Paris-Nice 2017, 5th-12th March

[Alexandre B.]

Welcome to the first important stage race of the season! La Course au soleil, as we say in french.

It features eight days of racing from La région parisienne to La Côte d'Azur. Let's see what we've got.

Stage 1 » Bois-d'Arcy › Bois-d'Arcy (148.5k)

Stage 2 » Rochefort-en-Yvelines › Amilly (195k)

Stage 3 » Chablis › Chalon-sur-Saône (190k)

Stage 4 (ITT) » Beaujeu › Mont Brouilly (14.5k)

Stage 5 » Quincié-en-Beaujolais › Bourg-de-Péage (199.5k)

Stage 6 » Aubagne › Fayence (193.5k)

Stage 7 » Nice › Col de la Couillole (177k)

Stage 8 » Nice › Nice (115.5k)

STARTLIST

bold = GC leader
italic and underlined = sprinter

AG2R LA MONDIALE / FRA
BARDET Romain
CHEREL Mikael
DOMONT Axel
ENGER Sondre Holst
FRANK Mathias
GAUTIER Cyril
LATOUR Pierre
NAESEN Oliver

ASTANA PRO TEAM / KAZ
BRESCHEL Matti
DE VREESE Laurens
FUGLSANG Jakob
KANGERT Tanel
LUTSENKO Alexey
MINALI Riccardo
TLEUBAYEV Ruslan
VALGREN ANDERSEN Michael

BAHRAIN – MERIDA / BRN
BOLE Grega
BONIFAZIO Niccolo
BOZIC Borut
COLBRELLI Sonny
GASPAROTTO Enrico
GRMAY Tsgabu Gebremaryam
IZAGUIRRE INSAUSTI Jon
PIBERNIK Luka

BMC RACING TEAM / USA
DE MARCHI Alessandro
MOINARD Amaël
PORTE Richie
ROCHE Nicolas
SCHÄR Michael
TEUNS Dylan
VENTOSO Francisco
WYSS Danilo

BORA – HANSGROHE / GER
BARTA Jan
BASKA Erik
BENNETT Sam
BUCHMANN Emanuel
KOLAR Michael
KONRAD Patrick
PIMANTA COSTA MENDES José Joao
SAGAN Juraj

CANNONDALE DRAPAC TEAM / USA
CRADDOCK Lawson
DOMBROWSKI Joseph
FORMOLO Davide
KOREN Kristijan
ROLLAND Pierre
SLAGTER Tom Jelte
VILLELLA Davide
WOODS Michael

COFIDIS, SOLUTIONS CREDITS / FRA
BOUHANNI Nacer
LAPORTE Christophe
LEMOINE Cyril
NAVARRO Daniel
SENECHAL Florian
SIMON Julien
SOUPE Geoffrey
TURGIS Anthony

DELKO MARSEILLE PROVENCE KTM / FRA
COMBAUD Romain
EL FARES Julien
FERNANDEZ CRUZ Delio
FINETTO Mauro
MADRAZO Angel
PACHER Quentin
SISKEVICIUS Evaldas
SMUKULIS Gatis

DIRECT ENERGIE / FRA
BOUDAT Thomas
CALMEJANE Lilian
CHAVANEL Sylvain
COQUARD Bryan
MORICE Julien
PETIT Adrien
SICARD Romain
TULIK Angélo

FDJ / FRA
CIMOLAI Davide
DELAGE Mickaël
DEMARE Arnaud
GUARNIERI Jacopo
HOELGAARD Daniel
KONOVALOVAS Ignatas
MOLARD Rudy
SARREAU Marc

FORTUNEO – VITAL CONCEPT / FRA
BOUET Maxime
HARDY Romain
JARRIER Benoit
JEANNESSON Arnold
MC LAY Daniel
PERICHON Pierre-Luc
PICHON Laurent
SEPULVEDA Eduardo

LOTTO SOUDAL / BEL
BAK Lars Ytting
DE GENDT Thomas
GALLOPIN Tony
GREIPEL André
HANSEN Adam
HOFLAND Moreno
VANENDERT Jelle
WALLAYS Jelle

MOVISTAR TEAM / ESP
ANACONA GOMEZ Winner
DE LA PARTE Victor
ERVITI Imanol
HERRADA LOPEZ Jesus
HERRADA LOPEZ José
IZAGUIRRE INSAUSTI Gorka
SOLER GIMENEZ Marc
SUTHERLAND Rory

ORICA – SCOTT / AUS
ALBASINI Michael
DOCKER Mitchell
GERRANS Simon
HAYMAN Mathew
JUUL-JENSEN Christopher
KEUKELEIRE Jens
NIELSEN Magnus Cort
YATES Simon

QUICK – STEP FLOORS / BEL
ALAPHILIPPE Julian
BAUER Jack
DE LA CRUZ David
GILBERT Philippe
KITTEL Marcel
LAMPAERT Yves
MARTIN Daniel
SABATINI Fabio

TEAM DIMENSION DATA / RSA
BERHANE Natnael
FARRAR Tyler
FRAILE Omar
JANSE VAN RENSBURG Reinardt
KING Benjamin
PAUWELS Serge
REGUIGUI Youcef
SBARAGLI Kristian

TEAM KATUSHA ALPECIN / SUI
BYSTRÖM Sven Erik
HALLER Marco
KISERLOVSKI Robert
KRISTOFF Alexander
LOSADA Alberto
MARTIN Tony
MORKOV Michael
ZAKARIN Ilnur

TEAM LOTTO NL – JUMBO / NED
BOOM Lars
CLEMENT Stef
GROENEWEGEN Dylan
KRUIJSWIJK Steven
LEEZER Thomas
ROOSEN Timo
TANKINK Bram
WAGNER Robert

TEAM SKY / GBR
DEIGNAN Philip
HENAO GOMEZ Sebastián
HENAO MONTOYA Sergio
KNEES Christian
LOPEZ GARCIA David
NIEVE ITURRALDE Mikel
ROWE Luke
VAN POPPEL Danny

TEAM SUNWEB / GER
ARNDT Nikias
BARGUIL Warren
CURVERS Roy
GESCHKE Simon
MATTHEWS Michael
OOMEN Sam
STAMSNIJDER Tom
WAEYTENS Zico

TREK – SEGAFREDO / USA
CARDOSO André
CONTADOR Alberto
DEGENKOLB John
GOGL Michael
PANTANO Jarlinson
RAST Gregory
THEUNS Edward
ZUBELDIA Haimar

UAE ABU DHABI / UAE
BONO Matteo
GUARDINI Andrea
MORI Manuele
PETILLI Simone
POLANC Jan
SWIFT Ben
ULISSI Diego
ZURLO Federico

 

[Valv.Piti]

Cant you just bold all of Cannondale's team?

 

[Gigs_98]

This race has written Contador vs Porte all over it.

 

[AlexNYC]

Really looking forward to this. I'm hoping Henao can win his first stage race; but I'm guessing Contador, Porte and Zakarin will be hard to beat here.

 

[Alexandre B.]

Re:

Cant you just bold all of Cannondale's team?

I thought about making a joke of it, but Talansky is realistically their best shot at GC.

 

[DFA123]

Think this is Contador's to lose. But he probably needs to be in the lead after the TT (cancelling out the bonus seconds Henao/Valverde/Martin) might get. Because I think he'd struggle to ride away from Sky/Quick Step / Movistar on the main climb if they are defending the lead.

Will be interesting to see if Valverde, Alaphilippe, Henao and the like try something on the end of stage 1. I guess probably not, but if so they could put Contador and Porte (who hasn't raced for over a month) under a bit of pressure.

 

[sQiD]

First race of Micheal Matthews. We will see if he can really challenge Peter for the green jersey this year.

 

[DNP-Old]

The last stage is just screaming for Contador to do some mad man's stuff again. Hope he won't be in the yellow by then.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Contador vs Porte, really can't say who is the biggest favorite. The ITT will be crucial.

 

[BigMac]

I think Ulissi can surprise here, not necessarily GC wise.

 

[portugal11]

Re:

First race of Micheal Matthews. We will see if he can really challenge Peter for the green jersey this year.

 

[portugal11]

Porte vs contador. I don't think contador will win this because he won't drop porte in the queen stage and after that he will race alone against sky/movistar/bmc/katusha/astana...

 

[Valv.Piti]

Going for an outsider and saying Henao. I know, its only the Colombian nats, but I really do think he can challenge the best here and win the race on marginals. I think he will be super strong throughout this season, he has had enough of problems.

Contador and Valverde to fill out the podium in random order. Barguil, Bardet, Rolland to disappoint, Alaphilippe to top-5. Pretty boring first 5 days, but the last 3 days looks really, really good. Calmejane could also be a rider to make some noise in this race!

I would be surprised if Porte won actually. Staying in his TdU shape wouldn't be optimal with regards to TdF, I think, and he will probably pay for not having raced in february. Also, I think the ITT suits Contador and Valverde better than Porte compared to the Col d'Eze time trial.

 

[portugal11]

What contador must do, is winning that time trial and let the breakaway win stage 6 with 2/3 minutes of margin

 

[DFA123]

Re:

What contador must do, is winning that time trial and let the breakaway win stage 6 with 2/3 minutes of margin

Agreed. TT is the critical stage for him - not necessarily win I think, but be in the lead out of all the GC guys after it - preferably by more than 10 seconds! He should be able to follow anyone's wheel on the main mountain stage, but having to drop Henao, Porte or Valverde would be very difficult in current shape.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re:

Going for an outsider and saying Henao. I know, its only the Colombian nats, but I really do think he can challenge the best here and win the race on marginals. I think he will be super strong throughout this season, he has had enough of problems.

Contador and Valverde to fill out the podium in random order. Barguil, Bardet, Rolland to disappoint, Alaphilippe to top-5. Pretty boring first 5 days, but the last 3 days looks really, really good. Calmejane could also be a rider to make some noise in this race!

I would be surprised if Porte won actually. Staying in his TdU shape wouldn't be optimal with regards to TdF, I think, and he will probably pay for not having raced in february. Also, I think the ITT suits Contador and Valverde better than Porte compared to the Col d'Eze time trial.

Henao will lose too much time in the ITT. IMO. Same for e.g. Bardet and Martin.
The TT should suit Valverde, but considering his performance in Andalucia, I think he will lack 1 or 2% uphill to beat Contador and Porte. But with the bonus seconds he is always dangerous.
And beware Zaka, although his TTs are a bit hit-and-miss.
Izagirre could be a threat as well, I don't know how bad his crash was though.

I think Contador against Porte is pretty much the most interesting battle you can get on such a parcours. They have very similar strengths and weaknesses. They are very good one-week stage racers, very strong in hilly TTs and they are similar in climbing level, in one-week races at least. And they both can't really sprint :lol:

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re:

Porte vs contador. I don't think contador will win this because he won't drop porte in the queen stage and after that he will race alone against sky/movistar/bmc/katusha/astana...

Who knows. Maybe he will beat Porte by 20 seconds. Maybe Porte will drop Contador like a stone. Maybe they'll have to sprint for the victory. We can't know until it's happened.

 

[Singer01]

interesting last few stages, depends on whether Contador is over raced or Porte is under raced for the win.

 

[Flamin]

Didn't know Valverde is going to race here :surprised: so no strade then.

 

[Escarabajo]

Nice parcours. Rooting for eenao. Good group of contenders for this race.

 

[Tonton]

Contador vs. Porte for the win, probably very close. Although Valverde could spoil the party.

Bardet needs to start showing something. He's not as good as he was at the same time last year. Henao, Zakarin, and Alaphilippe should be factors as well. I'll be curious to see what kind of form Martin and Kruijswijk will show.

Demare has FDJ dedicated to him: let's see what he can do against a very good field of sprinters.

If the weather cooperates, this will be a great race.

 

[May0maniac]

I think Ulissi can surprise here, not necessarily GC wise.

Yes, the MTF on stage 8 could be a bit too hard for him, but he already finished 7th on gc in 2013, finishing top 10 on gc wouldn't be a huge surprise.

 

[sQiD]

Re: Re:

First race of Micheal Matthews. We will see if he can really challenge Peter for the green jersey this year.

the guy wants to win the green jersey and spent 2 mounths in training camps, so i want to see if he has improved a lot his form.

 

[Mr.White]

Contador vs Porte vs Valverde for me. Bala might loose something uphill in stage 7, but not necessary. On the other hand he might grab some bonuses in 2-3 stages. TT will be very important, who has an advantage after that, among these three, will be very hard to beat

 

[Red Rick]

Alberto Contador will win this bike race.