Problem is, I don't recall any cyclist ever doing "meh" at the Dauphine and going on to be in peak form for the Tour.
Cycling 2024
- Thread starter Suedesi
- Start date
Problem is, I don't recall any cyclist ever doing "meh" at the Dauphine and going on to be in peak form for the Tour.
I really don't think Remco will be anywhere near fighting for GC. Honestly wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't finish top 10. Roglic barely scraping the Dauphine doesn't fill me with confidence on his part. Vingegaard is a huge question mark. If anyone has the capacity to recover from his crash and then improve during the Tour it's him, but still a massive long-shot.
Is Tadej all the way for me. It's a shame for the race, but at least there is always the secondary stories about stage wins, podium spots, and so on. The Tour is not all about who wins GC.
Tadej is clearly the favorite, but I wouldn’t rule out the other three just yet.
Remco doesn’t seem to be in his best form; he used the Dauphiné race mainly to get back in shape after a crash. According to his Strava, he was only doing about 400 miles a week before the race, which isn’t much for him at all. Dauphine was really just for training. He’s planning on doing another 10 days of intense training, which should help lift his form. I’m hopeful, but if Remco can get through the first week without trouble, he’s set to do really well in the time trial on Stage 7, and then there’s gravel and a day off. He could really start to shine after that.
Roglič also wasn’t at his best, and he seemed to be hurting—when he went up to get his prize, he couldn’t even lift his left arm. That’s probably why he didn’t take off his shirt. Bora had a few issues to sort out, but with Jai Hindley and Vlasov there to help, they can keep Primoz supported on the tough climbs.
Jonas is the most uncertain for me. He hasn’t raced since his crash, which shows he might be far from his usual form. Normally, he’d be the top contender, but his crash was really bad. Some people even think he shouldn’t be racing at all in this edition of Le Tour. However, his sponsors probably expect him to be there...
Combination of someone who didn’t manage the fame well, and poor advisors who he probably trusted.
This kind of story happens fairly often with ex sports professionals.
Visma-LAB confirms Jonas Vingegaard will start the Tour de France! Huge news for the race!
Full team: Vingegaard, Van Aert, Kuss, Kelderman, Jorgensson, Benoot, Tratnik, Laporte.
Full team: Vingegaard, Van Aert, Kuss, Kelderman, Jorgensson, Benoot, Tratnik, Laporte.
They've said for weeks now that he'd only be going if they feel he can be competitive, so that must mean they (or he) think(s) that he's ready enough and can be close to full strength - might be in the latter stages rather than from the beginning onwards but that's not necessarily a bad thing. But let's face it he's not going to participate in the Tour off the back of back-to-back victories to be a domestique for Jorgenson.
If I'm UAE I'm going all out in the first week to put him behind. But he has a very strong team with him, WVA's presence is a big one as well.
If I'm UAE I'm going all out in the first week to put him behind. But he has a very strong team with him, WVA's presence is a big one as well.
Last edited:
Unsurprisingly, Jonas and Wout start the tour
Their jerseys are ugyly as feck by the way. We really didn't need more dark, not-distinctive colours in the peloton.
I think Jonas is more or less 100% to commit to this.
Has anyone watched the new season of the Tour de France show yet on Netflix? I very much enjoyed the first one and it brought back some interest I used to have for cycling back in the 90s and early 2000s. Just wondering if its worth the watch again.
I'd say the second season is actually a big improvement on the first. There is way less explanation of cycling and the Tour de France aimed at people who've never heard of the sport, so that's already a lot better. And I think they stick to actual storylines better this time, rather than exaggerating or inventing drama where there is none. And you always get introduced to some new characters that you don't normally hear a lot from.
Of course, it's not a perfect show, and with so many teams they can't possibly cover everything. AG2R get an insane amount of screen time relative to their relevance in the race, for example. But all in all, I liked it.
Yeah, but are any of the jerseys really good looking? Once you have to cover with all kinds of crap sponsors, they never really look good. The main criteria is to be distinct from the other teams and from the leaders jerseys, and here they definitely fall flat like you say. Give me the pink EF-Education jersey over this - at least that's easy to spot in the peloton.
Some jerseys are better looking than others though - Soudal, UAE, Bora, Ineos and old Visma were pretty good.
Froome out of the TDF. Expected and unexpected at the same time.
Don't quite know what to make of his career. Brilliant, if he rode clean - but I'm not so sure.
There was definitely something dodgy about that early 2010’s Team Sky - especially around Wiggins and his exemptions. But if they did it then, when are they supposed to have stopped?
This fecking sport
There was definitely something dodgy about that early 2010’s Team Sky - especially around Wiggins and his exemptions. But if they did it then, when are they supposed to have stopped?
This fecking sport
I wasn't planning on bringing this up, but I recently watched the TDF series on Netflix (brilliant watch, even better than last year's). It reminded me that Mauro Gianetti, the team principal and CEO, was a Festina rider and nearly died due to doping at FDJ. I love Pogi, but seeing Gianetti as the UAE leader left a bad taste in my mouth.
Yeah, there are so many examples of this. Bjarne Riis massively doped during the 1990's, then goes on to be team manager during the 00's and 2010's. Tyler Hamilton has stated that Riis actively encouraged doping as a team manager, so one would assume he continued this up until he left the team in 2015. That would include Grand Tour wins by Alberto Contador and Andy Schleck. Just a decade ago.
Just watching a Roadman podcast clip and Lemond is accusing Froome of motor doping, Cancellara too.
I just started it and have only watched the first episode so far, but that was a LOT about falling and pain and injuries. I hope they cut that out subsequently. I know it's a bit thing in cycling and there's a lot of drama in it, but it's also awful and not something I need to see All. The. Time.
They were almost glorifying crashes in the trailer, which is why I didn't even bother watching it. Think they even showed the Groenewegen vs Jakobsen incident in their trailer of the first season, which didn't even occur in the Tour.
Sensationalism for the sake of it. Don't need a documentary to tell me how great the Tour (and cycling is), but seemed to me like they focused on the wrong stuff.
I liked S1 more as it had a flow to it. S2 was a bit haphazard and lacked cohesion. Plus the GC being a foregone conclusion took away a lot.
Wonder what Jasper Philipsen did to anger Netflix, pretty much vilified all through.
They tried to create some artificial hype around the suspected doping, which just fizzled out.
Also a weird repeated focus on filming naked men getting massaged! Bizarre.
The Pinot episode was nice.
Wonder what Jasper Philipsen did to anger Netflix, pretty much vilified all through.
They tried to create some artificial hype around the suspected doping, which just fizzled out.
Also a weird repeated focus on filming naked men getting massaged! Bizarre.
The Pinot episode was nice.
I don't actually think they exaggerated that (at least not by a lot). Philipsen really did behave quite arrogantly during the Tour, and most of his sprint wins were in contention one way or the other. It was definitely a theme during the Tour, at least in the media if not in the peloton itself. But the series showed both sides and allowed him and MVDP to also speak about it. I think they chose to lean into the bad boy image a bit, which just makes for good TV. You're allowed to be a bit arrogant if you're as good as those two.
Honestly I think O'Connor comes out of the series looking a lot worse than Philipsen.
Heard quite a lot of speculation that the yellow card system was rushed in to stop a repeat of Philipsen/Alpecin's conduct last year. He could easily have been DQed from the race, MVDP too, both for his elbow on Binny, but also some of the other events.
Ben came out ok. Taken off leadership was hard, but he was actually supportive of the team and ended on a high note.
Unlike Tom Pidcock who came out proper douche. Not good enough to lead and too big ego to support.
Yeah, sensationalism is the right word. I like seeing it because I don't follow cycling much anymore but do still like it; but the pain porn is a little much.
Same also with some of the personal stories, which is the same as in the F1 series: they create narratives about rivalries and personalities to have stories, but you can't really trust they're real in all cases. A big grain of salt is advised!
No Kuss for Jumbo-LAB as he has not recovered sufficiently from his Covid infection. Big loss for Vingegaard that one - will be relying almost exclusively on Jorgenson in the mountains now (and Kelderman for a bit). Don't think Van Aert will be of much use given his (lack of) current form, and especially not when UAE's insane climbing team will be pacing hard form the start (which they should).
Yeah, Sepp Kuss is a big loss for Jonas.
Kuss is a loss, but given how he performed at the Dauphine I didn't really expect him to be the usual super domestique anyway. Vingegaard will be on his own for much of the mountain stages, and UAE will put on a ton of pressure. I wonder if he might lose time already on stage one, given that he might be a bit rusty himself.
Evenepoel with some disappointing comments yesterday about the opening weekend (loosely translated): "it's not a one day race, but the first days of a grand Tour so we need to survive and not lose time. I don't know if I need to win if you look to what's still ahead. We just want to stay out of trouble".
The opening stage suits him perfectly imo, don't know why he wouldn't go for the win if the opportunity presents itself. He dreams of a top 5 finish and a stage win, but those goals might be incompatible because no one will let him go away if he's still close in the GC. No better stage to get it done than the first one, then assess from there on how to lose the yellow jersey again.
The opening stage suits him perfectly imo, don't know why he wouldn't go for the win if the opportunity presents itself. He dreams of a top 5 finish and a stage win, but those goals might be incompatible because no one will let him go away if he's still close in the GC. No better stage to get it done than the first one, then assess from there on how to lose the yellow jersey again.
Vingegaard with some serious lowering of expectations during the team presentations today. Basically just said that he will ride for GC, but that he is just happy to be able to make it and anything more is a bonus. Will be interesting to see where he is really at. We might know on Saturday already.
What the heck, Pogi confirms COVID infection, Jonas 'touch and go', Roglic feeling no pain
This is wide open if Pogi had COVID - even if he's fully recovered (big if), he probably had to skip a week or two of training.
This is wide open if Pogi had COVID - even if he's fully recovered (big if), he probably had to skip a week or two of training.
According to Pogacar himself, he missed one day of training.
Nevermind then
Cavendish will be lucky to finish stage 1. Almost a full team effort to keep him going.
Noooo
fecking hell, what a horrible start. Was really hoping he could compete for the sprint stages.It's apparently 35 degrees out there which has a huge impact.
I was just thinking the other day whether a Tour de France that takes place primarily in July will continue to be viable.