Bradley Wiggins is tipping Victor Campenaerts to break his UCI Hour Record when he rides for glory on Tuesday in Mexico. The 2012 Tour de France champion set the recor of 54.526km in London in June 2015, becoming the fifth rider to set the benchmark since the governing body changed the rules on the use of specific equipment in 2014.
Since Wiggo set the record, six riders have taken on the challenge and Campenaerts will become the seventh in Aguascalientes, a location specifically selected due to its lack of air density. That same altitude could hamper the Belgian’s oxygen consumption but with the 27-year-old’s pedigree as European time-trial champion and months of preparation behind him, Wiggins believes his record could be about to go.
“I think if he starts, he’ll do it, because you don’t start the Hour Record unless you know you’re going to do it, because it’s so quantifiable,” Wiggins told the Eurosport podcast. “The first thing you do is go and ride 10 or 15 or 20 mins at pace and see what it feels like. If that feels all right, you do a half-hour trial, maybe a 45-minute trial.
When I was speaking to him back in December, they’d already done 30 minutes at pace and felt comfortable, so I think he’ll break it. “He’s been working on this for a long, long time with a good team of people around him. He has not gone all the way out there to start it and fail. There is no second place; you either do it or you fail in an Hour Record. So if he starts, they’ll be confident he’s going to break it.”
