ONE OF EACH, PLEASE

Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2020 is quite an important race in the career and life of Lizzie Deignan. Perhaps not as important as Paris-Roubaix 2021, which we’ll get to later, but there was something about the strategy and execution of her victory that wasn’t quite the norm for her, and also a lot which was typically Deignan.

We’re in Otley, at the house in which Deignan grew up and where she and husband Phil are spending a little post-season time before heading back to Monaco. You could describe it as a holiday, though when there’s a three-year-old in the equation and a lot of family and THE BIG INTERVIEW friends to catch up with, both in Ireland and Yorkshire, it’s not the kind of holiday where there’s a lot of time to put feet up. Deignan has also had to shoehorn into her schedule her temporary position as guest editor of this publication, which she is treating diligently and seriously.

But while daughter Orla and Phil go out to burn off some of her considerable energy, Deignan and I are debating the ethics and politics of cycling, specifically with reference to Liège 2020. On a cold and rainy day in eastern Belgium, Deignan was away on her own, and had been for some time. Doing well in crappy weather is normal Deignan behaviour; solo breaks, at the time, less so. Tactically, everything was very well set up indeed - Deignan out ahead, her team-mate Ellen van Dijk in the group behind. However, Mitchelton-Scott rider Grace Brown had extricated herself from the group and was closing on the lone leader.

“I was getting hunted down by Grace, which was painful,” she says. “I just couldn’t go any harder. I was running out of cadence. Legless.”

Then again, Deignan is much better than Brown