SCHACH ATTACK
Max Schachmann can’t help it if he enjoys the work. “I’m not stupid, I don’t do this in training,” he joked after sprawling onto the roadside on a hilltop in Portugal. It was at the Volta ao Algarve last spring, and his chest was still heaving from having tried to outmatch Remco Evenepoel on the Alto do Malhão, but he could already laugh at the intensity of the effort he had just summoned.
Professional cycling may demand ever increasing levels of asceticism, but the German manages to retain his enthusiasm for the endeavour. In those heightened moments when the peloton’s rivets come loose, Schachmann typically wears a grimace that looks a lot like a grin. Maybe it’s both.
“I like it when you don’t have to play the normal game with the team, when you just can try something,” Schachmann explains now to Procycling. “I like to entertain the spectators, all the people at home watching, because this sport is better if someone tries something instead of just being there and waiting for the final 100 metres.”
Schachmann left a calling card for his gently
