UAE Team Already Dominating; Fall-Out on Sports From the Epstein Affair; Ineos Owner Ratcliffe Sounds Off on Immigration; Growing Challenges of Watching Cycling on TV; Cycling "Ban in Iowa ...?
Key Takeaways:
● Season Barely Underway, But Team UAE Already Dominating
● Del Toro and Pogačar Look Tough to Beat
● Potential Effects on Sport from the Epstein Affair
● Ratcliffe Sounds Off
● Cycling’s Declining TV Accessibility
● Banning Bicycling in Iowa?
The UAE Tour this week marks the first meaningful collision of GC ambitions in the 2026 men’s professional season. Team UAE captain Tadej Pogačar remained focused on fine-tuning his form for later objectives elsewhere while his young teammate Isaac del Toro tested Bora-Hansgrohe rival Remco Evenepoel’s dominant early-season momentum. On the opening stage, Del Toro leveraged his formidable power to surge clear inside the final few hundred meters to foil the sprinters and seize the GC lead. Evenepoel’s early season general classification confidence is being met with genuine resistance in the UAE desert, and the 2026 pecking order is starting to solidify into something more durable than preseason conjecture. Far from being a predictable early-season procession, the UAE Tour has quietly evolved into an annual GC hierarchy proving ground; five of the past seven men’s winners have gone on to stand on the Tour de France podium later in the same season.
Del Toro’s opening stage win and teammate Tim Wellens’ solo victory at Clásica Jaén reinforced their UAE Team’s dominance over the rest of the sport. The practically simulcast victories pushed UAE’s season win tally to 12 – a sum greater than the season-long win totals of seven WorldTour teams in all of 2025. The team has already built a massive lead in the UCI Point team rankings, just as they did last year. Although March racing rarely determines final November standings, establishing this level of separation this early confirms that UAE’s pre-season preparations and protocols are dialed in and that they will be tough to beat at the bigger races later in the season.
As Del Toro test-drives team leadership in the desert, Pogačar continues refining his position, equipment, and training along Spain’s Costa Blanca in preparation for his ambitious 2026 campaign. Most training blocks are typically shrouded in secrecy, but Pogačar may have inadvertently offered the cycling world one of its most revealing physiological glimpses ever by uploading a routine ride to Strava with his power zones left visible. Originally posted in frustration after an allegedly rude roadside encounter, the reigning Tour champion’s file contained far more than commentary: the intact power profile effectively disclosed a functional threshold power in the neighborhood of 450 watts, an extraordinary figure for a rider who reportedly weighs just 65 kilograms, and one that helps explain his dominance across nearly every terrain type. Elite climbers have historically relied on superior power-to-weight ratios to compensate for lower absolute output, yet Pogačar appears to possess the engine of a Classics powerhouse and the efficiency of a pure mountain specialist. In a sport long defined by tradeoffs like weight versus wattage, the data confirms suspicions that his rare convergence of strengths leaves rivals with no reliable terrain, flat or alpine, on which to expose him. This disclosure would have been disheartening for rivals hoping to challenge Pogačar, and cynics may even suggest the “leak” was intentional.
Aside from the UCI road season’s hot start, weather has had an outsized impact on racing and outdoor sporting venues in general, following the news that Saudi Arabia has been replaced by Kazakhstan as host for the 2029 Asian Winter Games. From the snow in Provence, to the high winds in Spain and the Middle East, conditions have been less than ideal for many road races. They have led to detours and course alterations that may have altered race outcomes – from reduced elevation gain or endurance load or both. That being said, such occurrences are likely to become more commonplace as weather fluctuation hits predicted extremes in the coming seasons and riders place a premium on safety when the conditions are likely to have consequential outcomes, in terms of crashes, frostbite, or heat stroke.
More to the point, some race venues may become less feasible for UCI events, with many already wondering if the 2028 World Championships in Abu Dhabi will be even more problematic due to heat and Gulf humidity than the 2016 desert edition held in Doha (Qatar). Hence, Saudi Arabia’s failed attempt to host Winter Games at its planned Trojena complex – part of the significantly-delayed NEOM project and Vision 2030 initiative – bears closer examination. Irrespective of NEOM construction delays, the commitment may have been folly from the start as the region’s weather cycle has become dryer and warmer, thus reducing the potential for consistent snowmaking even at the site’s 2600 meter altitude. Abu Dhabi’s race organizers are building a hill climb to create a challenge for the 2028 WC road course, but the bigger challenge may be its increasingly-stifling October climate with an average mean temperature of 96 Fahrenheit and 62% relative humidity.
The staggered release of the Epstein Files is having a staggering impact on professional sports, and pro cycling has already been shaken. Millions more files are yet to be revealed and many more names will certainly be unredacted, so this is a story that will be updated as legal and political drama plays out. Among the sports business giants already identified as associating and/or doing business with the sordid sex-offender financier are the owners of globally-recognized franchises, such as Steve Tisch, co-owner of the NFL’s New York Giants; Josh Harris whose private equity firm owns several American pro sports teams; and Chelsea FC chairman Todd Boehly, who also is a part-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Lakers. Formula 1 auto racing’s founder Bernie Ecclestone’s name appears several times thus far in attempted business dealings, with Alpine racing team owner Flavio Briatore and Aston Martin owner Lawrence Stroll also exposed as having friendly relationships with Epstein. (Several others were tangentially named in the file releases thus far, but not as associates of Epstein.)
However, the most consequential revelations thus involve the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics via Casey Wasserman’s prior relationship with Epstein conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, and Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem – the now former CEO of DP World, the UAE’s global shipping logistics company that is the key sponsor of the UAE Tour event mentioned above as well as the PGA Europe Tour’s lead sponsor. Wasserman has already had to resign from and prepare to sell his eponymously named Wasserman Group talent agency, as many entertainment and sports stars promptly left the agency in light of the revelations. However, he has thus far held onto his role as CEO of the 2028 LA Olympic Committee. Revelations concerning Sultan bin Sulayem were thoroughly damning, with the Emirati magnate deeply implicated in business deals with Epstein and “recreational” visits to his island starting in 2007. Like Wasserman, Bin Sulayem resigned as a CEO but remains deeply entrenched in UAE business and political agencies, having been a former board member of the Emirates’ Executive Council and Sovereign fund.
The slow-burn of billionaire team owner scandals has been reshaping the sports landscape even without the Epstein Files adding fuel to the fires. INEOS team owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s recent and very public xenophobic tirade only adds to this trend. His statement last week that he believes that the UK is being “colonised by immigrants” did not mention any specific ethnicity or race, but by using the language of far-Right white-race replacement firebrands, he earned immediate widespread backlash. While his apology was equally derided as half-hearted, the damage may have been done – not just as owner of Manchester United FC and INEOS, but also his downward-spiraling public image as a UK tax-dodger. One wonders whether the tone-deaf and often ignorant behaviors of team owners will soon reach a critical mass in the personal decisions and actions of the athletes and professionals under their employ. A little over ten years ago the NBA banished owner Donald Sterling from the league and forced the sale of the Los Angeles Clippers when his racism was laid bare – the team’s players were otherwise prepared to boycott a playoff game without that nuclear response. Hence, Ratcliffe has an opportunity to recast his image and that of his sporting enterprises by embracing change and using these assets to promote understanding – to defuse toxic derision of immigrants in his home country and sponsor meaningful public reforms that truly use the power of sport for altruistic ends.
Pro cycling’s season-opening overlap with other major sporting events, including January’s Australian Open and the ongoing Winter Olympics, highlights the growing accessibility problems facing modern sports. Australian Open viewers in particular were met with the unexpected addition of ESPN’s Unlimited paywall, and cycling fans continue to face similar steadily rising costs. As we have previously discussed, there are now three primary streaming services that one must have access to in the U.S. for cycling: FloSports, HBO Max, and Peacock. Live sport subscription expenses are edging out of reach for many households, and at a minimum, U.S. cycling fans will be looking at a combined annual cost of $455 in 2026 – a jump of over $100 (and that’s via ad-supported streaming, more if you prefer ad-free). Similarly, the over-stacked season-opening weekends across the globe reinforced the “what to watch” problem – from Australia, to India, South America, and multiple European and Middle Eastern venues – creating headaches if one wanted to pick up live content in a preferred language, or catch specific replays and highlights. The challenges include: too many races, not enough product scarcity in the right places, and – at least for men’s cycling – little room to diversify and build the content into a meaningful seasonal arc that attracts new fans rather than tiring out its current base. “More races” does not equate to “more coverage,” and oversaturation without accessibility puts cycling at risk for fan attrition – but also opens the opportunity for an intrepid streaming service provider to tackle the problem and bring a cohesive, affordable package to market.
A recently proposed legislative bill in Iowa appears – incredibly – to be aimed at basically outlawing bicycling on the state’s roads and highways. House Bill 637 would sharply limit where cyclists would be allowed to ride by proposing that “a person shall not use (such a) device on a roadway with a speed limit above 25 miles per hour.” This would include most of the rural roads in the state. The bill also says that no person on a bike would be allowed to carry a package, bundle or article that would “prevent the person from keeping (their) hands on the handlebars…” Bicycle advocate groups described the bill as “functionally and explicitly banning biking on most of Iowa’s roadways.” Beyond preventing thousands of recreational and competitive cyclists from riding their bikes, the bill’s draconian intent would also have debilitating and suppressive effects on larger events, like the well-known RAGBRAI – one of the largest and best-known North American multi-day cycling celebrations. Following a huge outcry by the state’s cyclists, the bill’s advance was paused last week for further review, but it could still resurface in the future. Although initially introduced as a safety measure, the real drivers behind the bill are unclear; we sincerely hope that copy-cat bills do not start to mysteriously appear in other States.