Le Tour '19 Stage 20: Albertville > Val Thorens 59km

[Cance > TheRest]

Re: Re:

I did some research. I might be wrong but I think Bernal will be the first rider since Roger Walkowiak in 1956 to win a Tour de France without finishing in the top3 in any individual stage.

I think you are probably right in that assessment:

in 2017 Froome was 3rd in stage 9 (He may have podiumed in more I stopped checking after 1)
in 2006 Oscar Periero was 3rd in stage 16 (He may have podiumed in more I stopped checking after 1)
in 1990 Lemond was 2nd in stage 11 (He may have podiumed in more I stopped checking after 1)
in 1966 Lucien Aimar was 2nd in Stage 14a (He may have podiumed in more I stopped checking after 1)
in 1960 Gastone Nencini was 2nd and 3rd in Stage 1a and 1b (He may have podiumed in more I stopped checking after 1)

and that takes us back to Walko!

This a a great resource for old Tour results - https://www.bikeraceinfo.com/tdf/tdf1960.html

2nd on stage 13 the day he was allowed ½ hour with Voigt

 

[dgodave]

Re:

Seldom has a Tour de France promised so much yet delivered so little.

I dunno.

I had more fun watching this one, as a daily average, than most Tours.

 

[del1962]

Yesterday feels like a stage win for Bernal though, however the reason Ineos didnt go for a stage win was in case Stevie K won the stage and gapped G by 3 seconds

 

[AICA ribonucleotide]

The TV coverage really dropped the ball today with their choice of cameras at the finish.
Landa attacked they cut to Nibali and we didn't see anything of the GC group for another 1m19 seconds.
Valverde emerging out of nowhere.
It's 2019 ffs.

 

[RedheadDane]

Re: Re:

so bernal just gives away the KOM, what an idiot, at least Froome was sprinting in the last stage to get the green jersey. This is a **** joke, the KOM is a prestigious price not to just gift to someone!

you can't make this *** up, Froome got nothing but grief when he sprinted for that points jersey in that Vuelta...Now Froome is getting credit for respecting the jersey....make your mind up people

Bernal might not even have been fully aware that he was in the running for KoM. I think he had more important things to worry about…

 

[carton]

Re: Re:

so bernal just gives away the KOM, what an idiot, at least Froome was sprinting in the last stage to get the green jersey. This is a **** joke, the KOM is a prestigious price not to just gift to someone!

Would've been good to see him take the stage and KOM jersey, yeah. Bardet really isn't a very good KOM winner this year.

In fairness, if they don't cancel the Roseland, then Bardet goes in the break and probably takes max points on it unless Yates is there, as nobody else in the break would have designs on the classification most likely and would be preserving their energy for Val Thorens.

The problem with the KOM at the moment in the Tour is that they've colossally over-valued MTFs, to the point where a Unipuerto stage with a HC MTF has more points available than the 2009 queen stage with four cat.1s and a cat.2. This has led to a move away from the 'king of the breakaways' stigma of the winners being combativity candidates rather than real climbers (though I do feel sorry for Charteau being singled out as the reason it had to change, that was largely the result of a deal made to protect Jérôme Pineau in the St-Jean-de-Maurienne stage, and then Radioshack defending the lead in the Teams Classification and nuking any break with a Caisse d'Epargne rider in it on the Tourmalet stage, preventing Christophe Moreau collecting points on those two days. If Moreau picked up the KOM as a career parting gift, much like Garzelli in the 2011 Giro, then nobody decides the classification needs a revamp, as Moreau would probably have been seen as a 'worthy' KOM), but while much of the time it has been won by a secondary contender or somebody who has lost out on the GC but come into form late in the race (Majka's wins both fall into this category), it has also on occasion been won by a GC candidate basically by accident (Froome in 2015, for example). While a big GC candidate can definitely win the KOM in the 'right' way, by competing for the win collecting points by being combative in the mountains - Quintana's win in 2013 and Rasmussen's was-going-to-be-a-win in 2007 for example - it's not like Froome ever really went on the kind of escapade to win the jersey that made him visible as the "king of the mountains" even though he was obviously the best climber in that race (his reward for which, of course, was the yellow jersey).

By the way the jersey has functioned since the revamp in 2011, the logical winner of the KOM for me would have been Simon Yates, and his attack with a few kilometres to go was likely with this in mind. He's won two stages and been visible on the attack throughout the mountain stages. Nairo Quintana was also within striking distance of the jersey, and had the two been fresher, we could have seen them battle on the front once Bardet was dropped, being one point apart and both having won major mountain stages in the race. Bernal has at least been decently aggressive, but it wasn't like Landa in the Pyrenees - that was the type of move he was on when the Tignes stage was neutered, and had that stage been able to be completed and THEN he'd won or top 3ed today's stage, he'd feel more like a GPM winner.

Bardet simply doesn't feel like a GPM winner here. I mean, as a calibre of rider, he fits in well with the kind of riders who've won the jersey in recent years. But he had a catastrophically bad GC campaign, and he only had the one real mountain exploit, which he didn't exactly set the world alight in either. This isn't just a Tour problem though - a few years ago Giovanni Visconti won the Giro GPM almost by accident; Carlos Betancur and Beñat Intxausti had been duelling over the jersey for most of the race, and Visconti got into the break on one key day which had the Cima Coppi, originally to try to protect Intxausti's lead in the classification, but because of the crazy overvaluing of the Cima Coppi and the idiosyncrasies of the Giro's GPM (such as the number and difficulty of uncategorized ascents) he wound up winning the jersey on the strength of that one day.

Great post as usual.

I like how the current system seems to be working. It rewards the riders who tirelessly set out for those KOM points and prove themselves bona fide mountain men worthy of such an honor. If no one steps up, it kind of defaults back to the best climber amongst the GC men. And if in the attempt to chase after yellow someone eats up the mountain stages to such an extent that the would-be contenders in the break get swallowed up and digested by his efforts, then so be it as well.

I agree that Bardet didn't quite earn it. But as a national prize, it seems like a proper consolation price of sorts for the punchy French grimpeurs who livened up the Tour in the mountains.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re:

I did some research. I might be wrong but I think Bernal will be the first rider since Roger Walkowiak in 1956 to win a Tour de France without finishing in the top3 in any individual stage.

Thats great company for a champion.
Seriously though, he would obviously have finjished at least 2nd on one stage.

 

[woodburn]

Re:

Alaphilippe with an amazing 3 weeks...big decisions now if he wants to become a grand tour GC rider..

Not really. He isn't a GC rider just like TJ wasn't after he finished fifth in 2012. Sometimes the field is weak. Sometimes circumstances favor you. But that doesn't change the overall calculation. He's an elite stage hunter and classics rider. Why would he abandon that to try and ride GC even though he obviously can't climb at that level consistently?

 

[Asero831]

Re: Re:

Alaphilippe with an amazing 3 weeks...big decisions now if he wants to become a grand tour GC rider..

Not really. He isn't a GC rider just like TJ wasn't after he finished fifth in 2012. Sometimes the field is weak. Sometimes circumstances favor you. But that doesn't change the overall calculation. He's an elite stage hunter and classics rider. Why would he abandon that to try and ride GC even though he obviously can't climb at that level consistently?

He should target the Olympics next year.
Then he could start thinking of GC ambitions in 2021.

 

[jaylew]

Re: Re:

I did some research. I might be wrong but I think Bernal will be the first rider since Roger Walkowiak in 1956 to win a Tour de France without finishing in the top3 in any individual stage.

Thanks, I knew it had to be awhile! Usually the 'strongest' hits a podium at least multiple times. Very few win without winning a stage.

Fairly meaningless, imo. I mean he "won" a stage whether it's official or not and 100% would have podiumed it had it not been shortened. In any case, we ideally want our GC winners to win a stage because if often means they've raced aggressively and he's done that. Seems like when the winners don't get a stage it's because the break steals it. I think I remember that happening to Contador as well.

It bothers me a bit that he's so gracious and not so cutthroat but it makes sense given his age and the all the big names on his team. Anyway, it was probably a savvy move to let Bardet keep polka dots.

 

[wirral]

Re: Re:

so bernal just gives away the KOM, what an idiot, at least Froome was sprinting in the last stage to get the green jersey. This is a **** joke, the KOM is a prestigious price not to just gift to someone!

you can't make this *** up, Froome got nothing but grief when he sprinted for that points jersey in that Vuelta...Now Froome is getting credit for respecting the jersey....make your mind up people

That is a very pertinent point.

The KOM competition this year was a damp squib. Bardet was, frankly, an undeserving winner. Apart from Wellens, who was too weak, there wasn't a rider who consistently targetted the competition and those that tried were too weak to sustain their challenge. The competition fell to Bardet due to a lack of rivals and the GC guys sharing the spoils.

Also having 5 HC climbs with 40 points each for a total of 200 points out of a total of around 350 points completely skewed the competition. The difference was too great.

 

[Anderis]

Re: Re:

so bernal just gives away the KOM, what an idiot, at least Froome was sprinting in the last stage to get the green jersey. This is a **** joke, the KOM is a prestigious price not to just gift to someone!

you can't make this *** up, Froome got nothing but grief when he sprinted for that points jersey in that Vuelta...Now Froome is getting credit for respecting the jersey....make your mind up people

You can't expect "people" to make up their minds because obviously something like one person having different opinion to another can happen.

 

[Carols]

Re: Re:

I did some research. I might be wrong but I think Bernal will be the first rider since Roger Walkowiak in 1956 to win a Tour de France without finishing in the top3 in any individual stage.

Thats great company for a champion.
Seriously though, he would obviously have finjished at least 2nd on one stage.

Yeah but he Didn't!