Just watched the race and ugh, this season really hasn't delivered. But well, when you have a few guys who are just way better than their competition but they don't race each other all season, that's what happens. With Van Aert last week and this week go very differently, even if the end result is perhaps the same. If Vingegaard and Pogacar ride the same races there might actually be a fight for the win. If Van Aert and MvdP ride strade bianche, who knows what happens. But they all seem to avoid each other this year. Every time at least two of the "big 6" actually meet the race turns great. It just barely ever happens.
On another note, Mads Pedersen thinking it's actually a "big 7" and he is surely part of it, didn't help. The guy was doing no damage when at the front on the cobbles yet pretended he could go 1 v 1 against MvdP and spent his entire team setting up the favorites attack. Like, I get you also cannot just let the lead group go, but the entire time Trek was riding like a team whose leader was the favorite, not like a team whose main objective had to be to disrupt Alpecin. I think the only thing more annoying than a dominant rider, is his opposition pretending he is actually not that dominant, proceeding to set up the dominant riders win.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram