The first Monument of the year, this Saturday’s Milan-Sanremo is all about the tense finish, the paradox of the longest race of the year that’s often decided in the final metres, a race where every pedal stroke counts and the list of contenders and pretenders is longer than any other. Who will keep their nerve?
The route for the 2018 Critérium du Dauphiné has been presented today, a chance to project beyond the spring classics into summer. The Dauphiné is a dress rehearsal for the Tour de France and the 2018 route supplies practice for a team time trial and a copycat mountain stage. It runs from Sunday 3 June to Sunday 10 June. Here’s a closer look at the route ahead…
Peter Sagan leads on the Poggio having blown the field off his back wheel. Michał Kwiatkowski and Julian Alaphilippe are chasing and there’s just 6km to go. If you’ve been watching on TV this is a moment of almost unbearable tension.
Milan-Sanremo is the longest race on the pro calendar yet it’s often dependent on events in the last five minutes. Why all the hours of airtime when surely you could just tune in for the final 10 minutes? All the details make the Poggio’s ascent and descent so thrilling.
In the wake of last week’s report from the UK parliament plenty readers have emailed in to ask for a reaction. Only it’s hard to have much of a response there’s not much new apart from seeing it printed on parliamentary headed paper and getting front page coverage in the UK media rather than back page or cycling-specific coverage. Whatever the British parliament does, the story is set to rumble on and on and it’s been hard to add to past pieces (here and here). Instead a quick look at TUEs where things have already changed but there’s room for improvement.
Are you sitting comfortably? On Sunday morning Marc Soler was sat comfortably in sixth place overall, wearing the white jersey of the best young rider under his rain jacket and had taken a strong second place in the Saint Etienne time trial earlier in the week. He’s a promising rider and was already in a very satisfactory position. Only it wasn’t enough for him and he took off on the steep climb to Peille with 47km to go and won the race overall.
110km and it’s all up and down on twisting roads with time bonuses on offer and the overall classification still to play for.
The Queen Stage and a long climb to the fiish, a 45 minute uphill effort is beaucoup for early March and should tease out the overall contenders who remain huddled together. If you’ve been watching during the week note the earlier finish time.
Hopefully two races for the price of one with a breakaway making it and behind the GC contenders exploiting the tricky finish including a surprisingly nasty penultimate climb.
After three skirmishes for time bonuses and stage wins, the first big chance to shape the overall classification. The course is harder than the profile suggests with a steady opening climb and then a sharp spike nearer the finish.
