Lutsenko, the joker of Kazakhstan.
Each runner has certain technical and physical characteristics. There are climbers, small and skinny, passing by the passers, quite muscular, reaching the sprinters, equally well physically structured and very powerful. Then there are the so-called jokers: athletes who are able to tackle any terrain without any problem, always going to the maximum and winning in the plains, uphill and in time trial. The young Kazakh runner Alexey Lutsenko is the classic all-rounder cyclist: he performs well on all terrains and he usually wins races of all kinds. Certainly, he prefers the classics, on which he has placed and will place his attention in the future, but he does not disdain even the stage races, often at the service of his captains. Born in 1992, he won the 2012 U23 World Championship title in Valkenburg, and the following year he managed to pass professional with the Astana jacket. In short, everything in the family: Kazakh by birth and by profession. For Alexey, Astana and Kazakhstan are a home, where they can work and grow professionally. And the successes, especially this year, have not been lacking: to signal the victories to the Tirreno Adriatico, to the Arctic Race of Norway and in Oman with a dream that, at the moment, remains in the drawer: to win the Amstel Gold Race.
Do you know why?
The World Cup won by Lutsenko in 2012 ended right on top of the Cauberg, the wall that distinguishes the Classic of beer. He lives in Monaco and trains constantly on Italian roads: he speaks our language perfectly and is very aware of his strength, so much to say: “I want to wear the rainbow shirt”. The engine is there, the talent as well: the class that characterizes the twenty-seven years old native of Petropavlovsk, capital of the Northern Region of Kazakhstan, is easily recognizable. Who could we compare it to? Well, I personally think of Valverde, the “Embatido”. Now, however, the definitive passage of the consecration is missing: entering the age of maturation, his goal is to win a monument, a race that could make him enter the park of champions.
(Niccolò Anfosso)
