Grand Depart 2017 in Germany?

[yaco]

Total for me. Let's see how strong the team's are and how versatile are the riders. My only caveat is that any TTS must occur in the first three stages.

 

[staubsauger]

I guess the ttt might be kinda long. It's a good way to include much tt miles once again, while it ain't gonna hurt the Froome versus Quintana fight. Movistar uses to be strong at ttt's and on their day they might even beat Sky.

 

[Alexandre B.]

Salon-de-Provence is probably the location pictured in this tweet : https://twitter.com/LeTour/status/781340228715819008

As a reminder, this city held the finish of this year's Paris-Nice stage 5.

 

[sir fly]

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

 

[Red Rick]

Skipping Massif Central as well lol. This is looking worse and worse

 

[sir fly]

Re:

Skipping Massif Central as well lol. This is looking worse and worse

Know what... I bet the ASO will come out with a great route, just to piss you off.

 

[Gigs_98]

Skipping the Massif Central is bad but not horrible. There is a high chance of crosswinds on the southwest coast of France, so the stages still might be good.

 

[roundabout]

Re:

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

Current rumors say that the second rest day will be in or around Puy-en-Velay

 

[sir fly]

Re: Re:

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

Current rumors say that the second rest day will be in or around Puy-en-Velay

Yes. That's on the way from the Pyreenes to the Alps.

 

[rghysens]

Re: Re:

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

Current rumors say that the second rest day will be in or around Puy-en-Velay

Yes. That's on the way from the Pyreenes to the Alps.

And in the Massif Central.

 

[sir fly]

Re: Re:

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

Current rumors say that the second rest day will be in or around Puy-en-Velay

Yes. That's on the way from the Pyreenes to the Alps.

And in the Massif Central.

Yes, they'll skip it on the way from the Jura to the Pyrenees, according to the rumours.

 

[Gigs_98]

Re: Re:

Two weeks till the presentation, and there's more uncertainties than ever.
Looks like they'll skip Massif Central on the way to the Pyrenees and make a visit to the coast on the way to the Alps.
Looks attractive so far, but the Alps will have to be spectacular in order to justify the third successive anticlockwise conclusion.

Current rumors say that the second rest day will be in or around Puy-en-Velay

Yes. That's on the way from the Pyreenes to the Alps.

And in the Massif Central.

Yes, they'll skip it on the way from the Jura to the Pyrenees, according to the rumours.

How stupid is the ASO to make a rest day in middle of the massif central but no stages there. Anyway although I don't know the rumors I find this very unlikely. The 2nd week will probably start with the pyrenees like in 2015 right? In that case they would have to spend a lot of time at the coast to avoid the central massif.

 

[Gigs_98]

I just read through the velowire article and their rumors suggest that the massif central will be included. And generally i find the route relatively good. Probably a long ITT, the freakin Mont du Chat, two relatively easy mtf's in the first week which will probably be perfect to sort the gc, and at least one very interesting Alps stage. The Izoard mtf still seems strange to me, but has anyone thought about a possible stage through Italy yet. Although the last mountain stages of the tour weren't always super hard in the last years a stage with only the Vars before the Izoard seems strange to me and since there is the 100th giro next year maybe the tour wants to pay tribute to the giro by using some Italian climbs (Finestre). Just like the giro and the vuelta 2013 had mountain stages which finished in France since there was the 100th tour in 2013.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Unless Sestrières is paying, Prudhomme is never going to Finestre. If Sestrières is paying, he still probably isn't.

It's going to be mega backloaded, especially if the rumours that the Mont du Chat stage are coming at the end of week 1 are right because it will then take at least a couple of stages to get over to the Pyrenees. I'm not particularly enthused by Planche des Belles Filles either, it's at least being used in the right role this time, as an early wheat-from-the-chaff MTF where it's accepted the gaps won't be that big but they'll tell us who isn't going to be a contender, but it's basically a poor man's Peña Cabarga and while it's nice that the Vosges is getting involved in hosting the race as it opens up more options, I don't need to see it every time they go into that neck of the woods. Unless they're going to go with what I fear might happen, which is that almost all the weekend stages are transitional stages, as per usual.

 

[Nirvana]

Agnello + Izoard with a finish in Briançon like at the Giro in 2000 and 2007 would be the best but i don't think we can see this in the Tour, if they come in Italy probably will be Finestre + Sestriere, there is a candidature from local administrations since 2014.

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

Skipping Massif Central as well lol. This is looking worse and worse

Know what... I bet the ASO will come out with a great route, just to piss you off.

I wouldn't even be mad. Great route would be amazing

 

[gregrowlerson]

I'm sensing a great route. Prologue, long ITT, maybe another short one, plus some lesser used climbs with a variety of mountain top and descent finishers. This year (next year) they will get it right.

And if not we burn everything.

If there is anything left to burn

 

[guncha]

If rumour about two ITTs is true this route could have good potential.

 

[Le Blaireau_13]

If - and that's a big if - the last time trial will be long enough (at least 40km), I think this could be a really great route: tough stages spread out over three weeks, descent finishes after hard climbs (Chat, Galibier), some nice puncheur-finishes (Longwy, Rodez). I don't think that's bad at all. I wonder what kind of stage Embrun - Salon-de-Provence would be like: a rolling/medium mountain stage would be great I think. I just hope that ASO won't repeat the backloaded pattern of last years: four mountain stages in a row in the last week...

 

[veji11]

The route looks good so far, yet the fundamental problem that routes aren't the main source of ubercontrolled racing, but other factors over which the organiser has no control (team size and strength, SRM, earpieces...) remain.

In theory I love having some real flat ITTing, and more descent finishes, but I would hate to see Sky just control the race even more tightly..

I actually which the ASO / UCI war had continued so that as .HC race the tour could have had Aso saying "so here is the route, btw the tour will be ridden with 24 teams of 7, and earpieces will be forbidden, see you in july !". That would have been epic/.

 

[Gigs_98]

I read a rumor about a finish in Foix after the Mur de Peguere. Again I hope this will indeed happen since I really want to see this climb again, just with a slightly less crappy finish.

Gradients like that are really rare in France.

Edit:
Source: http://www.ladepeche.fr/article/2016/10/04/2431862-foix-et-saint-girons-sur-le-parcours-2017-2017.html

 

[Red Rick]

I really think two 40+km TTs and a prologue are a perfect way to get a worse Tour than this year if Quintana (and Contador) were to miss their peak. Apart from these two, nobody even believes in winning against Sky.

 

[MatParker117]

Re:

I really think two 40+km TTs and a prologue are a perfect way to get a worse Tour than this year if Quintana (and Contador) were to miss their peak. Apart from these two, nobody even believes in winning against Sky.

Even then Froome would probably still put six minutes into Quintana and several into Contador, then Kenny, Wout, Geraint, Mikel & Sergio will choke the life out of them in the high mountains.

 

[sir fly]

Re:

I really think two 40+km TTs and a prologue are a perfect way to get a worse Tour than this year if Quintana (and Contador) were to miss their peak. Apart from these two, nobody even believes in winning against Sky.

Yes, more than 50 kilometres of itt in total would sedate the race.
Unless ASO believes Dumoulin will transform into a GC contender. I'm not convinced he will, yet.

 

[yaco]

Two ITT's will strangle the race if Froome is in form - Expect lots of whinging from posters.