Positive suprises:
- A very good Bora with Kelderman, Buchmann, Hindley and Kamna
- A very good Bahrain with Landismo (he will finish top-2 yes), Bilbao and Buitrago
- A more than decent Bike-Exchange with Hamilton looking very strong in support for Yates
- A more than decent DSM with a very good Arensman in support for Bardet
- Ciccone and Almeida going pretty good early one, while one might hope they peak in week 3
- Valverde and Sosa giving Movistar some options of a decent GC
Expected events:
- Dumoulin dropping very bad on a climb once more as has been the case everywhere recently
- Nibali dropping to not really play a role in GC
- Gui Martin dropping, because he is just a **** rider who will probably get close to a GC top-10 again anyhow (Sorry, one of the few riders I truly dislike)
- UAE looking very weak in support for Almeida for now
Unpleasant suprises:
- Skjelmose dropping quite easily, I had hoped a bit more, but he will have chances to redeem himself, and at least it puts Ciccone into a single leadership role if he maintains this form once Lopez loses pink
- Poels being in poor form in support of Landa and Bilbao
- Foss and Oomen also dropping making sure that Jumbo is effectively out of the race already so early on
All in all the signs are there for a great final week and for some nice additional stages in the 1,5 week to come. Ineos looks strong, but the good thing is that Bahrain (Why Tratnik, why!?), Bora, Bike-Exchange, DSM also seem to have multiple options, which might make this a nice tactical race on occasions as well.
Nice takeaways. A few observations:
- Sosa will fade as soon as they hit multi-mountain stages.
- Why the hate on Martin? He is a decent climber who loves to go on the offensive. No shame in gaining time and places on breaks, especially when his gains are not extremely blatant.
- I think Skjelmose is better suited to mid mountain stages or stage hunting in breaks at the moment. His climbing level does not allow him to achieve more than a Top15 in a GT.
- Foss always starts slow on a GT. Let's see if he manages to bounce back.
Additions by my own:
- A shame Taaramae didn't manage to pull off the same trick as he did last Vuelta.
- This is probably Jan Hirt's best performance ever on a first mountain stage in a GT. The guy is going to crush the field on the last week, be wise to pick him as a winner on the Aprica stage.