Michael Matthews heads back to Milan-San Remo on Saturday, taking another shot at a race where victory has narrowly eluded him over the years.
The Australian has racked up three podium placings in 11 appearances at La Classicissima, but none saw him come closer to the win than last season, where he came centimetres away from beating Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) to the line in San Remo.
This year, Matthews stepped his preparation up another notch ahead of taking on his first big goal of the season, he said in a Jayco-AlUla press conference earlier this week.
“After last year, losing by a tyre width or something, it gave me extra motivation to put a bit more time into the recon,” Matthews said. “I made sure I know every piece of the road.
“I sort of did before, but not to the amount of detail that I do now. I think that [over the] winter, I did [the final] between 20 or 30 times.”
After leading into the race with a week at Paris-Nice supporting his teammates, Matthews will rely on a squad including Mauro Schmid, Filippo Zana, and Jasha Sütterlin on the 289km run from Pavia to San Remo this weekend.
There’ll be a six-hour lead-up to the hectic final, where should he hit the closing Via Roma among the leaders, he’ll be hoping to avoid a mishap like the sunglasses distraction which may just have lost him last year’s edition.
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“Sprinting to the line, I really thought I was going to win. I think it was at 25 metres to go, I was still in front, and when my glasses fell, I had that lapse of concentration for a second,” Matthews said of last year’s sprint finish.
“That’s when Philipsen was able to pass me. So, it’s been, honestly, very difficult to swallow that result.”
“I’ve had to work a lot to get back to try and fight for it again this year. It hasn’t been an easy process. I don’t think it’s ever happened in cycling – that someone lost a Monument because their glasses fell off. Let’s not repeat that.”
This year, those hoping for a sprint finish, such as Matthews and Philipsen, will once again have to contend with Tadej Pogačar and his UAE Team Emirates-XRG squad. The Slovenian, third last time out, will once again push a hard pace up the Poggio, or perhaps even earlier up the Cipressa, in the hope of detaching the faster finishers.
“Every race that Tadej goes to he’s normally the biggest favourite, but this is probably one of the hardest races for him to win,” Matthew said of his rival, the betting favourite for the win on Saturday afternoon.
“It’s not as selective early on as he would like personally. It’s up to his team to make it as hard as possible for the rest of us to get to the finish.
“I think they just need to go as hard as possible as early as possible and just keep going. They showed in Strade Bianche for the last two years they can make it hard early and get a small bunch. That doesn’t really suit the San Remo course, but they don’t have much other choice.”
Whatever the result, and however the final ends up being raced, this year’s San Remo will be a different race to his early participations, including his 2011 debut, where he rode in service of reigning champion Oscar Freire at Rabobank.
“It’s changed massively,” Matthews said. “When I was first riding it, it was known as the sprint race. Basically, all the sprinters would get over the climb and it would be a big bunch kick.
“And then obviously more climbers saw that making it hard was possible. But it can change, depending on the characteristics of the favourite to win the race and if they have the strongest team to make the race the way they want it.”
