44th Tour de Hongrie. In the first part, we highlight the biggest contenders for the general classification.

Egan Bernal (INEOS Grenadiers)

The race's biggest favourite is 2019 Tour de France and 2021 Giro d'Italia champion Egan Bernal. In January 2022, during a training ride in Colombia, he was collided with a standing bus, fracturing his femur, collapsing his lung and severely damaging his spine. Doctors gave him a ninety-five percent chance of being completely paralysed.

Bernal, however, made a miraculous recovery. In fact, in August 2022, he was back in professional competition in the Tour of Denmark. He is slowly but surely regaining his form: he finished fourth in San Juan on the queen stage and eighth in Switzerland just a week ago at the Tour de Romandie. If his form continues on the same trend, he could be back among the world's best GC riders by the end of the season, now with a Tour de Hongrie victory...

(Photo: Team DSM)

Max Poole (Team DSM)

In Tour de Romandie, the only Tour de Hongrie competitor to finish ahead of Bernal was 20-year-old Max Poole. Team DSM's climber joined the Dutch team's academy last year and his career is moving upwards at an astonishing pace. After excellent results in the junior level, he made his debut in the big team in August, finishing fifth in the queen stage of Sazka Tour and tenth overall. Just a few days later, he was racing in the far north, finishing seventh in the Arctic Race of Norway ProSeries!

In 2023, he took it to the next level, finishing 11th overall at the Tour of the Alps and winning the youth classification, and then finishing fourth in his first ever WorldTour race, the Romandie! Although DSM's climber line-up is far from comparable to INEOS' (Poole's only mountain helper may be his also very young compatriot, Oscar Onley), we wouldn't be surprised if he also claimed his first professional overall win at the end of the 44th Tour de Hongrie.

(Photo: RIDE Media/greyspr/Sarah Reed)

Luke Plapp (INEOS Grenadiers)

Speaking about INEOS - Bernal is not the only one in the strongest climbers' line-up in the peloton who has a chance of winning the overall. Also very young, Luke Plapp, just 22, is Australia's latest cycling sensation. We first saw his name in 2018, when he finished 2nd in the junior time trial at the World Championships in Innsbruck - behind Remco Evenepoel. Three years later, he won a silver medal in the U23 World Championships, and this year he was signed by INEOS - first as a trainee and then as a full-time professional.

He started 2022 with an Australian national title, then finished 12th in the UAE Tour, 9th in the Romandie and 3rd in the Norwegian Tour. His momentum seemed unbroken at the start of this season: he defended his title at the Australian Championships and finished second overall in the UAE Tour - again behind Remco Evenepoel. However, he eventually missed the Tour of Catalunya at the last minute and was counted on as a helper for the Basque Tour, leaving his current form more in question than Bernal's. However, INEOS will be in good shape with two excellent captains and two luxury helpers in Narváez and Tulett. It is very difficult to lose from this position...

Damien Howson (Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team)

Another Australian, Damien Howson, has already had the taste of success in Hungary, winning Tour de Hongrie in 2021. Howson was already an U23 world time trial champion in 2013, but his profile has since shifted to the mountains and one-week races. Raised at the academy of Orica-GreenEdge (now Jayco AlUla), he was with the Australian team from 2011 until last year. His first major success came in 2017 by winning Harald Sun Tour (2.1), followed by a breakthrough in 2020, when he won the Czech Tour and finished third in Tour de Hongrie (his early attack on the Kékes was countered in the final moments by Attila Valter and Quinn Simmons). In 2021, he learned from his mistake and took the Kékes finish with a perfectly executed attack.

Easily recognisable by his distinctive hairstyle, the 30-year-old Howson has joined the Q36.5 team this year, where he will be accompanied by a very strong line-up for the Tour de Hongrie. Matteo Badilatti (who finished fourth here in 2020) and last year's fifth-placed rider, Carl Fredrik Hagen could help him, not to mention three-time US champion Joey Rosskopf. Howson's form is also encouraging: he won a stage in Vuelta Asturias (2.1) at the end of April and finished 3rd overall.

(Photo: Israel - Premier Tech)

Jakob Fuglsang (Israel – Premier Tech)

Like Bernal, another big favourite in the race, Jakob Fuglsang, is also looking to regain his form after a long break. The 2016 Rio Olympics silver medallist gave up the UAE Tour back in February due to illness and has not been seen racing since. Now 38, in top form, Fuglsang can still compete with the world's best climbers. Last year, he won the MercanTour Classic, famous for its climbs, and finished 3rd in Tour de Suisse. Fuglsang has previously won Liége-Bastogne-Liége and Il Lombardia, so the terrain of Tour de Hongrie's mountain stages should suit him perfectly. Israel's team includes other climbers too. Former silver medallist Ben Hermans, for example, could be in contention for a podium finish himself, if Fuglsang is not yet feeling well.

In addition to these stars, former Il Lombardia silver medalist George Bennett (New Zealand, UAE Team Emirates), Italian Matteo Fabbro (BORA-hansgrohe) and Soudal Quick-Step's Italian climber Fausto Masnada can also be in the hunt for the overall podium.