Rate the 2015 Vuelta Route!

[Gigs_98]

The route has several problems:
-First week only has ___/ stages and no difficult passes. However we at least saw some very good racing on the final climbs
-The great andorra stage came far too early. If that stage had been raced today there would have been much more carnage because the final climb gave you the possibility to do a long range attack
-3 mtf's in a row is stupid because the riders are afraid to attack on the first two stages because they might fade on the last one
-3 mtf's in this row is even more stupid because you don't even get good racing on the last stage because the last few hundred meters are so ridiculously steep.

However there are still good stages to come which might make the battle for the gc very interesting. Moreover I didnt know how steep the final climb today was, which is another reason why I rated it 6.

Yep, 3 MTFs in a row at the end of the second week is a problem and automatically leads to bad racing in the third one, even more so if it is steep. Grossglockner, Zoncolan, Gardeccia.

Now believe it or not, but if Contador hadn't been in such an unbelievably great shape, the attack on the Großglockner would have been extremely stupid. The rest however is completely different from here. The hardest mtf came on the second stage and not on the last one, while the last mtf was at the end of such a hard stage that even the steepness didnt change anything (and gardeccia is also shorter)
And where the hell did I wrote that it leads to bad racing in the 3rd week. I actually even wrote:

However there are still good stages to come which might make the battle for the gc very interesting

 

[hrotha]

Also, those 3 stages made the Giro be backloaded, which was a problem that was recognized as such at the time.

 

[SergeDeM]

Unless the parcours is at Tour 2012 stupidity levels, the excitement is always down to the riders. A fit Contador and/or Nibali would've turned this Vuelta into a total light show.

 

[Carols]

Re:

Unless the parcours is at Tour 2012 stupidity levels, the excitement is always down to the riders. A fit Contador and/or Nibali would've turned this Vuelta into a total light show.

Spoken for truth!

 

[ice&fire]

After a pile of mountains and a reasonably long TT we have a climber and a TTer within 3 seconds. Can we agree that the route was well balanced?

 

[Valv.Piti]

At this point, the route looks quite good considering we have 3 interesting stages left and everything still can happen. I'll look very much forward to those stages.

Overall, you can't make up for riders being pussies/equal and they have designed the 2 best mountain stages this year imo. Apart from Escarandi which was a climb that I really didn't like and 'slightly favoring Purito and Valv early on with those classic Vuelta-finishes, I'll give it 6,5. Decent route imo, could still be a lot better!

 

[Carols]

Re:

After a pile of mountains and a reasonably long TT we have a climber and a TTer within 3 seconds. Can we agree that the route was well balanced?

It's difficult to argue with that fact.

 

[Eshnar]

Re: Re:

After a pile of mountains and a reasonably long TT we have a climber and a TTer within 3 seconds. Can we agree that the route was well balanced?

It's difficult to argue with that fact.

The TTer is a guy who beat Froome, as well as all the others, in an uphill finish. Calling him just "a TTer" is quite misleading.

 

[hrotha]

It's very easy to argue with that anyway. The climbers rode very conservatively and essentially wasted whole stages because they didn't need to do anything differently due to the massively unbalanced route.

 

[ice&fire]

Re:

It's very easy to argue with that anyway. The climbers rode very conservatively and essentially wasted whole stages because they didn't need to do anything differently due to the massively unbalanced route.

Don't let the estimated power numbers from the climbs cloud your view that they've been taking it easy.

 

[Tonton]

This Vuelta is the perfect illustration of the old cliche: "the riders make the race". I agree with hrotha that the climbers rode conservatively. Maybe that once Froome DNF and Quintana lost big time, Purito and Aru (and their teams) didn't know how to handle their new responsibilities. They completely under-estimated Dumoulin, they let him hang around, and it's biting them in the rear. I'll be glad if he wins. Walkowiak-style win maybe, but who cares: a win is a win.

 

[70kmph]

8

 

[Taxus4a]

I put a 7 knowing that stages like today were really though, and these 3 days would be important, maybe other prople would improve now his note.

I think that all those people that rate a 3 or less are just trolling, as well I cant put more becouse I rated 8,5 to the Giro that has a longer ITT at the middle and stages with Mortirolo and Finestre...

 

[WheelofGear]

That's one of the tightest polls I've seen.

All numbers have min. 8% and max 14%.

 

[Eshnar]

Re:

That's one of the tightest polls I've seen.

All numbers have min. 8% and max 14%.

60% of those votes have been submitted in the last few days. I should have locked it.

 

[hrotha]

Re: Re:

It's very easy to argue with that anyway. The climbers rode very conservatively and essentially wasted whole stages because they didn't need to do anything differently due to the massively unbalanced route.

Don't let the estimated power numbers from the climbs cloud your view that they've been taking it easy.

Power numbers won't tell you whether they could have gone faster. You're probably comparing watt numbers from the Vuelta's short, one-climb stages with the proper mountain stages of other races.

 

[Billie]

not that hard to get a good stage when we don't have these ridiculous ramps

 

[Descender]

Re:

not that hard to get a good stage when we don't have these ridiculous ramps

And you don't put the finish line on top of the climb.

FINALLY some meaningful descending action in a Vuelta.