Reorganising the GT calendar

[nhowson]

So I saw a suggestion in the comments today that the Vuelta and Giro should be swapped on the calendar to avoid the weather inherent to both these years. In theory, this would make both Tours a little easier and hopefully bring back the Giro-Tour double or even attempts at triples with the minimisation of external risks.

After seeing this, I'm wondering what (original) ideas anyone has for this?

 

[pastronef]

So I saw a suggestion in the comments today that the Vuelta and Giro should be swapped on the calendar to avoid the weather inherent to both these years. In theory, this would make both Tours a little easier and hopefully bring back the Giro-Tour double or even attempts at triples with the minimisation of external risks.

After seeing this, I'm wondering what (original) ideas anyone has for this?

I would be interested in a Giro-Vuelta calendar swap. agree very much

 

[VO2 Max]

So I saw a suggestion in the comments today that the Vuelta and Giro should be swapped on the calendar to avoid the weather inherent to both these years. In theory, this would make both Tours a little easier and hopefully bring back the Giro-Tour double or even attempts at triples with the minimisation of external risks.

After seeing this, I'm wondering what (original) ideas anyone has for this?

Certainly has recent precedent; there's nothing fundamental to the sport about the current arrangements. This time though should only be in conjunction with fundamental reforms to the calendar and points systems to better incentivise more positive racing imo. Switching them round isn't an end in itself and the different weather conditions add to the different challenges - but a whole package that gets the top guys to all the GTs (and preferably a few monuments too) and the top-10 guys actually racing to win instead of incentivise to defend their positions... then we'd be talking!

 

[King Of The Wolds]

I would be interested in a Giro-Vuelta calendar swap. agree very much

Doubt RCS would.

 

[DFA123]

It's not a bad idea though I can't see it happening. One problem would be that the Giro is really hard, and would be even harder if it is moved to summer when they can use more of the high climbs in the north.

Having such a hard race at the end of the season could result in riders, particularly GC contenders, specialising and targeting one tour even more than they do now.

The Vuelta is kind of an easy tour to do as a second tour of the season because it is generally ridden at quite a slow pace and the mountain stages haven't been especially loaded (at least not in recent years).

 

[Echoes]

The wisest thing to do with GT's is to scrap them all but that won't be too popular, unfortunately.


So now, my more pragmatic suggestion would be to get the Tour of Spain back to May, with 17 stages + ITT prologue (if they want to, but if they don't want any prologue, it should remain 17 stages, the in-line stage can replace a prologue) and the Tour of Italy back to June, just like in the old days (and them also cut to 17 stages + prologue, would make my day, a sweet revenge for Verbrugghen's destruction of the classics ).

If beside all this, the ProTour is scrapped, then the Tour of Spain would be what it always was, a good race for young Spanish talents to get experience and for some GT riders to have a good prep for the Tour of Italy. The classic riders would then skip it and race the classics in spring + the other classics in autumn while in the current context, they are forced to race the Tour of Spain as a prep for the Worlds. With my solution, they would all have to race, either the Canadians, or the Euros (Wallonia, Fourmies, Paris-Brussels - which should get its real route back, of course -, Plouay, etc.)

 

[ILovecycling]

The wisest thing to do with GT's is to scrap them all but that won't be too popular, unfortunately.


So now, my more pragmatic suggestion would be to get the Tour of Spain back to May, with 17 stages + ITT prologue (if they want to, but if they don't want any prologue, it should remain 17 stages, the in-line stage can replace a prologue) and the Tour of Italy back to June, just like in the old days (and them also cut to 17 stages + prologue, would make my day, a sweet revenge for Verbrugghen's destruction of the classics ).

If beside all this, the ProTour is scrapped, then the Tour of Spain would be what it always was, a good race for young Spanish talents to get experience and for some GT riders to have a good prep for the Tour of Italy. The classic riders would then skip it and race the classics in spring + the other classics in autumn while in the current context, they are forced to race the Tour of Spain as a prep for the Worlds. With my solution, they would all have to race, either the Canadians, or the Euros (Wallonia, Fourmies, Paris-Brussels - which should get its real route back, of course -, Plouay, etc.)

when do these 'tours' take a place, I dont know them

 

[Netserk]

Have the Giro a week later and remove all rest days in the GTs.

 

[Buffalo Soldier]

when do these 'tours' take a place, I dont know them

For now, the Tour of Italy is held in May, the Tour of Spain in September. But there's some discussion going on about switching the two.

Weird that you have never heard of them, since you seem to love cycling.

 

[ILovecycling]

For now, the Tour of Italy is held in May, the Tour of Spain in September. But there's some discussion going on about switching the two.

Weird that you have never heard of them, since you seem to love cycling.

lol


ten ch

 

[veji11]

It's not a bad idea though I can't see it happening. One problem would be that the Giro is really hard, and would be even harder if it is moved to summer when they can use more of the high climbs in the north.

Having such a hard race at the end of the season could result in riders, particularly GC contenders, specialising and targeting one tour even more than they do now.

The Vuelta is kind of an easy tour to do as a second tour of the season because it is generally ridden at quite a slow pace and the mountain stages haven't been especially loaded (at least not in recent years).

This is quite true but indeed from a purely meteorological point of view it would be ideal to have the Vuelta taking place in May, the Tour de France in July and the Giro in late august/early september.

The interesting corollary is how would this impact the rest of the season ? for example with the Ardennaises right before the Vuelta, what would punchers do in terms of calendar ? With a Giro in september, wouldn't it be too hard for ridesr who are preparing for the words ?

Interesting debate though.

 

[Red Rick]

I'm absolutely sure it would work out terrible. Here's why


None of the top GC guys peaks for the Vuelta alone, and none of the top GC guys risks his luck to wait for the 3 GT to strike. No GC guy normally has the Vuelta as main target of the year, so unless a few guys go Vuelta-Giro the Vuelta gets a crap field, also because nobody now can use it as a prep for the Worlds

Vuelta in may would get a disastrously crap field
Tour field would probably get a little better
Giro field would be terrible, cause if they keep make it the hardest GT and so backloaded, nobody is gonna just try to see how it goes.

You want to kill the Giro and Vuelta, this is how you do it

 

[Red Rick]

I'm in favour of having 1/2 weeks extra between the GT's, but that would make the Giro really early (snow) or the Vuelta and subsequent races really late (snow in lombardia instead of reain)

 

[argyllflyer]

On Eurosport, Sean Kelly always refers to the Vuelta as the Tour of Spain, with Carlton Kirby opting for 'Vuelta, Tour of Spain'. Pretty sure Kelly calls the Giro Tour of Italy too.

 

[wirral]

Tour of Spain should be reduced to 14 stages over 16 days. It should be held after Andalucia in late Feb/early March.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I'm in favour of having 1/2 weeks extra between the GT's, but that would make the Giro really early (snow) or the Vuelta and subsequent races really late (snow in lombardia instead of reain)

They have sort of brought Lombardia forward a couple of weeks recently though. It should go back where it was.

Maybe the Worlds should go back to late August and before the Vuelta if the weather is that much of a problem, but that will have a bad effect on the Vuelta's field.

The weather is a factor in races. It happens. The Giro has had a bit of bad luck on that front in the last couple of years, but then again it's not exactly unprecedented. We've had stages like the infamous 1988 Gavia stage, the 2010 Gavia one with the 2m snowbanks, and drastic last-minute re-routing of stages. The Vuelta has in recent years mostly been putting its big final climbs up in the north of the country, which has meant that when they do visit the south it's early in the race, so happening in the heat of August. But it was less of an issue in races like the 2007 and 2009 Vueltas where the southern stages came later in the race; also the 45º heat at the Grand Depart in Pamplona in 2012 was a freak heatwave; you would not normally expect such heat in that part of the country.

The problem at the moment is crappy, sensationalist course design rather than anything else. If they want Angliru or Ancares on the penultimate day, then the south must come early in the race if they want to pay. Also, poor stages where they're racing at low altitude on exposed terrain in this heat rather than at higher altitude through rockier terrain. Same goes for the Giro - going over Gavia and Stelvio in the same stage is asking for trouble because of the lack of viable alternative roads through that area; if the weather isn't up to it, the whole thing goes out the window.

Even the craziest Zomegnan days at least had alternative options; 2010 Gavia could have used Mortirolo instead (again) if Gavia was out of action; in 2011 despite the 21 MTFs in 21 stages approach, the Cima Coppi was the Passo Giau.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Tour of Spain should be reduced to 14 stages over 16 days. It should be held after Andalucia in late Feb/early March.

yeah let's make the status of La Vuelta as a GT even more laughable

 

[Dr. Juice]

Swap Giro and Vuelta.
But Vuelta 2-3 weeks later than the Giro now. If they did so , we'd have 1 or 2 weeks between Vuelta and Tour. Enough to recover from the easier Vuelta and do both GTs in one peak.

Vuelta + Tour for Spaniards or simply those who want to use the Vuelta as (by winning) preparation for the Tour.
And for Italians and those who want to achieve the "great double" Tour + Giro.

 

[Arnout]

I would actually like to see the Tour moved backwards one week, the Vuelta shortened to the last two weeks of the three weeks it is now, the Giro in the current position and an extra 2-week stagerace in the last week of March, first week of April. Obviously that new spot will be tricky due to the weather and the inaccessability of high mountains so early in the spring, but for all I care that race is organized in Colombia or California and it doesn't need to be that hard, a sort of expanded Paris-Nice type (like it was before they butchered it) would do fine.

 

[Mellow Velo]

So I saw a suggestion in the comments today that the Vuelta and Giro should be swapped on the calendar to avoid the weather inherent to both these years. In theory, this would make both Tours a little easier and hopefully bring back the Giro-Tour double or even attempts at triples with the minimisation of external risks.

After seeing this, I'm wondering what (original) ideas anyone has for this?

No need if only the Tour would move it's fat ass a bit.

 

[Bavarianrider]

Get rid of Vuelta. Move Tour back 4 weeks and Giro 2 weeks.

 

[yespatterns]

I'd go with flipping Vuelta and Giro, add time in between the big three and (this will make purists angry) intersperse the spring classic routes before, during and after. That's just my spitball idea.

 

[Red Rick]

Let's cut the Tour a week down, then it all fits perfectly, but no, we just got to **** up the GT's that a hard time getting on tv already

 

[Red Rick]

I'd go with flipping Vuelta and Giro, add time in between the big three and (this will make purists angry) intersperse the spring classic routes before, during and after. That's just my spitball idea.

I just think the Giro is too hard to have that late in the year, lots of riders already tired in late august/early september

 

[Arnout]

Let's cut the Tour a week down, then it all fits perfectly, but no, we just got to **** up the GT's that a hard time getting on tv already

Yeah let's destroy the one race that attracts all the sponsors, that's a brilliant idea.