Recent content by The Barb

This is a quality post. For what it’s worth, my main take on the stage is that Carapaz will not win. If you have a Betfair account, then lay him endlessly. He is far too short. First, the breakaway actually has a decent chance (I’d say 40%, with Fortunato and Quintana the best prospects)...

The rain complicates things massively in terms of the Stage winner. If the forecasts I’ve seen are correct (that’s a big “if”) then the rain will intensify from 2pm onwards and not ease. The earliest real contender to begin is Affini at 1:55pm. Tarling and WVA begin about 40 mins later. If...

What an utterly pathetic Vuelta for Kuss.

This is a classic “second tier on GC guy who’s holding form while others are fading” stage. Candidates are Kuss, Yates and Dunbar. I can’t imagine Kuss won’t give it everything but I kinda like Yates. It’s seems clear the extra 2 mins he dropped yesterday were by design, to provide that...

If UAE allow Soler to try to steal Vine's KOM (after Vine was so unlucky two years ago, has been a great team mate, and Soler has his stage win) it would be a horrible piece of team management. But maybe my ticket on Vine at 12-1 makes me biased. :) This should be a cool stage ... massive...

You may be right but I think it would be unwise for the rouleurs to wait until Stage 18. While that stage is more likely to be a win for the breakaway, a Cat 1 that tops out 45km from the finish, followed by multiple uncategorised hills before the finish, will make it very hard for the rouleurs...

It probably doesn't count because he's out of podium contention, but I could totally imagine Sepp Kuss going long range, particularly if he has a teammate up ahead in the break to assist on the flat leading to the final climb.

I doubt that Roglic is thinking in that way. He's already only 1:03 behind O'Connor and will likely take almost that much off him in the final time trial. The easier the race is from here on the better it is for him. He can just chip away at O'Connor and reduce the risk of blowing to bits and...

If the first two climbs were a bit easier then there could be a scenario for WVA where he could out-sprint Vine get max points on those climbs then sit up and hope it's a GC day at the top of Covadonga. but I think those first two climbs are still too much for WVA to compete with Vine. more...

Vine is single handedly holding the gap to a committed team of rouleurs. What an absolute beast.

I think they don’t have the climbers to match it with Vine but I expect we’ll see them reduce the gap on the run in to Cuitu Negru, then from half way up it’ll be pretty much every man for himself.

Not sure about the wisdom of UAE’s tactics but my god Vine is strong. Surely there’s a stage for him in the final week.

Forgive the long post ... I'm really enthused about this stage. Break or GC? I'd thought all along that this would be GC, particularly being the last stage before the rest day, but the way the GC sits now I'm not so sure. Red Bull doesn't need to make it a GC day. O'Connor is no longer a...

Did you see him? I’ve been looking but haven’t, and don’t trust the timings.

Don’t give up on Vine here. He can still win this.