57th Vuelta al Pais Vasco 3-8 April 2017

[Arked]

From what I've heard Kwiatkowski is going for GC in Itzulia. He is not going there as team sprinter or anything like that.

 

[portugal11]

Pais vasco is perfect to contador, the only way he could loose this race, is henao dropping him big time in arrate and he has to loose more than 20 seconds. He will destroy this time trial

 

[DNP-Old]

Re:

From what I've heard Kwiatkowski is going for GC in Itzulia. He is not going there as team sprinter or anything like that.

I reckon he should be both, really. He could grab some valuable boni's along the way.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re: Re:

From what I've heard Kwiatkowski is going for GC in Itzulia. He is not going there as team sprinter or anything like that.

I reckon he should be both, really. He could grab some valuable boni's along the way.

There are no bonus seconds available.

 

[SHAD0W93]

Contador to win a stage and GC.
Valverde to win 2 stages and finish 2nd.
BMC riders to either crash or have a flat and movistar up the pace.
Kreuziger to top 5 GC.

 

[HelloDolly]

Re:

Contador to win a stage and GC.
Valverde to win 2 stages and finish 2nd.
BMC riders to either crash or have a flat and movistar up the pace.
Kreuziger to top 5 GC.

Yours is wishful thimking methinks

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

Contador to win a stage and GC.
Valverde to win 2 stages and finish 2nd.
BMC riders to either crash or have a flat and movistar up the pace.
Kreuziger to top 5 GC.

Yours is wishful thimking methinks

Isn't it all?

My typical thinking here is.

If hell freezes over, lightning strikes thrice and if stars, planets and galaxies allign, is there a chance?
If yes > predict it will happen. So by that logic. Contador to win 2 stages, points jersey and GC

 

[SHAD0W93]

All I ever have is wishful thinking. 10% of the time it comes true.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Embarrassingly bad route. Worst in at least 5 years. They've had to really work hard to find that many flat roads in Euskal Herria. Long TT and only one significant climbing stage. It's the Basque Country FFS.

 

[Escarabajo]

Agree with Libertine. Terrible route. One good mountain stage and the ending is short and steep. Too short to make a difference.

 

[WheelofGear]

As much as I like Contador, he is not as strong on these brutal gradients as he used to be. I could easily see Valverde could drop him on Arrate and TT to the finish line. The only one I can see following Valverde on that climb (if he is serious about winning the race) would be Simon Yates.

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

 

[WheelofGear]

Re:

Agree with Libertine. Terrible route. One good mountain stage and the ending is short and steep. Too short to make a difference.

Let's hope they actually race stage 4. Vivero is a pretty hard climb. Seeing Matthews or Swift winning there would be anticlimactic.

I'm looking at guys like Bardet, Barguil and Simon Yates to give it a try.

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

Re:

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

Depends on the the TT, really. Not sure if this medium length flat one suits him. Same for Valverde. Is it technical?

I could maybe see one of the shadow favorites win this race rather than Contador, Valverde or Henao if it's a straight ahead TT. Gaps could be substantial. Unless the favorites go all out in the hardest road stage(s), of course.

Some good TTists at the start who can climb well enough. Kwiatkowski could be dangerous, if he does indeed target this.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re: Re:

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

Depends on the the TT, really. Not sure if this medium length flat one suits him. Same for Valverde. Is it technical?

I could maybe see one of the shadow favorites win this race rather than Contador, Valverde or Henao if it's a straight ahead TT. Gaps could be substantial. Unless the favorites go all out in the hardest road stage(s), of course.

Some good TTists at the start who can climb well enough. Kwiatkowski could be dangerous, if he does indeed target this.

It's not a flat TT. There's 6km of climbing at around 6.6% average and 6km of descending, then there's 15km of flat roads.

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Re:

As much as I like Contador, he is not as strong on these brutal gradients as he used to be. I could easily see Valverde could drop him on Arrate and TT to the finish line. The only one I can see following Valverde on that climb (if he is serious about winning the race) would be Simon Yates.

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

Unless Yates has found the form of his life recently, I struggle to see how you can reach that conclusion. He was dropped spectacularly by Alberto in Paris Nice and only gained time when the other riders let him sneak away to Fayence. Top 5 is my guess for Yates if all goes well

 

[Forever The Best]

Re:

Embarrassingly bad route. Worst in at least 5 years. They've had to really work hard to find that many flat roads in Euskal Herria. Long TT and only one significant climbing stage. It's the Basque Country FFS.

Indeed. As much as Itzulia is a lovely race, the route is very bad.
The San Sebastian stage should have climbed this climb as the final climb:
http://www.altimetrias.net/aspbk/verPerfilusu.asp?id=1543
Or this one:
http://www.altimetrias.net/aspbk/verPerfilusu.asp?id=1717

Bilbao stage should have climbed the last 4 climbs on this stage made by Libertine in the Race Design Thread: viewtopic.php?p=1834127#p1834127

 

[Brullnux]

Re:

Embarrassingly bad route. Worst in at least 5 years. They've had to really work hard to find that many flat roads in Euskal Herria. Long TT and only one significant climbing stage. It's the Basque Country FFS.

It's because they went to Navarre for not one but two stages. While Navarre (North) does have its fair share of hills and mountains, they aren't that near Iruña. And starting two consecutive stages there seems a bit self defeating. Still, they should've tried a bit harder.

 

[DFA123]

Think Contador will win this fairly comfortably. He's shown consistently good form already in Andalucia, PN and Catalunya - and the TT gives him the edge of Valverde. Ion Izagirre the other main threat, his form has been a bit up and down, but it is a race he is targetting.

No chance for riders like Roglic and Kwiatkowksi. Valverde being in the race ends their hopes because Movistar will be close to the front and will drive these stages hard all week - particularly on the climbs.

 

[WheelofGear]

Re: Re:

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

Depends on the the TT, really. Not sure if this medium length flat one suits him. Same for Valverde. Is it technical?

I could maybe see one of the shadow favorites win this race rather than Contador, Valverde or Henao if it's a straight ahead TT. Gaps could be substantial. Unless the favorites go all out in the hardest road stage(s), of course.

Some good TTists at the start who can climb well enough. Kwiatkowski could be dangerous, if he does indeed target this.

The one in Andalucia was flatter. And Valverde/Contador was still able to be 2nd and 3rd. They are both underrated as rouleurs. Easily beating specialists like Brändle, Ludvigsson and Kiryienka.

Even Henao should do well on a TT like this. The one in Paris-Nice was a bit easier and he was still in top 10.

 

[WheelofGear]

Riders like Roglic and Spilak shouldn't be able to handle the Arrate climb. They aren't explosive enough.

And for the explosive puncheurs (Kwiatkowski, Alaphilippe), it's too long and brutal. There will be gaps of minutes.

The only one I can see following Henao/Contador/Valverde would be Simon Yates.

 

[Ramon Koran]

Awful course, such a shame usually a lot better than this. I'm interested to see how harder does here it looks good for him. The tt should mean it's a routine win for contador, if he doesn't win then we can write him off.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re: Re:

But Contador's TT is still good. Maybe he can bounce back there.

Depends on the the TT, really. Not sure if this medium length flat one suits him. Same for Valverde. Is it technical?

I could maybe see one of the shadow favorites win this race rather than Contador, Valverde or Henao if it's a straight ahead TT. Gaps could be substantial. Unless the favorites go all out in the hardest road stage(s), of course.

Some good TTists at the start who can climb well enough. Kwiatkowski could be dangerous, if he does indeed target this.

The one in Andalucia was flatter. And Valverde/Contador was still able to be 2nd and 3rd. They are both underrated as rouleurs. Easily beating specialists like Brändle, Ludvigsson and Kiryienka.

Even Henao should do well on a TT like this. The one in Paris-Nice was a bit easier and he was still in top 10.

Actually I don't completely agree, you're right about Contador and Valverde although the Andalucia TT was a bit shorter, but the TT in Paris-Nice had less flat km and the climb was better for him (very steep) this climb is will be better for riders like Contador who can pace themselves really well . The winner of this race will be someone who can be among the best on Arrate and in the TT which pretty much leaves us with Contador, Valverde and possibly Roglic and Spilak, depending on the circumstances.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re:

Awful course, such a shame usually a lot better than this. I'm interested to see how harder does here it looks good for him. The tt should mean it's a routine win for contador, if he doesn't win then we can write him off.

Don't be so harsh, Contador could have bad luck with time loss or a crash or he could be up against a very strong Valverde and Roglic, even if he finishes 2nd he shouldn't be written off. As I've said many times winning isn't easy and it shouldn't be taken for granted. The differences between the top riders are very small and Contador is definitely not head and shoulders above everyone else on a parcours such as this one. Roglic could slaughter him in the TT and limit his losses uphill while Valverde could take time uphill and deliver a similar performance in the TT as Berto.

 

[18-Valve. (pithy)]

Re: Re:

It's not a flat TT. There's 6km of climbing at around 6.6% average and 6km of descending, then there's 15km of flat roads.

Right, I had missed the profile of the climb. Didn't realize it was ~ 8% for a few kms. Still looks like ~ 17.5km of false flat to me going by the profile alone, not including the apparent false flat on the top of the climb.

Just going by the first profile ... if anyone has a more accurate profile, please post it.

 

[DFA123]

Where's the big hype about Roglic coming from? He's never been remotely close to challenging for GC in a stage race where riders of the quality of Contador and Valverde are around and in decent form.