National Champs round-up

National jerseys to fight for pride

Up to eight national champions' road race jerseys will be on display at the Tour de France this weekend, with the Italian, Dutch, Czech, Belgian and French titles among the victories going to riders set to be on the Dusseldorf start line.

The closest victory of the weekend saw Oliver Naesen (Ag2r La Mondiale) take the win in the Belgian national road race for the first time in his career by just a tyre’s width. The 26-year-old narrowly edging ahead of Sep Vanmarcke (Cannondaledrapac) and Jasper Stuyven (Trek-segafredo) on the line after escaping as part of a five-man group.

Naesen will be supporting Frenchman Romain Bardet at the Tour.

Meanwhile at the other end of the spectrum, Juraj Sagan (Bora-hansgrohe) retained his Slovakian national jersey, winning by almost 10 minutes from his brother Peter. Juraj will be riding the Tour for his first time in support of his older sibling.

Fresh off fifth place at the Dauphiné, Astana’s Fabio Aru soloed to the first Italian national jersey of his career beating Diego Ulissi (UAE Emirates) by 40 seconds. The 27-year-old will be heading the Kazakh team alongside the Dauphiné’s overall winner Jakob Fuglsang.

Arnaud Démare (FDJ) ensured the French tricolore jersey returns to the Tour beating Nacer Bouhanni (Cofidis) and Jérémy Leveau (Roubaix-lille Metropole) in a reduced bunch sprint. Elsewhere, Ramon Sinkeldam (Team Sunweb) won the Dutch title, Zdenek Štybar (Quick Step-floors) won the Czech title for the second time, Marcus Burghardt (Bora-hansgrohe) won his maiden German title and Jesús Herrada (Movistar) beat teammate Alejandro Valverde to the Spanish title. Not all teams had confirmed their Tour line-ups at the time of going to press.

Champs not off to France...

Away from the Tour, Ryan Mullen (Cannondale-drapac), Elisa Longho Borgini (Wiggle-high 5) and Amber Neben (Team Véloconcept Women) emulated Steve Cummings winning the road race and time trial titles at the Irish, Italian and American National Championships. Mullen, 22, now in his second season with the Worldtour outfit, repeated his feat from 2014, while 42-year-old Neben won her first titles in both after finishing second in the TT six times previously.

Wiggle-high 5’s Jolien D’hoore continued her winning form, by securing her fourth Belgian road race title and ninth race of the season.