2012 Tour de France: Stage 10: Mácon → Bellegarde-sur-Valserine (195 km)

[gustienordic]

Sure, Sagan might be a better climber than EBH. Thing is that he hasn't showed it yet, therefore there is no good reason for claiming that he is a better climber than EBH.

This has been debated to death... its almost as bad as the chaingate discussions...

 

[WindLessBreeze]

SKY wants a Briton to succed

That rules out Kenyan Frommie´.....Listen, later on you´d wish you had the 2 Colombians plus the Argentinian(Spaniard) FLECHA on the squad.......PD Panda sleeps with a Big-Fatso (teddy bear)

 

[Kaxesen]

So I reckon those going for the polkadot will try something here. A better question is who's actually aiming for the polkadot. Chris Anker Sørensen maybe?

 

[vcampbell]

I hope tomorrow will be a Sky 1-2, just for +1 reason for the haters, to feel themselves bad.

 

[Falken]

So I reckon those going for the polkadot will try something here. A better question is who's actually aiming for the polkadot. Chris Anker Sørensen maybe?

CAS for sure. Kessiakoff has said that he will at least try to defend the jersey. But if Brajkovic rides well I guess he will be back in his domestique role.

 

[Red Rick]

Let us pray for it to rain cats and dogs and hail on the parcours, let the descend be slippery

 

[Frosty]

Matt Lloyd is not going to start according to Inner Ring. He fractured his elbow on stage 8 during the roll-out - had some misfortune with a roundabout.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Exciting racing I hope.

 

[jens_attacks]

My prediction is that most of the top riders will climb nonchalantly, like the case has been in the last few years. We may see a no-name rider win, and the group with the favorites come in at the finish line more or less together; except for whoever has a crash or a mechanical, maybe the main group will contain 30 or so riders sprinting the last kilometer...of course this is just a feeling and also a worse case scenario...I hope something dramatic happens for once.....something to save this horrible Tour.

Andre

nah .tomorrow it's your big day jurgen looks very strong to me,he might even win the stage.i'll cheer for him because he impressed me on col de la croix

 

[Kwibus]

nah .tomorrow it's your big day jurgen looks very strong to me,he might even win the stage.i'll cheer for him because he impressed me on col de la croix

I agree.
What I liked most so far about this tour that the 2 medium mountain stages were races hard. Including GC making gaps.
Allthough it was never really an attack, but more very high speeds up the mountain.

I hope everyone keeps it up and that there will be plenty of attacks in the mountains.

 

[maxmartin]

the best defense id being offensive, the sky train will try to drop everyone on Grand Colombier then take it easy on the descent. If Nibali and Evans can follow sky train on the Grand Colombier , for sure they will attack on the descent and very possibly work together on this stage. And let it rain!!!!!

 

[Fidolix]

the best defense id being offensive, the sky train will try to drop everyone on Grand Colombier then take it easy on the descent. If Nibali and Evans can follow sky train on the Grand Colombier , for sure they will attack on the descent and very possibly work together on this stage. And let it rain!!!!!

I agree about the sky train, but I doubt they can drop Evans or Nibi.
As I see this stage, sky will go like a tju tju train up the Grand Colombier, and Evans and Nibi will just follow to the summit and then attack on the decent, I really hope it rains....
Hopefully Nib and Evans can work together and fight it out to the finish, I have Evans for the stage win.

 

[Parrulo]

imo liqui should already set a very high pace on the first climb of the day in order to tire the sky train before the grand colombiere.

nibali, evans and VdB2 should also start attacking half way up the colombiere and try to ride away from them right there.

 

[phanatic]

nah .tomorrow it's your big day jurgen looks very strong to me,he might even win the stage.i'll cheer for him because he impressed me on col de la croix

I hope if Frank and Horner have the strength to attack on the Grand Col, Jurgen will jump right on their wheel. Froome, too, but that's likely a pipe dream.

 

[cineteq]

Matt Lloyd is not going to start according to Inner Ring. He fractured his elbow on stage 8 during the roll-out - had some misfortune with a roundabout.

Oh no!! My fantasy TdF is ruined

 

[cineteq]

I hope tomorrow will be a Sky 1-2, just for +1 reason for the haters, to feel themselves bad.

You're not making any friends here

 

[roundabout]

The best chance to gain time on Wiggins will be in the last km.

 

[guncha]

The design of this stage is awful. Corlier should have been 3rd cat climb. It single climb stage once again. The worst thing is about Grand Colombier - what is the point of H.C. 43km before the finish? When was the last attack from top3-top5 in a similar stage? In 60ies or 70ies?
I expect no action between top 10 or top 15 riders: at best 2-3 of them will be dropped as a result of MJ group tempo. Some 15-20 riders should be in MJ group at the top of Grand Colombier; if tempo is very high then about 10.

 

[vcampbell]

You're not making any friends here

At the moment I don't want to make any friends
Why? Because it's ridiculous how many forum member (many in it whom I respected for they comments in any topic before the Tour) are changed like idiots because a rider is leading the GC who they hate/dont't like. The best from the bests when the clinic stuff comes in, and I need to see that people are believing that Wiggins (and Froome and Sky) are cheating, but for example Evans or Nibali not. That's nothing just ridiculous.
Cancellara almost beaten by TJVG: "wow, TT of his life"
Cancellara beaten by Wiggins: "we can move this to clinic"

I just really hope that many from here will come back after the Tour with a clean head and will think about what they wrote after 9 stage.
I hate many riders too, but I will never say that they are cheating, until a sample will not say the opposite... I know that is hard to admit when someone is better than the others, but at least we could leave behind the bulls**t talk.

At least there are people who are still capable to think. This is something to mention in these days.

 

[mwallack3]

Chavanel is one of the pre-stage favorites, but wasnt he dropped in the dauphine stage 5?

 

[Opalius]

At the moment I don't want to make any friends
Why? Because it's ridiculous how many forum member (many in it whom I respected for they comments in any topic before the Tour) are changed like idiots because a rider is leading the GC who they hate/dont't like. The best from the bests when the clinic stuff comes in, and I need to see that people are believing that Wiggins (and Froome and Sky) are cheating, but for example Evans or Nibali not. That's nothing just ridiculous.
Cancellara almost beaten by TJVG: "wow, TT of his life"
Cancellara beaten by Wiggins: "we can move this to clinic"

I just really hope that many from here will come back after the Tour with a clean head and will think about what they wrote after 9 stage.
I hate many riders too, but I will never say that they are cheating, until a sample will not say the opposite... I know that is hard to admit when someone is better than the others, but at least we could leave behind the bulls**t talk.

At least there are people who are still capable to think. This is something to mention in these days.

I do not particularly like Wiggins og Sky, mostly because I think TT is sort of boring, but I totally agree with you.

He rides very well, and if he wins it is absolutely deserved; although from my perspective not that entertaining.

 

[Magnus]

The design of this stage is awful. Corlier should have been 3rd cat climb. It single climb stage once again. The worst thing is about Grand Colombier - what is the point of H.C. 43km before the finish? When was the last attack from top3-top5 in a similar stage? In 60ies or 70ies?

The last time there even was a similar stage in the TdF is basically never since the Gd Colombier hasn't been raced before in the TdF and there isn't a lot of similar climbs in France (a more or less none at all that have been used in the tour in recent years).

The point of a tough climb and then an easy climb is that somebody wants to take time they will have to go early and not wait for the last 2-3 km mtf sprint like we saw at the giro this year. The point is that Gd Colombier is hard enough for somebody to blow the race to pieces and then wee still have 43 km of racing with all kinds of scenarios that could play out.

 

[Arnout]

The last time there even was a similar stage in the TdF is basically never since the Gd Colombier hasn't been raced before in the TdF and there isn't a lot of similar climbs in France (a more or less none at all that have been used in the tour in recent years).

The point of a tough climb and then an easy climb is that somebody wants to take time they will have to go early and not wait for the last 2-3 km mtf sprint like we saw at the giro this year. The point is that Gd Colombier is hard enough for somebody to blow the race to pieces and then wee still have 43 km of racing with all kinds of scenarios that could play out.

Exactly, I quite like the idea of a stage like this. Especially as normally we would've had another flat stage instead of this.

 

[DominicDecoco]

Fabian will win this stage.

 

[Poursuivant]

At the moment I don't want to make any friends
Why? Because it's ridiculous how many forum member (many in it whom I respected for they comments in any topic before the Tour) are changed like idiots because a rider is leading the GC who they hate/dont't like. The best from the bests when the clinic stuff comes in, and I need to see that people are believing that Wiggins (and Froome and Sky) are cheating, but for example Evans or Nibali not. That's nothing just ridiculous.
Cancellara almost beaten by TJVG: "wow, TT of his life"
Cancellara beaten by Wiggins: "we can move this to clinic"

I just really hope that many from here will come back after the Tour with a clean head and will think about what they wrote after 9 stage.
I hate many riders too, but I will never say that they are cheating, until a sample will not say the opposite... I know that is hard to admit when someone is better than the others, but at least we could leave behind the bulls**t talk.

At least there are people who are still capable to think. This is something to mention in these days.

Completely agree.