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Vuelta a España 2023 Vuelta a España route rumours

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Rob5091

Rob5091

Apr 8, 2023
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c65e7

This is the TTT map for stage 1 - not a lot of places to get up to full steam .
 
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Berflamand

Jan 29, 2020
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Looking at some early weather forecasts there could be a chance of rain/thunderstorms which would make the TTT very tricky with all the corners. If it does rain the top teams probably won't take many risks just to gain a couple of seconds with the risk of losing minutes if half your team crashes.

Anyway I just hope the weather conditions are the same for every team because in a technical TTT like this that could probably make a huge difference.

Also does the time of the fourth or the fifth rider across the line count? I can't remember the rule in a GT TTT.
 
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yaco

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Berflamand said:
Looking at some early weather forecasts there could be a chance of rain/thunderstorms which would make the TTT very tricky with all the corners. If it does rain the top teams probably won't take many risks just to gain a couple of seconds with the risk of losing minutes if half your team crashes.

Anyway I just hope the weather conditions are the same for every team because in a technical TTT like this that could probably make a huge difference.

Also does the time of the fourth or the fifth rider across the line count? I can't remember the rule in a GT TTT.
Click to expand...

If this is the case the organisation will neutralise the times but still have a stage winner.
 
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Devil's Elbow

Devil's Elbow

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Red Rick said:
Damn, the sprinters field is SO bad.

And the route isn't even that terrible for sprinters either, there's like 5 nailed on sprints in there, and you can just GTFO before the Pyrenees too if you like.
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Worst GT sprint field since at least the 2017 Vuelta (2016 Vuelta makes this field look stellar by comparison, otoh). Even the 2020 Giro, which had a whopping four flat stages, had a better sprint field than this.

As a reminder of how bad that 2016 Vuelta was: there were six proper bunch sprints, won by Meersman, Meersman again, Van Genechten, Drucker, Cort, and Cort again, with Felline winning the points classification. The only one of those riders to have won another GT stage before or since is Cort, and none of those have been in actual bunch sprints. Pathetic doesn't even cover it, your average .1 race has a better sprint field. This time, we at least have three people who have won a GT sprint before in Groves, Dainese and Molano, which is still bad but not even comparable to that edition...
 
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ashhutch1997

ashhutch1997

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Devil's Elbow said:
Worst GT sprint field since at least the 2017 Vuelta (2016 Vuelta makes this field look stellar by comparison, otoh). Even the 2020 Giro, which had a whopping four flat stages, had a better sprint field than this.

As a reminder of how bad that 2016 Vuelta was: there were six proper bunch sprints, won by Meersman, Meersman again, Van Genechten, Drucker, Cort, and Cort again, with Felline winning the points classification. The only one of those riders to have won another GT stage before or since is Cort, and none of those have been in actual bunch sprints. Pathetic doesn't even cover it, your average .1 race has a better sprint field. This time, we at least have three people who have won a GT sprint before in Groves, Dainese and Molano, which is still bad but not even comparable to that edition...
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Tbf like this year, 2016/17 Vuelta's arguably had the best GC fields of the season.
I remember the early 2000's back when you would get all the big sprinters at the Vuelta and the first week would be full of dull flat 200km stages through deserts.....
 
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Devil's Elbow

Devil's Elbow

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ashhutch1997 said:
Tbf like this year, 2016/17 Vuelta's arguably had the best GC fields of the season.
I remember the early 2000's back when you would get all the big sprinters at the Vuelta and the first week would be full of dull flat 200km stages through deserts.....
Click to expand...
2017 Vuelta didn’t have that good a GC field - Froome, Nibali, a retiring Contador and an Aru who finished 13th were the only GC riders who podiumed more than two GTs (as well as the only GT winners, of course). Then again that was a really weak era for GTs with all five main riders of the years before (Aru, Quintana, Contador and to a lesser extent Froome and Nibali) having started to decline and really only Dumoulin stepping it up at that point. Still, the Tour had a better field with Quintana, Valverde in arguably his best form ever (who of course crashed out immediately), and Thomas who crashed out while in yellow, whilst missing only Nibali of the four riders who headlined the Vuelta pre-race.
 
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