The UCI Road World Championships continue on Friday with the elite men's individual time trial. The world's best riders against the clock will go head to head on the 31.7km course that starts and finishes on the race track at Imola, Italy.
With some lumps along the course, the shorter than usual distance will still prove a test but should see more riders in contention for a podium place.
>>> Imola Road World Championships 2020: men’s individual time trial start list and timings
Defending champion Rohan Dennis (Australia) will be aiming to take back to back titles after his victory in Yorkshire last year, but will face some stiff competition. Filippo Ganna (Italy) is in scintillating form after destroying the short 10km time trial at Tirreno-Adriatico earlier this month, while 2018 world champion Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands) and Wout van Aert (Belgium) are riding strongly after an impressive Tour de France.
While a number of the riders, including European champion Stefan Küng (Switzerland), are coming into the time trial off the Tour de France, others are still fine-tuning their form ahead of the Giro d'Italia in just over a week's time.
Geraint Thomas (Great Britain) is one such riders looking better and better as the week's go by towards the Giro, and he'll be leading the British charge along with Alex Dowsett. Former European and Belgian champion Victor Campenaerts will also be hoping to at the top of his game today as he rides towards the Italian Grand Tour next week as well.
Ahmad Wais of Syria gets the action underway at 14.30 local time, with Rohan Dennis the last rider out on the course at 15.54.
The elite men's race is the last time trial of this year's championships, which were reduced to just the elite events after the original host city Aigle, Switzerland was forced to cancel the Worlds there due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
This weekend will see the elite women's road race on Saturday and the elite men's road race on Sunday on long and hilly routes in Imola. The Worlds got underway on Thursday with the elite women's time trial, which was was by Anna van der Breggen of the Netherlands.
