Tour de France 2021

[Chris_]

5 minutes ago, Carmichael said:

Amateur comment incoming - But where is Sepp Kuss? What happened to him? Prev time he was up there leading the charge. 

I see only 2 minutes seperate Froome and Greipel....  

He came in almost last on stage 1. Affected by every crash

[TNT1]

6 minutes ago, Carmichael said:

Amateur comment incoming - But where is Sepp Kuss?

29	Sepp Kuss (USA) Jumbo-Visma

0:14:28

 

On the stage.

 

Overall:

74

Sepp Kuss (USA) Jumbo-Visma

1:39:14

 

Maybe he hunts a stage in the Pyrenees.

[Mountain Bru]

2 hours ago, TNT1 said:

On the Pogacar thing, the bottom line is if he could have stayed with Vingegaard he would have. This nonsense of "he chose to not follow" is, well, nonsense. Sure, he didn't crack open like a piñata, but at the moment he simply didn't have the legs.

Yip in his interview after the race he said he couldn't follow and he "exploded a little bit". I reckon if today was another mountain stage, he would have been in a lot more trouble because everyone would have thrown their entire arsenal at him to put him under max pressure and try to properly crack him early in the stage. But now he's got 2 "easy" stages to recover. 

But also, when you're 5 minutes up, and still have another TT in your pocket where you'll probably take at least another minute, it's all gravy.

[TNT1]

Are those van Poppel boys (no pun) related?

[Vetplant]

9 minutes ago, TNT1 said:

29	Sepp Kuss (USA) Jumbo-Visma

0:14:28

 

On the stage.

 

Overall:

74

Sepp Kuss (USA) Jumbo-Visma

1:39:14

 

Maybe he hunts a stage in the Pyrenees.

What is TJV to do? 

Wout sits on 44 points, 2nd in the KoM competition, with Quintana on 50. 

Vingegaard can likely contest for 2nd on GC.

Split their resources and every man for themselves or all-in for a specific cause? 

Tough one. 

 

[Plentipotential]

An honest question here. Would it not make sense for EFF, Jumbo or Ineos, or all three to combine their efforts, to put pressure on UAE today by trying to get their leaders into a breakaway? Lots more work and probably will not succeed but worth a try? How vulnerable are UAE at the moment? There is only one more mountain top finish left so trying to get away from TP when he can recover time on a descent will probably not work.

[Vetplant]

1 minute ago, Plentipotential said:

An honest question here. Would it not make sense for EFF, Jumbo or Ineos, SNIP

WHAT?!

There goes the neighborhood

[TNT1]

2 minutes ago, Plentipotential said:

An honest question here. Would it not make sense for EFF, Jumbo or Ineos, or all three to combine their efforts, to put pressure on UAE today by trying to get their leaders into a breakaway? 

Pointless waste of effort. The sprinters' teams will see to that.

[Plentipotential]

1 minute ago, TNT1 said:

Pointless waste of effort. The sprinters' teams will see to that.

All the sprinters are chasing DQ. Let them do the work and give Tim Declercq the day off.

[Long Wheel Base]

16 hours ago, shaper said:

The green jersey of Mark Cavendish came over the line in a large gruppetto around 40 minutes down so the Manxman beats the time cut by around seven minutes. Earlier, on the first ascent of Mont Ventoux, Cav showed his class by doffing his helmet towards the Tom Simpson memorial.

Source: Eurosport

The year he rode CTCT, I was racing tandems and our group was right behind the pro's and he was just a few meters from me. When they started playing our national anthem before the start like they do every year, Cav removed his helmet. A few of us saw this and we sort of looked around and were like sjoe this is our anthem and he shows respect like that. I don't think any of us even thought about removing our helmet during the anthem.

[TNT1]

Just now, Plentipotential said:

All the sprinters are chasing DQ. Let them do the work and give Tim Declercq the day off.

I'm not sure what you're getting at. But a GC contender trying to get away on a flat stage is a waste of time as the sprinters' teams will pull anything back either to go for green points or a stage win.

 

The proviso being when massive crosswinds influence the GC battle on the flat roads, but today doesn't look like being that.

[Chris_]

19 minutes ago, Vetplant said:

What is TJV to do? 

Wout sits on 44 points, 2nd in the KoM competition, with Quintana on 50. 

Vingegaard can likely contest for 2nd on GC.

Split their resources and every man for themselves or all-in for a specific cause? 

Tough one. 

 

Our man on the ground said they would work for Vingegaard.

I'm glad Wout didn't listen.

 

[TheoG]

4 minutes ago, Chris_ said:

Our man on the ground said they would work for Vingegaard.

I'm glad Wout didn't listen.

 

Wout got his stage win, now he can focus on helping JW and maybe help himself into the top ten also.

Edited July 8, 2021 by TheoG

[Plentipotential]

So unless Pogacar does something stupid or explodes he looks likely to hold onto yellow until Paris, he's managed to stay out of the carnage that a good few of the contenders have been caught up in, his luck, so far. At the moment it looks like the rest are riding for a podium place except that yesterday Vingegaard puts his hand up and suddenly there's a glimmer of light. I don't believe Pogacar was holding back on the climb yesterday, his effort to take a pointless 4th place at the end sprint showed that. How do the other teams react to this? Clearly the Ineos method that worked well in the past is shot to hell now.

[Vetplant]

8 minutes ago, Chris_ said:

Our man on the ground said they would work for Vingegaard.

I'm glad Wout didn't listen.

 

I was very concerned that they would ask Wout to sit up on the descent yesterday and wait for Vingegaard. With only a 10s gap to the two Trek riders initially, I think Wout could have closed it down and still taken the Win, but I am happy he got the win under the belt without the added stress.

IMHO they should leave Wout to do what he does best. But losing Tony Martin yesterday, TJV is very thin on support for Vingegaard.

Vingegaard seems absolutely fine on his own on the climbs. He will need the Wout Watts if he gets caught out in crosswinds.

So most likely instruction is to stick with Vingegaard till 3km-to-go on sprint stages and then Wout can surf wheels to try and get a result. His breakaway days are probably done, for now.

[Vetplant]

2 minutes ago, Plentipotential said:

So unless Pogacar does something stupid or explodes he looks likely to hold onto yellow until Paris, he's managed to stay out of the carnage that a good few of the contenders have been caught up in, his luck, so far. At the moment it looks like the rest are riding for a podium place except that yesterday Vingegaard puts his hand up and suddenly there's a glimmer of light. I don't believe Pogacar was holding back on the climb yesterday, his effort to take a pointless 4th place at the end sprint showed that. How do the other teams react to this? Clearly the Ineos method that worked well in the past is shot to hell now.

Seems Pogacar is more suited to the cold days than the hot ones. Yesterday was relatively warm and he wasn't lightyears ahead of everyone.

So at best the GC contenders will hope for warm days and then attack him relentlessly, if they can, until something sticks.

Paris is still some way off.