Ciccone points the finger at Van der Poel and Simons for McNulty getting away: 'Not everyone turned out to be an ally'

The Italians looked good at first, until Van der Poel set the pace just under 100 kilometers from the finish. In addition to Ciccone, the blue-jerseyed riders also had Davide Piganzoli and Christian Scaroni in the mix for a long time. In the end, Lidl-Trek climber Ciccone proved to be the best of the three. Unfortunately for him he didn’t manage to win a medal.

And yet Ciccone was in excellent form. In fact, the Italian regularly picked up the pace and seemed determined to give it his all to catch McNulty. Not everyone shared that determination, however, and so the American remained out of reach of his pursuers. “I’m disappointed with the result. I sincerely think we deserved more,” Ciccone told Cyclingnews afterward.

At one point, the chasers almost caught up to McNulty. “In the final stretch, the cards were reshuffled, and we had riders like Van der Poel, Mads Pedersen, and Quinn Simmons, who had no interest in closing the gap and didn’t work together to do so,” Ciccone was quick to point out.

The Italian understood that, of course, about Simmons and Matteo Jorgenson, since they’re McNulty’s teammates. But as for the rest, not everyone turned out to be an ally. “On the climb, I tried to make a move with Pidcock, but I was out of energy. For a moment, I believed we could do it, because we saw that McNulty was 20 seconds ahead; we had a gap, and both Pidcock and I had every reason to go all out.”

That didn’t work out, and in the end, Ciccone finished in 9th place in the day’s results. “I already said last week that the World Championship is an open and tactical race. The situation was constantly changing. Tactically speaking, it was a very difficult race, and you can’t react to everyone. I’m disappointed with the result. It’s such a tough race. We were well represented and rode strongly; I’m just bummed about the result.”