MinnMan

I'm thinking that the discussion is going to get pretty complicated, so leaving the existing "no chaser" thread for discussions of individual stages and stuff, and starting a conversation here about the GC battle. Maybe others will want to start additional threads about other sub-topics.

Stage 3 raised tons of questions about the GC. Everybody is focused on how Roglic lost time and possibly more importantly, may be injured enough to affect his performance (we'll see). Other Important developments include Thomas losing time more time (on seemingly an unforced error? that one has a thread of its own already). Pogacar lost a little time, but probably no big deal.

And Carapaz? He smells like roses. How did he do it? Not only did he avoid major crashes, but he was the only GC guy to lose zero time, so now he's in 3rd place. Even all the other GC survivors who avoided mishaps (Mas, Kelderman, Quintana, etc.) ended up gapped and lost 14 seconds.

Also, I wrote this elsewhere, but I can't think of any other time when I've seen the guy in yellow ride leadout for his teammate to take a sprint stage. mvdp is a class act.

Nothing good will happen to the GC today in stage 4. People may lose more time in crashes, but otherwise no action. So mvdp will be in yellow for 3 stages (3-4-5). And the TT? It looks like Alaphillipe may take yellow then, though van Aert and Pogacar are possible. Everybody thinks that Pogacar is a TT master, but AFAIK, that's based mostly on his 1-time show last year on stage 20. He can change my mind on that one on stage 5.

Shadco 

It will be interesting to see what cards Movistar have to play if any.

.

MinnMan

Enric Mas has been uneven in ITts. He did well in the final ITT of the TdF in 2020, but was something of a disaster during the 2020 Vuelta TT.

slcbob

Without googling for a while, I can't remember who but I do know I've seen the maillot jaune all stretched out with bottles for a top up before the road tilted up. Perhaps Tony Martin?

The leadout in yellow yesterday was tremendous. So, too, was the green jersey work at the front in the closing k's today. Almost more cognitive dissonance there. Some real team players.

With this not being a flat TT, I don't expect to see Pogacar on top. I wonder if Uran can uncork another one like he did in the TdS. We'll see about Carapaz. And/or G's and Roglic's injuries.

diphthong

movistar always messes it up. they only won with carapaz because his talent was so off the charts, he was able to overcome their deficiencies.

MinnMan

My bet is that Alaphilippe will be back in yellow after stage 5. If so, he may keep it until the weekend. Vive la France!

USAZorro

Barring a crash, I don't anticipate huge changes. If Thomas can get comfortable, he and Porte may make back a bit of time on some. Not that I expect it would matter for Richie.

surak

He is definitely a class act, but I'm nearly certain that Alaphillippe has done just that while wearing yellow at least once, if not more times (when DQT didn't end up winning). For example, Viviani's stage 4 win in 2019. Of course he did so in the green jersey today for Cav. Bringing it back to GC discussion, he has a good shot of exchanging green for yellow after the ITT. Then it'd be 5 stages where Alpecin-Fenix and DQT are making the TdF their personal stomping grounds at the expense of the 21 other teams!

Carapaz and Pogacar are the 2 GC favorites well situated now after all the crashing that their main competition's suffered. Carapaz has avoided seemingly all disasters, while Pogacar has at least avoided injury, and we've seen that Pog's strong enough to claw back time lost without fatiguing much over 3 weeks.

MinnMan

A fair point..

MinnMan

Mind changed.

But the big surprise is MVDP's performance. Still in yellow.
And they say he seldom practices TTs.

MinnMan

So what's Pogacar going to do this weekend in the mountains? Ineos, JV and others are going to be on the attack. Pogacar is incredible, but he's never been a marked man before, and he may not have a lot of team support.

It's going to be some great racing to watch.

Doge

Brandon in last. I assume holding back to help. Maybe crash. I didn't get the story. I'd of thought he was good for a top 20 but was wondering if he would hold back. Last place is hard to do.

MinnMan

Screencap of McNullty's knees from The Butterfly Effect vllog.




cameras didn't catch the crash - cause unkown.

surak

Short answer: whatever he wants.

Long answer: He'll have to cover any dangerous move himself since none of his team is a threat, but it's hard to see anyone being able to ride him off a mountain the way he's going, even if he gets tag-teamed. Remember this is a guy who almost singlehandedly brought back (and put fear and exhaustion rarely if ever seen into) MvdP at Tirreno Adriatico on parcours more suited to the latter -- none of his rivals is going to get that big of a gap on him that he can't bring back. He'd have to spectacularly get drawn out and blow up by picking the wrong guy to chase, but he's shown canny and wisdom well beyond his years that suggests that he won't easily mistake any doomed efforts.

Barring crashes, I'm thinking that echelons exploiting his support will be the only threat to him easily rolling into Paris in yellow. If it's just mano a mano, not seeing anyone dethrone him.

slcbob

McNulty's mystery crash -- weird how the damage was knees only with no shredding noticeable on his kit. How does one do that?

Yes, the upcoming hills will be alive with the sound of racing. There will need to be a conspiracy amongst the top 10 to not try to protect their spots and thereby do Pogacar's bidding and bring the race back together. Even the wunderkind, or however you say that in Slovenian, can't mark every move. Perhaps there will be come big ones.

Snotrub

I was wondering the same thing myself. I can't think of any way one can crash on a road bike and skin the front of BOTH knees and nothing else. Weird.

MinnMan

This is definitely NOT how any of us would have expected the GC rankings to look after 7 stages.

Bring on the mountains.

surak

Oops, Ineos forgot that Movistar still carries a seething hatred for Carapaz.

Pogacar's team was predictably dropped but he managed to lose no time to the only real GC attack today with help from blue. Thomas said he's suffering and only hopes he can feel better soon, so I don't think Ineos are going to be able to attack much this weekend with only a doubly-marked Carapaz.

Roglic's lack of recovery was even more obvious. Will J-V attack Pog with their backup GC riders (all more long-shots than Rog going into the race), ride conservatively to try salvaging their Tour by getting anyone onto the podium, or make a desperate attempt to get WvA into yellow for at least a day? Wout's got a difficult task of dropping his Dutch nemesis.

Do any other teams have more than one option to throw against Pog? I suspect there won't be a conspiracy across teams to have their GC guy ride against him on the climbs because no one will be willing to be sacrificed in attacking. As long as Pog doesn't personally have an off-day, I still expect that riding his own pace this weekend will be enough to not only fend off attacks, but further crush some of the weaker competition.

MinnMan

Thomas is suffering, but Porte did a pretty good TT yesterday, and there is Kwiakotski and Hart. I expect that Carapaz will have strong support tomorrow and Sunday and will gain time over the weekend.

surak

How will having support help Carapaz drop Pogacar (it didn't for Roglic last year)? Pog's not going to care if Kwiato or Tao fly the coop, that's more likely to put the Ineos leaders in trouble by isolating them. Porte and Carapaz together maybe poses a problem, but if Movistar continues to neutralize Carapaz (their negative racing is in such bad style but deliciously fits them ), then it's back to one on one battles against Pogacar.

If later in the Tour Pog fatigues from having to chase down gaps himself, then sure it'll be primed for him to start bleeding time. This weekend I don't see him losing much, if any at all, when he's still as fresh as anyone.

cincipeddler

Interesting to see Quintana lose 18 minutes today. Building up enough of a gap that he isn't a threat before going for a stage win over the weekend perhaps? Disappointing to see Roglic in bits as he looked very punchy prior to his crash, clearly in worse shape than we realised since that crash, wouldn't be surprised to see him pull out of the tour soon, although maybe given he didn't ride for a while he will now try to use this as a warm up for the Vuelta.

Don't see any threat to Pogacar though and reckon we will see the biggest time gap for quite some time by the end of the tour.

Paul Barnard

When you think about healing from road rash, it's worse after things start scabbing over and you break the scabs. I suspect that's where he is in the healing process. These guys are tough as hell, but his injuries were significant.

MinnMan

Maybe so.

slcbob

Catching up on stage 8 today. Two great lines:

1) From Brian Smith: I feel sorry for everyone riding the Vuelta because Roglic is going to kill them.

2) From Orla: UAE only has 122km experience defending yellow and half of that was sipping champagne.

Lazyass

Young Pogacor is quickly becoming my favorite rider. I like the guys who go on the attack in yellow like he did yesterday on the last climb. I was like hell yeah. The last many years the leaders have mostly played it safe when they get the yellow and it's boring.

If the leader yesterday had been someone like Froome he probably would have not attacked, gone ahead and lost the yellow so he could save energy and got it back later. There hasn't been a whole lot of aggression in recent history. Since Armstrong left honestly.