Sprint or breakaway?
Netcompany Unchained: the stage win for Visma-LAB but it was close with Netcompany-Ineos only nine seconds behind. The Dutch team lost Ben Tullet to a puncture and then Wout van Aert with 8km to go when apparently he was meant to deliver a lead-out up the final climb. The British team lost Sam Watson to a dropped chain and then the same fate struck Oscar Onley which left them all sitting up to wait to wait for him and this cost them the win. If they’d ridden on they could have won the stage and had Kévin Vauquelin in yellow. By Sunday we’ll know what the right option was.
The big surprise of the day was EF finishing third to keep Alex Baudin in yellow by 12 seconds, again with help thanks to Netcompany’s jumping chains. An impressive result by itself for EF, all the more so given the work they did the previous day too.
A second surprise was UAE in ninth, a minute down and both the position and the time gaps. Lidl-Trek lost 32 seconds, Decathlon CMA-CGM 42 seconds.
To watch the stage was to see a lot of this happening, the format of teams shedding riders is televisual. You could see the confusion for Netcompany-Ineos in the moment, you could see Van Aert dropped early, likewise Stefan Bissegger for Decathlon.
The Route: 165km and 2,250m of vertical gain. The amount of climbing makes this accessible to the sprinters here, just and several teams have riders who can win after a tiring stage but it’s equally open to the breakaway. It’s across the Forez, the forested hilly roads of the Auvergne and then 50km in the final of descent and flat.
The Finish: a long flat road to the finish, no corners or junctions in the final 5km but there are some urban street furniture and traffic calming dividers.
The Contenders: a sprint finish or a breakaway? Just like Monday several team have a house sprinter who could win after today’s hilly course, think Dorian Godon (Netcompany), Wout van Aert (Visma-LAB), Benoît Cosnefroy (UAE) and Michael Matthews (Jayco) but unlike then there’s no reason to hold back today. Godon’s form has looked questionable but did a good ride leading the team until almost the food of the final climb while Van Aert is a harder pick but could still try the sprint while Cosnefroy needs an uphill finish.
There are sprinters here but they have few wins between them. Hugo Hoffstetter (NSN) is a sprinter but a rare winner and not yet in the World Tour. Matthew Fox (Lotto-Intermarché) can be quick but a win today would be more of a surprise than Hoffstetter. Phil Bauhaus (Bahrain) won a Dauphiné stage in 2017. Bryan Coquard (Cofidis) is here too but an infrequent winner and even focussing less on the sprints this year, team mate Valentin Ferron is quick and could aim for the breakaway.
Breakaway specialist Baptiste Veistroffer (Lotto-Intermarché) finds terrain to suit, likewise Ivan Romeo (Movistar) and with both it’s solo or bust. Matteo Trentin (Tudor) can do well from a group, maybe Matej Mohorič (Bahrain) too.
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Bauhaus, Godon, Matthews |
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Simmons, WvA, |
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Hoffstetter, Veistroffer, Romeo, Healy, Ferron |
Weather: some rain clearing to leave dry roads, 20°C.
TV: KM0 is at 1.15pm and the finish is forecast for 5.00pm.
Postcard from Montrond-les-Bains
There are only so many roads and over time an annual bike race will return to places it has been before. Today’s finish races where the Dauphiné has been before, in the last few years the race’s westward push has visited this area many times.
With 23km to go today’s stage goes through Mornand-en-Forez, in 2022 it was the mid-stage time check during the 32km time trial stage. Filippo Ganna won the stage but just, two seconds ahead of Wout van Aert. Primož Roglič was the best of the GC riders, his team mate Jonas Vingegaard was next among them 30 seconds back. A teenage Juan Ayuso was 10th, Movistar’s Matteo Jorgenson 11th.
Sacked on the Planche des Belles Filles in 2020, crashing out of the 2021 Tour, Roglič had won Paris-Nice in the spring of 2022 and with the Dauphiné everything seemed back on track, he went into the Tour as a contender alongside Vingegaard who’d matched him on the climb to the Plateau de Solaison. The pair would crack Tadej Pogačar on the Col du Granon, in part because the Slovenian did not eat enough but that was because he was kept under pressure. But by then Roglič was nursing injuries and Vingegaard would win the Tour while Roglič left the race again.
Today’s stage might be hard to extrapolate from but look out for Sunday’s Solaison finish as the Dauphiné goes there just as it did in 2022, and so will the Tour in July.
Ineos talk of marginal gains but to miss out on a WT victory through two dropped chains seems worse than careless. Watson was visibly furious and Vauquelin unhappy at the team waiting for Onley. At least they’ll have time to correct the technical problem before the TdF TTT.
The dropped chains were troubling. Were they not riding a 1x drivetrain with a chain guide? How do you drop the chain?
Tough day for the Ineos mechanics, they’d be celebrating a stage win if the set-up was better. From the pictures there was a chain guide.
It’s anecdotal but 12 speed chains are thinner and more whip-like. If you do a big pull and then stop pedalling suddenly the chain can be jumpy (try it if you can).
If only there was a movable chain guide, that could guide the chain fore and aft, and be potentially controlled by a lever on the handle bars…
I think we will take our Host’s word at that 😅🤣
I think we will take your word. No need to try ourselves 🤣😅.
On the other hand, is it more difficult to back pedal the chain on with a one-by?
Watch the LR recap video on YT. You will see some pedaling behavior that Del Toro does to ensure he doesn’t drop his chain.
But yes, even with a guide it’s hard to keep the chain on Shimano system. Even with specific 1x narrow-wide tooth profiles. The wide range of today’s cassettes makes it hard. Also if you aren’t running a clutched rear mech it is possible to drop even with a simple back pedal like you mentioned.
The chain guides are generally pretty good (think Kedge, Wolftooth) but like inrng said 12spd is very thin and chain angles can be extreme so you will often find yourself running on the chain guide slightly. Also teams contesting the win at these high level contests probably don’t care to add the friction of a clutched system. After all…they’re doing crazier stuff to save a watt
A further thing is the chain guide can also be a problem as you want to lift the chain back on only to find the guide is in the way while you try the on-bike recovery.
What could help instead is some kind of chain cage… or a front mech as Jean Bon says.
Ah, I actually meant back pedal to get the chain back on after it had already dropped.
Looks like Onley had to reach down and grab his chain with his hand while travelling at 50 kph. Crazy stuff.
Ah, that explains why the chain drops on my Ultegra 12-speed – ha ha (not likely with my poor power outputs)!!!
Without the two chain drops Vauquelin and Onley could have had another 20 seconds over Seixas. That might just have been enough to hold him off in the high mountains, though probably not.
This aged IR contributor rode hundreds of TTs in the seventies, often with a single front ring yet never with a dropped chain. The chains were often Reynolds though and anything but whip-like and flexible.
They seem to me to have had more than their fair share of mechs this year. If that’s down more to equipment or set-up than bad luck then it needs to be sorted toot sweet.
Vauquelin should be more philosophical and just be grateful that the wheels didn’t collapse this time.
You would have to assume both Netcompany & Visma will improve come Barcelona, UAE too but what about Decathlon? I know they were a rider down but that was a climbing domestique, not sure why Stefan Bissegger was dropped early, didnt see a mechanical, they seemed to be a level below the best teams. Maybe the time can be made up on the last three stages but still this is not ideal. Perhaps it shows that despite the hype, the team & Paul Seixas have a way to go to be truly competitive at the Tour.
Its good to be back looking at the summer French landscape. Whilst the Dolomites and Tuscany are unique, French landscapes and small towns are a level above. Images of cyclists riding through La France profonde say bike racing in a way nowhere else does.
Bissegger just had an off-day apparently. Barcelona will be different for all as it’s a big boulevard course and a selection paradox, teams wanting to win this stage for the instant glory hit and time gains vs teams needing support in the mountains although the best teams have riders who can deliver on both terrains.
Careful! There’ll be a lot of folks choking on their espressos at that remark about France being prettier than Tuscany and the Dolomites. Likewise, italian landscapes speak to me of proper historical racing in a way that French ones can’t (I don’t know why, but they seem to evoke Indurain-era instead for me). I’m prepared to accept that this stuff is hugely subjective, but my Italian grandmother will be making death threats!
I have spent practically every summer holiday for the past 25 years is Tuscany so well aware of its attractions (must say I prefer the food to that in France!) and the Dolomites are unique. However in general I prefer the rural French landscapes to the Italian. The roads are certainly better in France than in Italy! However these things are completely subjective, others will disagree.
A “disappointing” Dauphine might be good for Seixas and temper the hype a little. As for his team; it will take a little bit of time to build it into a powerhouse. Seixas is only 19, so I think it is fine if the team is two-or-three years from being properly competitive with Visma and UAE. That will also be the time when Seixas can realistically compete for a Tour win (if he develops as we all hope he will). I think it is important to be patient with Seixas and his team.
Either Decathlon need to go out and buy some doms, or if Decathlon repeat this TTT performance at the Tour, then Seixas might well think to himself, why are n’t I on one of teams that beat us?
They’ve signed Pavel Sivakov for reasons like this. They were planning to renew Felix Gall’s deal but his price jumped after the Giro and Lidl-Trek made a generous offer. But this could help Decathlon as it frees up budget for a lieutentant-style helper although it’s late to recruit one now.
Luke Rowe suggested they’d do a Watts Occuring after the TT. Both hosts too embarrassed, I guess.
🤣😅
May still happen. On the other hand, Luke and Thomas doing a Pod is also slightly problematic as they ar competing against each other.
“By Sunday we’ll know what the right option was.” Know what you mean, hindsight always being 20-20, but the right option is to do what is best with the information available to you at the time of the option.
Yes, as we don’t know the training values of Vauquelin and Onley (ie is Onley climbing better and so essential for the weekend?), or the office politics inside the team bus as often the team has liked to have multiple leaders as a way of keeping them all on their toes and so yesterday prolongs this rather than selects.
Seems like a crazy risk to me, although they wouldn’t have known how likely the win was if they didn’t wait. Still, if Onley doesn’t finish on the podium then it looks like a badly wasted opportunity.
I think one of the big surprises was Wout Van Aert. What’s going on with him and do Vinny and co have cause for concern for the Tour? Maybe he’s had too much fun after PR? Or has he been injured?
Whatever, he seems way off the level you’d expect him to be showing at this stage before the Tour. What do you think Mr Ring?
He crashed recently in training, the Monday before the race it seems, and seemed to lose a lot of skin, it probably cost him some training and sleep.
Ah, that explains plenty then – just an injury blip rather than a form issue. Thanks.