A lot can happen in 24 hours. On Monday, Sam Watson was out on a training ride, when he received a late call-up to race the Tour de Romandie in Switzerland. Fast forward to Tuesday afternoon, and the Ineos Grenadiers rider was pulling on the race’s yellow leader’s jersey, the winner of the prologue.
The 23-year-old Brit was the fastest on a technical 3.44km course in Saint-Imer. His time of four minutes and 33 seconds – an average speed of 45.3.km/h – saw him win by less than three tenths of a second ahead of UAE Team Emirates XRG’s Ivo Oliveira.
“All I felt was pain, to be honest,” Watson said afterwards. “I crossed the line and I didn’t know I was leading until the first interview. It’s quite a nice surprise.
“Yesterday I was out training in Andorra, one and a half hours from home, and I got a call from the team saying, ‘Get to the airport as soon as you can because you’re racing Romandie tomorrow.’ And here I am with a victory, it’s pretty special.”
The win marked the second of Watson’s young career, and his first at WorldTour level.
“I don’t think it’s really set in yet,” he said. “To say I’ve won my first WorldTour race with Ineos, my first win with them, is a bit of a dream.
“It definitely gives me some confidence. I was at the end of quite a hard, three-day [training] block. We can really go into the next days with confidence. On paper, they suit me.”
While some riders opted for road bikes for Tuesday’s unconventionally short race against the clock, Watson was among those who used a full time trial set-up.
Interviewed before the the final riders had finished, the Brit said he felt “horrendous” after his short, all-out effort.
“My head is just pounding, to be honest. It’s not nice,” he said, before going on to reveal for the first time: “I only found out I was coming to this race yesterday.”
Movistar’s Iván Roméo filled out the prologue’s podium, three seconds adrift of Watson. Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step) placed ninth as the best of the general classification favourites, just four seconds down.
So short was the time trial, that only 10 seconds separated the first rider from the 27th.
The six-day Tour de Romandie continues on Tuesday with stage one. It will close with a time trial in Geneva on Sunday.
