diphthong

guess it relegates any of the semi-serious gc contenders on the lesser teams into, essentially, being rabbits for the chase. every once in a while tho, one of those
rascally rabbits gets/stays away and hits the podium. and then they get snapped up by one of the rich teams...but for that brief, shining moment or two, it's glorious!

forces those that have already lost 10 seconds to more than a minute to go on the offensive early and often vs just waiting till the last stage or two. let's see what
ya got. roglic isn't invulnerable but if he's not being attacked in the crosswinds, on the descents, in the hills and on the mountaintop finishes then he's already won.

diphthong

stage dos...who ya got? would like to go with pedersen being on home turf and all and think his team is better but going with merlier. thinking it'll be very very close tho.

MinnMan

How many J-V members will have worn the red jersey before the 3 weeks are up?

GrainBrain

Lmfao right? I think there's a great chance Oomen then Kuss could wear it. Maybe JV will get tired of defending so early but they're 13 seconds ahead of ineos and 14 ahead of quickstep. Who's going to wear the jersey after Tuesday? I'm kind of wondering about Jake Stewart? 38 seconds back, maybe he sneaks in the break? If there's a group finish maybe the likes of Alaphillipe or Hayter grabs bonus seconds mid stage then takes another ten with a win? That would let Hayter snag red, Alaphillipe would still be a second off.

Awesome effort by Danny Van poppel today - that was an awesome finish and I'm glad to see Sam get that mojo back. He came from so far back it was crazy. I'm wondering if we'll see some better camera angles to see how that played out.

diphthong

starting tuesday, that pass the jersey around game is over for everyone in the jv team other than roglic.

MinnMan

I get so impatient on Grand Tour Mondays.

diphthong

this coming week is chock full of little donnybrooks.

time to be or not to be.

diphthong

horrible prediction for stage four...remco.

slcbob

I'll pick Hayter. And that will give wings to Jesus Herrada.

MinnMan

I would have liked to have seen Quintana in this stage. He's a descending demon.

Shadco 

What is Bora thinking? Does Bennett have a shot at the finish?

Edit, intermediate sprint.

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USAZorro

Looks like this is Primoz' race to lose. I hope it gets interesting along the way though.

diphthong

we haven't even hit the fun stuff yet. plenty of time to have un jour sans or an unexpected health/mechanical/gravitational oopsiedoodles.

sixteen stages of red jersey defense might burn out seppuku's clutch. jv would do well to let the first, non-gc threatening break go.

MinnMan

It will be a while before there could be a non-threatening break. There are still more than 50 riders within 3 minutes.

I'm disappointed that J-V is holding red through the early stages. there is plenty of time and there are many tough stages to come, but they are good at defense and I would much rather have seen them have to attack into red.

Here's to hoping that somebody threatening (in other words, Remco), takes a flier tomorrow.

diphthong

me too. horribly picking remco (again) for the stage five "w."

slcbob

J-V didn't have to work to hold red in stages 2 and 3. So I wouldn't hold that against them.

I haven't seen today's stage yet so IDK about 4.

slcbob

It's a lot tougher predicting winners on these in-between stages when WVA isn't racing.

Since Bizkarra and Hirt aren't playing in the GC, perhaps they'll do something in the breakaway tomorrow going for the polka dots. If not, I may be dabbling with the Stage Hunter thing. But that's another thread, isn't it?

seypat

Just turned on some highlights. Are the riders wearing jerseys with padding on the upper back and shoulders? It looks like it to me.

Shadco 

Wonder if it is some type of cooling material.

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seypat

Could be. The first thought that came to me was an aero jersey. If you look at the rider profile from the back angle that is shown most often, it looks similar to a bike frame TT where it joins the headtube. Suddenly, all the riders have big lats/trapezius muscles that give them a tapered Y shape. Maybe a litle bit of airplane wing aerodynamics from front to back as well.

diphthong

a little gc shuffling today after the break. wise move by team jv. tomorrow, it's mountain time. carthy's been almost invisible but not invisible enuff. he's the next horrible prediction to take stage six. poor guy.

decent chance that Grain Brain's fave rider could end up in red mañana.



question...? has anyone come across a site/source that lists/shows bonus seconds available for the various stage finishes in advance?

slcbob

Y'all aren't going to believe this, but two days ago when I horribly predicted Hayter, I almost said Roglic. And yesterday I was about to type Marc Soler and then dismissed my hubris at having any clue whatsoever on such a day.

So this pretty much means that: a) I'll probably be liberally throwing out wild conjecture now, with impunity; and b) it'll be nowhere near the mark ever again.

I need to catch up to today's action before I do my oracle thing. Stand by...

diphthong

great win by soler. he’s been kinda forgotten since moving over to uae but he (and mas) were always gonna be in valverde’s shadow at movistar. it’ll be interesting to see what happens with mas and co. once valverde retires and movistar possibly gets relegated (haven’t checked standings lately).

diphthong

please! misery loves company and i’m conveniently both.

Shadco 

I was hoping for Muhlberger today, he did ok but can’t believe who came out on top.

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