Philippe Gilbert may have retired from pro cycling just a few months ago but the Belgian rider will still be a constant presence at bike races this year, starting very soon, with Eurosport. He makes his debut at Het Nieuwsblad on February 25th. He has been hired as a consultant and will broadcast from the back of a motorbike during races through the season.
The 40-year-old ended his 21-year racing career at Paris-Tours Elite back in October and took two victories in his final year in the peloton; winning stage 3 at Four Days of Dunkirk back in May and also claiming the overall in that event.
He has now been hired as a "consultant" by Eurosport, with the main part of that role involving commentating from the road on the back of a motorbike. On February 20th the channel will also broadcast a documentary - Classic Gilbert - about his quest to win the five Monuments of cycling.
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While Milan-Sanremo eluded him, he won Il Lombardia twice (2009, 2010), Liège-Bastogne-Liège (2011), Tour of Flanders (2017) and Paris Roubaix (2019) and the film about his quest to win all five monuments began shooting back in 2018.
Gilbert lives in Monaco, where he has a bike shop, and while his new Eurosport job will take up much of his time, he also plans to continue working on rider safety with the Association of Professional Cyclists.
He previously complained that while riders were outspoken in the media about safety issues after an incident, he was hard to get them engaged on the issue at other times. He has also said that a large number of crashes in pro cycling have been recorded and analysed in recent years and that riders are at fault for most of them.
"The only ones to convince are the riders," he said of safety in racing, claiming other stakeholders were motivated to increase safety. "They often take reckless risks. We had asked for an analysis of the causes of crashes. For three years, each crash has been analysed; when, where, how. And we realise that in the majority of cases, the person responsible is a rider."
