Paris (AFP)

Propelled to the front of the stage by the Covid pandemic and containment, virtual cycling will be entitled to its first world championships on Wednesday, organized jointly by the International Cycling Union and the Zwift platform.

Everyone at home, from their living room or their garage, 132 cyclists from all over the world met on "Watopia", the name of the virtual world where they will advance their avatar by pedaling - for real - on a home - trainer connected to a screen.

"This will be the first event of this kind and I believe it will mark the future direction of the discipline," believes Eric Min, CEO and co-founder of Zwift, the popular application created in 2014.

On the starting line, Jordan Sarrou, crowned cross-country mountain bike world champion last October, will represent France alongside Marie Le Net, who came from the track.

"During the World Mountain Biking Championships, we were asked if we were interested in doing the World Championships," he told AFP.

"At first, I was not too much for, I was focused on the Worlds, and then finally I said to myself that it could be nice, because it's a first, it's historic."

On Wednesday, he will be in the saddle at the home of his trainer near Besançon to try to win the first rainbow jersey in the discipline.

“The season ended at the end of October, I observed a little rest to regenerate myself and I resumed training three weeks ago,” he explains.

"Running for an hour on Zwift allows you to exert yourself a little differently than usual and get back into the competition."

“It's another way to hurt yourself on a bike!” He continues.

"It's super fun and time flies much faster. I think it's a great tool, in tune with the times. During confinement, I did a lot of it."

- "Very violent effort" -

Already practiced in training by the pros for years, virtual cycling, also called ecycling or esport cycling, has precisely experienced a rush of practitioners at the time of confinement, when virtual races have replaced real events.

Failing to be able to take place on the road, the Tour de Suisse had thus migrated to online in April, with Julian Alaphilippe, Vincenzo Nibali or Romain Bardet among the participants, while Greg Van Avermaet had become the first winner of the Virtual Tour of Flanders.

Even the Tour de France, which had to be postponed to September, had converted to virtual in July.

On Wednesday, the runners will compete in a 50 km race with a hilly profile with a top finish.

Virtual races, "it's not quite the same sensations as real races, but it's a very violent effort," explains Jordan Sarrou, who has already recognized the circuit in training.

“There is a tactic to be had, a little different pedaling, a strategy to be put in place to make the efforts at the right time,” he adds.

Because thanks to Zwift, the difficulties of the course, slopes and percentages, are faithfully reproduced in the pedals.

For this first edition of the Worlds, twenty national federations have played the game. Among the selected riders, coming from different cycling disciplines (track, road, mountain bike ...), there are some known leaders of the peloton including the Belgian Thomas De Gendt, the Colombian Rigoberto Uran or the Dutch Anna van der Breggen.

At the start, there is also a Paralympic athlete, the Briton Sarah Storey.

© 2020 AFP