Paris-Nice? Familiar roads from March’s race but this will be hotter twice over, the temperature and the ferocity for the stage win.
Isolated 2000: the high point of the Tour didn’t supply the height of drama. The stage started with Visma-LAB sending their best two helpers up the road in Matteo Jorgenson and Wilco Kelderman. A relay plan for Jonas Vingegaard who could leapfrog them to victory? If it was a plan, the challenge came in the execution as Vingegaard sat tight on the Bonette. Thoughts started to turn, will Vingegaard race the Vuelta, could he do the Giro next year instead of the Tour? Because based on all we’ve seen so far what could he do, Pogačar has the measure of him raised to the power of two.
Perspective counts here because Vingegaard was still sitting second overall with a stage win to this name, as defeats go things can be worse. But rather than turn the tables he ended up “saving the furniture” as the French saying goes, protecting second place overall. Once Tadej Pogačar attacked Vingegaard was fixated on marking Remco Evenepoel and covered the Belgian’s attack on the final climb.
In the breakaway all day and first over the Bonette Richard Carapaz is now in the polka-dot jersey with 14 points on Pogačar and 10-8-6-4-2-1 points for the first category climbs and 5-3-2-1 points for the Braus.
The Route: a Paris-Nice stage but run in July this means two things, heat and form. It’ll be a hot day and more riders are on a better level, expect more attacks from the start.
The Braus as an opener is defined by the hairpin bends which help line out any group. There’s a small false flat over the top before dropping down to Sospel.
Next is the Turini, a 20km climb where the upper 10km are 7%-10% for most of the way and then a twisty descent on open roads. The Colmiane is similar, an even climb but steeper in the second half and another descent full of corners to negotiate.
The Finish: a long and steady climb. There’s nothing particularly technical to describe, the early parts have a wide road and the slope is so even all the way up although in the final two kilometres it just tightens up towards 8%.
The Contenders: Tadej Pogačar (UAE) has proclaimed today is for the breakaway… so maybe he goes in the breakaway? He might be content to take it easier in order to win tomorrow’s time trial. Both he and Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-LAB) will be happy to see a team mate win and can cope without them today. Still if no move can get clear then Pogačar can tidy up.
Ben Healy (EF) sat up yesterday so should be fresher. Romain Bardet (DSM Firmenich-PostNL) started so well, has been tired but looked sharper yesterday. Richard Carapaz (EF) and Simon Yates (Jayco) out to be tired but can be in the mix.
Clément Champoussin (Arkéa-B&B) is the local rider and normally this doesn’t make anyone faster but he’s got an impulsive side although just being in the break is a big ask. If it’s a Paris-Nice course then Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-LAB) gets a second go.
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Carapaz, Healy, Bardet, Pogačar, S Yates |
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Williams, A Yates, Almeida, Jorgenson |
Weather: 30°C and sunny.
TV: KM0 is at 1.55pm CEST and the finish is forecast for 5.30pm CEST.
Postcard from the Col de Braus
Why is Nice hosting the Tour de France finish? Officially because of the Olympics, the capital is spared a major sports even just before the Olympics and it’s right. But the secondary reason is because Nice hosted the start of the race in 2020 and it was a disaster on three fronts. First the pandemic and the restrictions turned a party into private event, not just barriers but hoardings fenced off the start, you might not get it on TV but the Tour is a very public open event. Second it rained and and all the expected images of the “Bay of Angels” and literal “azure coast” imagery were washed away. Plus a giant crash caused in part by the rain marred the finish. So returning to fix all of this makes sense. Plus where else to finish? Nice has plenty going for it.
So much so that it’s become a big hub for pro cyclists. Monaco lures some for the tax but plenty stay for the sunshine, while Americans and French riders alike who can’t dodge the taxes but can afford to rent or even buy a spacious home for a fraction of the cost of a Monaco apartment. Indeed it’s notable how many French riders are quitting their home regions these days to move here in order to train in better weather year round.
Many new residents on the Côte d’Azur with start their first ride via the Col de Braus, just because it’s there, to ride in land is to end up here. The postcard view above must be in thousands of social media posts today as it’s hardly changed since. Come around the corner and the view of the hairpins is still there, now combined with the urge to whip out your phone to record it.
What I would like to see is for all of team UAE to torn up at the sign in with hair protruding through their helmets.
Was glad to hear Pogacar describe the top of Bonette as scary as I think that I would be nervous doing it on four wheels.
So the ASO’s hopes of a grand finale have been dashed and instead we have a parade, and guys desperately fighting to hold onto their GC positions. More trench warfare then duelling adversaries.
A breakaway day, maybe, although it’ll be down to who has saved some energy. There are plenty of teams who are still hoping for a stage win so lots of guys up the road and a sedate pace by the peloton.
Or as UAE has shown this year, a need to win every day at every race and emphatically. Is this just greed or the result of so many guys trying to prove they are worthy team leaders at races? Visma have been like this, especially at one day races, but UAE have taken it to a new level.
Today, hopefully some crumbs for the “other guys” who have fought all year to be at the Tour and can go home with at least a consolation prize of a stage win.
“Pogačar tidying up”
is about as ominous a phrase as I can conjure right now. Even the crumbs…
… Visma have been like this…
The difference-for me personally-is, that I didn‘t mind it so much with visma, because of the extraordinaire talent they had. When you have for example a Van Aert it is almost a crime to not let him find his way to express himself. I feel totally, absolutely, different about what uae is doing.
And the misery cycling is in gets very obvious, when you see, that the top ten was/is for most of the race mostly made up of domestiques. The TOP TEN of the TOUR DE FRANCE. FFS! That anybody can talk about that with a straight face and discuss the „merits“ of „the racing“ is beyond me.
It is broken. The salaire of riders should be capped. So that the „wealth“ can get spread and not concentrated on a few riders and teams. This is hyper capitalism and if nobody stops it on purpose, with dedication, it will go on to devour cycling. Because that is what it does. It‘s the nature of it. This is something the riders should strike about. Not, if they have to ride a few kms more!
This is not more about sport or competition than a cracked mirror can show a perfect replication.
riders already make very little in the grand scheme of professional athletes, you will get no support at limiting rider salaries
Almeida is a good shout for the stage. He’s so far behind on GC (in time) I think he’d be given the freedom by visma and quickstep and his form is obviously very good – he was only 20 seconds behind remco and Jonas yesterday. Though admittedly I didn’t see him working on the front once.
God I hope the breakaway gets fifteen minutes so we don’t have to watch Pogi crush all the pitiful little humans at the end of yet another race. I stand by my previous comment that this is not a classic edition of the tour. I’m basically just rooting for the field at this point.
Your hope was fulfilled twice in the last three days, so the situation perhaps isn’t that dire.
Agree with The Other Craig, this has been very disappointing Tour for me after a similarly uncompetitive Giro and Classics season. There have been a few highlights: Campanaerts, Bardet, Girmay, EF.
Looking forward to Lombar…oh
Colnago’s paint shop must be feeling a bit overfaced by all of this…
Having watched both Merckx in his heyday and now Pogacar my conclusion is that although five decades apart, the two riders do have some similarities, strong team support, dominating performances, classic and GT riders. The differences are that Merckx used a bigger gear, which was the norm for his time but this did make his riding styles a little laboured. Pogacar has a brutal acceleration, you just sit waiting for it, which increasingly leaves his opponents just letting him go, in the sure knowledge that trying to follow will simply put them in the red. Pogacar also seems to be someone who simply enjoys racing for its sake and shows his pleasure, whereas Merckx always appeared somewhat dour and driven by different instincts dictated in no small way by the tighter financial realities of his time. Both great riders in their own time and way!
Its been a great, aggressive Tour with brilliant scenery and enormous roadside crowds. Good news for everybody involved, organizer, sponsors and us the lowly but loyal supporters.
I think one of the quotes of the Tour was Evenopoel describing Pogacar’s attacks as ticking time bombs 💣.
Its fair to say Pogacar has the GC in his pocket now so today will be a good test of his cannibalism. You could argue that with a mountain stage and TT ahead the race was still live yesterday, but if he chases down the break and takes the stage today I’d imagine there will be some grumbles. Possibly even from his own teammates!
Great Tour for Remco who must be wishing the final TT was 100km long.
Tadej is stupendous, no doubt about it. However, a little early to be writing off Jonas winning the Tour for the rest of time. He’s young, an amazing rider, and to say he had less than ideal preparation this year would be a huge understatement. If Tadej can improve, why can’t Jonas? I have no doubt that with proper preparation he’ll be much more competitive, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see him beat Tadej again at the Tour.
Of course he can. He is missing the legs – and almost as importnat – the team to help him. The one deployed at this Tour has fallen well short, although it has turned out to be immaterial.
I watched the last 85km as live last night and was really rather disappointed that Vinny didn’t have the legs to go for it and instead protected his second place.
Visma actually set it all up well and I was just waiting for the attack on the Bonette that never materialised and then again on the final climb, only to see Vinny look behind him ar Remco as soon as Pog attacked.
I’ll keep my thoughts on Pog’s attack and power private!
If it is true that JV was in ICU for 12d and had a plum contusion. That can have long term permanent lung scarring effects to blood alveolar interface and surface area.
I guess it’s not going to happen but what if Remco lines up his men, strings out the bunch and cracks Vingegaard on the final climb?* Just to see if they could do it, you know, in case the actual win is at play in the future.
*Pogi would of course happily accept the present and snatch the stage but that’s par for the cause
Don’t downplay in the coming years Remco’s personality and motivation to win, which necessarily includes beating up JV, as well as everyone else.
So LeTour might just morph into a Pog/Remco rivalry.
This Tour might just be that watershed moment when the calculated methodical approach to racing no longer wins GTs. If so, we are in for some wild rides.
Good pick
Am I the only one disappointed that there isn’t a picturesque crit to finish off the race? A TT today and then something for the sprinters on Sunday seems fair reward for those sprinters who’ve battled through the mountains, as well as providing a celebratory procession. Would potentially show off Nice better than a TT. Would have also added some suspense to the green jersey comp.
With the benefit of having now watched much of the race, with GC seemingly resolved, a “traditional” sprinters finish does seem tempting.
But no, breaking this tradition and gaining the possibility of having a real racing finish for GC was too good an opportunity to pass up. More tantalising before the race than a bunch sprint seems now. Though I do agree a last sprint hurrah after the mountains would have been good. Could we have had a 21a ITT and 21b crit?
Split stages were previously abused by organisers who were running full road race stages alongside ITTs, and therefore banned by the UCI.
Perhaps enough time has passed and enough leadership changed (both with race organisers and the UCI) that it is time to take off the straitjacket and find a more reasonable way to work collaboratively on innovative race formats. There could be a safeguard of the Professional Cycling Council being required to approve innovative race formats, just like there has been with the application of trial rules for sprint finishes in the last few years.
A good combination would be:
– ITT for just the top 20 on GC and any other riders nominating to get themselves the stage result
– circuit race not timed for GC, lap drop allowed for mechanicals, and lots of intermediate sprints on offer to keep the points jersey in play.
– riders required to complete one of the two only, riders which complete both get a 20 second bonus on GC and 5 UCI points.
– general assumption to be that the ITT comes first and circuit race second, but allowed to be reversed after stage 19 if the GC is close.
+1 I understand that history demands TTs, but a Crit around sunny Nice would have been far more spectator and sprinter friendly .
A little imagination from the organizers would have been much appreciated. For me it will be a morning out on the bike and look up the results later. I simply don’t understand why people would want to watch an event that offers so little in drama and excitement, other than screen time splits.
I’ll get my coat!
I feel just the opposite, I’ve always felt that having a leisurely procession followed by a circuit crit was a waste of the last day, the Giro has been far better in this respect until this year. I was therefore delighted to see the TdF do some thing different, (well, since 1989, anyway).
In the old days you’d have had a split stage – TT in the morning, and an 80km Critérium to finish things off. Split stages could be quite brutal when they were both long and 200km of racing would stretch between 8am and 5pm because if the break between, but a short TT plus short criterium would surely be acceptable?
I can’t help thinking that for 95% of the riders, their joy at finishing the tour will be somewhat muted. It’s one thing to cross the line in a peloton, even if the stage is largely a formality. But if you are 120th on GC – you ride for 25 minutes, with no TV motorbike, and finish, but can’t celebrate because all your team mates are still to ride. It can’t help but be a bit deflating?
and that’s not the case for all the Giro’s that ended in a ITT? Wher were all this whinning then?
Exactly!
It’s my understanding that split stages were banned, for good reason, and are still not allowed by the UCI, so this is pointless speculation.
The tt had a chance to be really exciting, but as we now know there won’t be the drama we were hoping for, so it would be great if they could magically change tomorrow to a sprinter’s special. Alas, we will have to settle for nice scenery and maybe a battle for second.
In terms of spectacle, it felt like Pogi jumped the shark today.
The temptation to go with the momentum and tick off your first triple must be enormous.
I commented yesterday that he shouldn’t pass up the opportunity when it’s there for the taking – you never know if it will ever come around again. Winning all 3 GTs in the same year would set him apart from everyone (beating Froome’s achivement of holding the winner’s jersey in all 3 at the same time).
Pogacar went too deep yesterday to be able to win today, surely. What on earth happened to that idea of ‘matches to burn’. How many has he got exactly?
“Surely”. LOL!
You could argue it was reckless for Visma to bring JV to the TdF. They were banking on Pog cracking and he hasn’t and I wonder if this is net negative for Jonas. He has certainly handed over the initiative and crown in the leader contest. He could have doe Vuelta on top form and used it base for 2025 TdF.
And yes hope for a breakaway today.
Reckless sounds like hyperbole. He’s won a stage and is likely to finish 2nd only months after leaving intensive care, with a team that isn’t strong enough to support a Tour win bid. There’s lots of work to do for sure but his overall performance and participation is far from a net negative.
He is 25 already but I think Jorgenson’s ride yesterday was fairly astounding. Unlike those in the peloton he had a lot of time into the breeze and was still only caught with under 2 km to go. It seems to me that VLAB now have an interesting understudy.
Yup
Jorgenson’s challenge is that he’s a big boy and not very aero by nature. But in a gt like the 22 Vuelta he would have the potential to stay up there on gc. Should be fun to see what they decide to do with him in 2025. He’s definitely more than a super domestique.
I think he said himself that 1-week stage race wins are definitely on his radar but Grand Tours are more problematic due to his size.
No gifts lol. An uncompelling tour in retrospect.
Pogi tried not to win this, but Remco (and then Jonas) left him no choice. He’d have gladly gifted it to Carapaz or pretty much anybody from that break … but not to Remco or Jonas when it meant giving up time. He even pretty much invited Jonas to try and outsprint him.
Lol. TP has no such intentions. Its all about him.
Perhaps a bit, Almeida didn’t pull for nothing. On the other hand, it’s Pogacar – or any sporting superstar’s – job. Schürrle wouldn’t miss an open goal at Mineirao, would he? (Ok, not a good example of star, probably.)
Winning is a form of respecting opponents. And also, it’s inherently tragic, because stars such as Pogacar build not only a legacy, but also huge expectations. At the moment he won’t be able to raise the bar over and over again, he’d fail; and so in a way, a failure is inevitable and the whole sporting career is little more than a waiting for the failure to come.
I’m not faulting TP for winning. My point is that TP is where he is, *because* he is so singleminded. The JumboVisma show in last year’s Vuelta would never have happened with TP in the role of Roglic or Vingegaard. He would have crushed Kuss as he is crushing his UAE team now. He is the Merckx or Armstrong of the 2020ies. Behind his smile, his jokes and the other antics that endears him to his fans, he is just focused on winning. Which is why he wins everything.
Phil Liggett said some truly idiotic things about Pogi letting JV have the stage. Not in a million years!
Yes. And yes again to your second paragraph. Almost without exception all sporting careers end in failure. Raging against the dying light but with absolute futility. ‘Remember you too are mortal’.
Have any top cyclists in the past won the Tour (or one of the other major races) & then promptly retired, thus ensuring that their career didn’t end in failure?
Bernard Hinault comes to mind for a prompt retirement at the top.
But remember while we might outwardly see a rider with declining results starting who is starting to look a bit like an old lion in the zoo, the rider is probably earning a small fortune based on their reputation. See Chris Froome who “should have retired early” when it comes to getting out at the top but in staying on he’s earned millions.
Thanks for your reply. Looking up Hinault (I do know who he is, just not the details) I see he “only” finished second in the Tour before retiring, so perhaps he could see the writing was already on the wall. I was thinking more of whether there had ever been a situation like Nico Rosberg in F1, who finally managed to win the championship then announced his retirement only weeks later. However I can quite understand that cyclists, being mostly much lower-paid than the likes of F1 drivers, may have more incentive to keep earning from success for as long as possible.
Hinault had announced his retirement date long before, it wasn’t a decision taken after defeat (or if you ask him, helping LeMond to win of course) either.
Pro cycling is interesting for the way riders can be paid a lot for having been good, at least on some teams because of their fame and status which attracts attention, invites even but other teams have a model that doesn’t accommodate this. It’s far from unique, eg soccer and the US and Saudi leagues, the athletes themselves become trophy assets.
It’s completely rational that Pog would not want to lose any time to Remco or Vingo. Anything could happen and go wrong in the TT tomorrow (illness, crash, “bad day”, etc). Better to preserve the 5+ minute margin.
But when Vingo’s attack left Pog no choice but to follow, I interpret Pog’s dominant, sprint, stage victory was a final revenge of what some might consider a humiliating loss to Jumbo Visma last year, and to prove all the naysayers were wrong.
I don’t really think he’s proved naysayers wrong. Not saying the naysayers are right, but beating a JV who was in the hospital 2 1/2 months earlier for 10 days after that crash, isn’t really convincing.
And last year Jonas had had the perfect lead up to the Tour, while Pogacar had had to stay off the bike a while with a crash injury to his wrist (though, I think he was back on the turbo relatively quickly).
We’ll never know exactly what difference Jonas’ crash made to his form for this tour, but we know he was putting in better numbers than ever on the big climbs at the end despite that bad crash.
I really don’t think he had that in mind. He just wanted another stage win, that had been presented to him pretty much on a plate.
Marc Madiot was right after all. The tour was over after stage 4 (or 2?), though we might have hoped otherwise.
I thought for sure Pogacar was asking Vingegaard to outsprint him when he came through at the end. But then I thought maybe Vingegaard wanted to let Pogacar just get ahead of him, perhaps as a gesture to say “you win” or perhaps not to be embarrassed by being passed in the sprint. Who knows.
Couldn’t you say Pogacar won today because SQS wanted him to? (eye roll) They sure pulled to get the break back.
Pogacar is brilliant but it’s become uncomfortable viewing, I’m pleased it’s nearly over. I’m not sure the intimidating optics of this domination helps cycling’s attractiveness as a viable sporting career for young people.
I’ve enjoyed Carapaz’s sparky little escapades in recent days, glad he has that jersey.
Carapaz saved the third week
With Vingegaard, Remco and Roglic in top form (and no early-season injuries) and a less dominant TP it could have been the Tour – so far – of this millenium. But as it is, it evolved into a boring forgettable circus. And I say that as an early Pogi fan. Cycling needs it superstars, but it needs the competitive edge even more. In todays televised reality where every minute of every stage is streamed, a new Merckx will kill interest. I dont really know how to fix it, but as TP may be able to maintain form (and focus) to better Armstrongs 7 (illigit) tour wins, who will watch it while he go for #5, 6, 7, ..?