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Truly silly. https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/aug/02/africas-top-cyclist-biniam-girmay-denied-uk-visa-for-glasgow-worlds

Africa’s top cyclist Biniam Girmay ‘denied UK visa’ for Glasgow worlds

The Eritrean was among the favourites for the men’s elite road race in Glasgow but has withdrawn after the Home Office reportedly denied him an entry visa

Related market, fixed instead of parimutuel:

Related market for the womens race, which is bound to be extremely exciting:

Also, if we get 5-8 favorites above the baseline within the next few days, I will also make a fixed multiple choice market for this race.

One of the primary considerations when thinking about how a Worlds race will go needs to be team composition and motives. In this case, the course does not guarantee a bunch sprint and it does not guarantee a small group will go to the finish -- so there are a lot of potential ways the race can play out.

The top 5 riders listed so far (Remco, Wout, Mathieu, Jasper, Tadej) have confounding factors that make picking them somewhat tricky!

Belgium (Remco, Wout, Jasper) brings a very strong team that should be able to manage the race even if other squads all look at them to do so. But the personal relationship between Remco, Wout, and Jasper seems very tricky to manage -- does the team need to give Wout a free role in the final even if Jasper is still in the group? Will Wout lead out Jasper? Will Wout cover attacks if Remco is up the road? This feels tricky to navigate. However, if Remco cannot get away in his own move, I do think he would be an excellent teammate in the late stages of a race bound for a sprint finish.

Netherlands (Mathieu) also suffer from a "too many leaders" issue in a slightly different way than Belgium does. If the race truly comes to a bunch sprint finish, is MVDP going to lead out Kooij? Or will MVDP have completely toasted himself attacking before that. What if Van Baarle and MVDP are both in a late race leading pack and can't decide which one should make the next attack? And then the rest of the squad is still capable, but probably not as capable as Belgium's.

Slovenia (Tadej) has not (that I can find) announced their full team yet, but one of their strongest competitors Mohoric has announced he will not be going to the race. Pogacar can absolutely be in the lead group at this race no matter how it plays out, but if he misses the right move, he might lack a team that can pull it back to put him in position.

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Overall, I think the favorites so far are good, but there are a LOT of other people out there with their own chances. If Belgium announces before the race that they are 100% committed to Jasper and no other plans, they would probably be the absolute favorites. That just seems unlikely though, because the teammates Wout and Remco likely also sense a race that they should be able to win.

Neither Wout nor MvdP seemed it top form for the Tour, and it's hard to believe they'll have recovered to be on their best for this one. Ditto Tadej. I think it gives Remco an edge, but one day races are always crap shoots.

@JCE I'd argue Wout/MvdP are still on their way to peaking. It looked like Tadej was on peak form with a bad day thrown in the mix. Can he maintain or is he going to a valley after his peak :)

@Iamczecksy Yea, fair, and maybe edge to MvdP because he had to do so much less work, but I still just can't imagine anyone being on peak form two weeks after the Tour.

Wout did get a few more days off but like, new dad, dude's not sleeping, and his sprint is not what it was?

Tadej had a very bad day but I think arguably was not barnstorming the way he did the early tour last year, and much of the explanation from UAE was due to his training interruption from his wrist. He's now got the Tour in but I still think it's quite a hole, and I don't think his performance in the late Tour is a good metric because he's competing against everyone else also doing the Tour. Others will be much more fresh.