Tour de France 2023 Tour de France, Stage 1: Bilbao - Bilbao, 182 km (Spain, Saturday, July 1)

Page 3 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Other threads that are presently missing:

If Remco were there, would he have won the first stage?
If Remco were there, would he have won the second stage?
If Remco were there…(I think you can extrapolate).

And of course…

Would Remco have faked a mechanical in the last 3kms when Pog attacked?
All these mini threads are within the mega thread of "Remco Evenepoel would like to be the next Eddy Merckx but he needs to get to the standard of Masnada first" thread.
 
Who will win? Get the first yellow jersey?
Pogacar, doubtful wrist.
Higuita, Alaphilippe, doubtful form.
Vingegaard. Not really the uphill punchy guy.
Skjelmose. has the form, but has never ridden a tour stage before.
Bagioli? Showed nothing in Dauphiné, DNF the nationals.
Fred Wright, has the form but is it too hard?
Bilbao? has probably been thinking of this stage and the next every day since last year.
Pinot?
Gaudu?
...nd I haven't even mentioned Van Aert, MVDP or Laporte.
 
Last edited:
No big surprises but it feels a bit underwhelming. Unless Alaphilippe finds his best legs again, they are not going to be much of a factor on every stage that isn't completely flat.

Apparently Alaphilippe's influence is still big enough for Devenyns to make the selection. I'd have preferred any one of Vansevenant/Bagioli/Sénéchal instead of Devenyns but if he's the one making sure Alaphilippe wins one or more stages (with his influence on and off the bike) I'll happily take it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Last climb tends to be a mini-version of Côte de la Croix-Neuve/Montée Laurent Jalabert, Mende, followed by forgiving (by Basque standards) downhill to finish.
Mende: 3.3k @ 9.5% avg
Côte de Pike: 2.0 @ 9.4% avg but last 1k @ +13% avg will take its toll, so to me comparable with Mende.
GC riders going full pull (Pogi will) and MvDP is surely dropped.
 
I believe they are not very proud of their team, giving them 6 seconds of screen time on a 110 seconds video.

Same amount of time of that very useful information of when and where are the rest days. Only thing missing was Patrick Lefevere's guide to the best restaurants around the route.
 
Actually think the best recent GT comparison to Pike is I Cappuccini in the Fossombrone stage of this year's Giro (2.8k at 7.9%, final 1.65k at 10.6%), the problem is that the only non-GC guy in that race you'd expect anything from in that kind of finish was Healy and he was in the break so it doesn't tell us much about what the Van Aerts, Van der Poels and even Alaphilippes will be able to do here.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Eh, that's misleading. They can just cruise the first km from the speed of the peloton itself, and then it's just last km that is steep, which they can just power into with their cyclocross watts. I can't see MVDP being dropped here.

tour-de-france-2023-stage-1-climb-n15-3fda7b1c2c.png
1k @ +13% is not just a Koppenberg pull...IMO a couple of hundred meters too long.
Edit: Koppenberg gains 64 altitude meters. This last section the double.
But excellent race design, since just a tad hesitation will give them a chance.
But Pogi takes no prisoners :p
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
Actually think the best recent GT comparison to Pike is I Cappuccini in the Fossombrone stage of this year's Giro (2.8k at 7.9%, final 1.65k at 10.6%), the problem is that the only non-GC guy in that race you'd expect anything from in that kind of finish was Healy and he was in the break so it doesn't tell us much about what the Van Aerts, Van der Poels and even Alaphilippes will be able to do here.
I mean if GC guys are dropping each other then usually other guys dont have much of a shot to hang on.

Pog and Vingegaard not cooperating and bonus seconds being removed may change race dynamics though
 
It all depends on how the first stage is raced. When we saw the similar final in Circuito de Getxo last year, the sprinters were no longer able to contest the win, and the distance from the top of Pike Badea to the finish is shorter here, plus there's also more climbing to be done with before Vivero.

However it might not be raced like a one-day race, but I still expect the Basque and other Spanish riders to go crazy if the GC riders hesitate a little.