TDF 2018 Predictions

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

Really? It was predictable that he would bleed time in the beginning of the race, win a hard-fought battle with Yates on the Zoncolan, bleed time the next day, ride a mediocre TT and then blow everything away on stage 19?

You should begin betting if you aren't already.

Actually I wasn't happy, but also wasn't surprised at all. It more appeared like lay low for the first two weeks, then do whatever you need to to go and win it.

Can't bet as I'd really rather not get in trouble with the state or US govt and I definitely don't live in Nevada although I'm not sure cycling is an option to be bet on there or not. I had HOPED someone else would win, but I figured he would and that it was already decided before hand.

Really? Is it illegal to bet outside Nevada?

In Denmark betting commercials is pretty much the only thing on the TV between broadcasts - you'd think the state has some agenda of getting everybody addicted to gambling here.

And I have a friend who caught a bet of a Froome victory at 20/1 just before the Bardonecchia stage.

Nevada and Atlantic City, New Jersey are the only places outside of a few Native American reservations that have a casino or two where betting is legal, and for some reason horse tracks get an exemption. Technically office pools for the college basketball tournament are illegal. Although I think something was done to change the law to allow those to be legal.

 

[Juan Pelota]

Porte
Quintana
Froome

 

[Moviefan1203]

Re: Re:

Really? It was predictable that he would bleed time in the beginning of the race, win a hard-fought battle with Yates on the Zoncolan, bleed time the next day, ride a mediocre TT and then blow everything away on stage 19?

You should begin betting if you aren't already.

Actually I wasn't happy, but also wasn't surprised at all. It more appeared like lay low for the first two weeks, then do whatever you need to to go and win it.

Can't bet as I'd really rather not get in trouble with the state or US govt and I definitely don't live in Nevada although I'm not sure cycling is an option to be bet on there or not. I had HOPED someone else would win, but I figured he would and that it was already decided before hand.

Really? Is it illegal to bet outside Nevada?

In Denmark betting commercials is pretty much the only thing on the TV between broadcasts - you'd think the state has some agenda of getting everybody addicted to gambling here.

And I have a friend who caught a bet of a Froome victory at 20/1 just before the Bardonecchia stage.

Nevada and Atlantic City, New Jersey are the only places outside of a few Native American reservations that have a casino or two where betting is legal, and for some reason horse tracks get an exemption. Technically office pools for the college basketball tournament are illegal. Although I think something was done to change the law to allow those to be legal.

With the recent Supreme Court ruling, it’s a state to state issue now.

 

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

Really? It was predictable that he would bleed time in the beginning of the race, win a hard-fought battle with Yates on the Zoncolan, bleed time the next day, ride a mediocre TT and then blow everything away on stage 19?

You should begin betting if you aren't already.

Actually I wasn't happy, but also wasn't surprised at all. It more appeared like lay low for the first two weeks, then do whatever you need to to go and win it.

Can't bet as I'd really rather not get in trouble with the state or US govt and I definitely don't live in Nevada although I'm not sure cycling is an option to be bet on there or not. I had HOPED someone else would win, but I figured he would and that it was already decided before hand.

Really? Is it illegal to bet outside Nevada?

In Denmark betting commercials is pretty much the only thing on the TV between broadcasts - you'd think the state has some agenda of getting everybody addicted to gambling here.

And I have a friend who caught a bet of a Froome victory at 20/1 just before the Bardonecchia stage.

Nevada and Atlantic City, New Jersey are the only places outside of a few Native American reservations that have a casino or two where betting is legal, and for some reason horse tracks get an exemption. Technically office pools for the college basketball tournament are illegal. Although I think something was done to change the law to allow those to be legal.

With the recent Supreme Court ruling, it’s a state to state issue now.

That's very recent and still for the most part isn't possible and won't be legal in most states although office pools I'm sure will be exempted.

 

[SHAD0W93]

Podium: Valverde, Nibali, Bardet
1st yellow: Cav
Most Wins: Cav with 6
Green: Cav
KoM: Majka
White: Yates
Demare, GVA and EBH both getting 1 stage
Valverde and Sagan 2 stages
Froome to finish 5th
Quintana to get upset that he has to work for Valverde and DNS stage 17.
Biggest disappointment Kittel and Greipel.

 

[Son of Amsterhammer]

I can’t wait for the race.

Battle for yellow will be epic. I could see it going 10 different ways. If Froome hadn’t done the Giro, I’d say forget about it, but he did.

Battle for Green goes through Sagan, but the Sprints should be very competitive. I think there will be a bunch of photo finishes.

There will be some great storylines.

Potentially the best Tour in years coming up.

 

[Koronin]

Re:

I can’t wait for the race.

Battle for yellow will be epic. I could see it going 10 different ways. If Froome hadn’t done the Giro, I’d say forget about it, but he did.

Battle for Green goes through Sagan, but the Sprints should be very competitive. I think there will be a bunch of photo finishes.

There will be some great storylines.

Potentially the best Tour in years coming up.

Gaviria could battle Sagan for green, but don't think anyone else is in competition there.

As for yellow, the UCI already gave us that answer today. Froome isn't accountable for anything he does. So me no point in bothering and if the stages are on TV I'm certainly not going to track them down on line.

 

[Son of Amsterhammer]

Re: Re:

I can’t wait for the race.

Battle for yellow will be epic. I could see it going 10 different ways. If Froome hadn’t done the Giro, I’d say forget about it, but he did.

Battle for Green goes through Sagan, but the Sprints should be very competitive. I think there will be a bunch of photo finishes.

There will be some great storylines.

Potentially the best Tour in years coming up.

Gaviria could battle Sagan for green, but don't think anyone else is in competition there.

As for yellow, the UCI already gave us that answer today. Froome isn't accountable for anything he does. So me no point in bothering and if the stages are on TV I'm certainly not going to track them down on line.

Can Froome win? Of course. But a lot could go wrong for him too. Even if he’s leading deep into the race, the others will always give themselves a chance because he did the Giro. One bad day on those big mountain stages and he’s done.

 

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

I can’t wait for the race.

Battle for yellow will be epic. I could see it going 10 different ways. If Froome hadn’t done the Giro, I’d say forget about it, but he did.

Battle for Green goes through Sagan, but the Sprints should be very competitive. I think there will be a bunch of photo finishes.

There will be some great storylines.

Potentially the best Tour in years coming up.

Gaviria could battle Sagan for green, but don't think anyone else is in competition there.

As for yellow, the UCI already gave us that answer today. Froome isn't accountable for anything he does. So me no point in bothering and if the stages are on TV I'm certainly not going to track them down on line.

Can Froome win? Of course. But a lot could go wrong for him too. Even if he’s leading deep into the race, the others will always give themselves a chance because he did the Giro. One bad day on those big mountain stages and he’s done.

Unfortunately the decision today says otherwise. So no the result is a forgone conclusion because of today's decision. Because of today's decision I'll be shocked if he has one of those bad days that he SHOULD have.

 

[42x16ss]

Re: Re:

I can’t wait for the race.

Battle for yellow will be epic. I could see it going 10 different ways. If Froome hadn’t done the Giro, I’d say forget about it, but he did.

Battle for Green goes through Sagan, but the Sprints should be very competitive. I think there will be a bunch of photo finishes.

There will be some great storylines.

Potentially the best Tour in years coming up.

Gaviria could battle Sagan for green, but don't think anyone else is in competition there.

As for yellow, the UCI already gave us that answer today. Froome isn't accountable for anything he does. So me no point in bothering and if the stages are on TV I'm certainly not going to track them down on line.

Matthews has been ridiculously strong since coming back from injury, if his speed is back to its normal level in time he’s a genuine contender.

 

[dacooley]

entertaining to read numerous contributors who just yesterday were going to end up with watching cycling but ultimately could overcome themselves and find a new object of worship - nibali's woodoo!

Porte
Froome
Landa

 

[Oliwright]

JEEES Koronin, dude move over to the clinic and go talk there, no one wants to read 40 messages from you across threads implying Froome is doping.
Hey mods can you explain to Koronin the rules of the clinic and also that people are meant to keep to the relevant thread topics? Just because a few of the mods aren't happy about today's result doesn't mean the rules shouldn't be followed.

 

[Sartorius]

Podium: Froome, Roglič, Latour
1st yellow: Groenenwegen
Most Wins: Sagan (3)
Green: Sagan
KoM: Barguil
White: Bernal

Biggest disappointment - Quintana & Kittel

 

[Oliwright]

Re:

Podium: Froome, Roglič, Latour
1st yellow: Groenenwegen
Most Wins: Sagan (3)
Green: Sagan
KoM: Barguil
White: Bernal

Biggest disappointment - Quintana & Kittel

Now a Lator podium is bold. I've never understood why he gets so much hype off relatively small performances. Also Roglic is a great pic, it's hard to predict however if he'll finish top 5 or 25th.

 

[silvergrenade]

JEEES Koronin, dude move over to the clinic and go talk there, no one wants to read 40 messages from you across threads implying Froome is doping.
Hey mods can you explain to Koronin the rules of the clinic and also that people are meant to keep to the relevant thread topics? Just because a few of the mods aren't happy about today's result doesn't mean the rules shouldn't be followed.

Seriously..
This guy is making me cringe...
And he's a supporter of clean Piti LMAO :lol:

 

[SafeBet]

Re:

Podium: Quintana, Froome, D. Martin
1st yellow: Groenewegen
Most Wins: Quintana 3
Green: Sagan
KoM: Bardet
White: G. Martin

Porte, Zaka, Landa and Bardet won't survive the first week (or will lose 10+ minutes)
Vanmarcke will win the Roubaix stage
No wins for Cav
TTT - Sunweb
Dan Martin will start week 2 with a 5 minutes gap and go for an epic comeback, being the strongest rider in week 3. Unfortunately it won't be enough for the overall win.

 

[Gigs_98]

Winner: Froome
First yellow: Froome
TTT winner: Froome, team sky gets 2nd
Green: Froome
KoM: Froome
White: Froome (The ASO originally wants to ban Froome from this competition but sky uses their lawyers and an independent study about dogs is released which confirms there is a chance Froome is actually a dog, 33 is actually his dog age and his human and therefore young riders competition relevant age is 4)

On a more serious note, I have no clue what's gonna happen. Froome might absolutely steamroll this race and this edition could be worse than 2016 but I still think there is a reasonable chance we will see a good race. Let's not forget Contador was the outstanding favorite prior to the 2011 tour but it turned out we underrated the effect of the giro. Maybe we are making the same mistake again.

 

[SKSemtex]

My prediction: only one Sky rider in top 10. Yes, on papers they are by far the strongest team. They have probably 3-4 riders that could win the Tour. But this year it is going to be really hard for Sky doms. (one less)
Probably for a first time we will see united peloton against Sky. No more waiting. No more mercies. The opposite is more likely. If they lose one or two riders before stage 10, there is no way they can hold Movistar trio in the mountains.

Froome is better very lucky on stage 9. He has strong cobbles riders in the team. But can he afford to burn them all first half of Tour?

This tour will be epic. No doubt. As much as I hate the decisions of UCI (in spite of the fact I like Froome, he should pay his price, as everybody who was caught.) I am glad that he is riding so we have the winner without asterisks.


Let the game begin.

 

[SKSemtex]

Re:

Groenwegan is my prediction to be the star of this years tour. To bad for Ewan not getting included.

In terms of GC the winner will need three things:
1. A strong TTT team
2. The ability to do a good ITT
3. Not losing massive time on stage 9 or on any of the 3 MTFs.

I only see 6 riders that have a possibility of winning
Froome
Thomas
Bernal
Porte
Roglic
Dumoulin


My prediction then is:

1. Porte
2. Thomas
3. Froome
4. Bernal
5. Quintana

While Porte is the clear favorite odds are he will crash out or get left behind on the cobbles. But I feel inclined to pick him to barely hang on.

But with the TTT and Skys cobble team this tour could easily come down to which sky rider does the best ITT with no one else close.

My hope is to see Cav win a stage but I doubt he even gets a top 5. I am thinking there is a good chance EBH takes over as a sprinter after a few stages for DDD.

Never ever underestimate Nibali

3 Sky riders in top 5. :surprised: :lol:

 

[tobydawq]

My prediction: only one Sky rider in top 10. Yes, on papers they are by far the strongest team. They have probably 3-4 riders that could win the Tour. But this year it is going to be really hard for Sky doms. (one less)
Probably for a first time we will see united peloton against Sky. No more waiting. No more mercies. The opposite is more likely. If they lose one or two riders before stage 10, there is no way they can hold Movistar trio in the mountains.

Froome is better very lucky on stage 9. He has strong cobbles riders in the team. But can he afford to burn them all first half of Tour?

This tour will be epic. No doubt. As much as I hate the decisions of UCI (in spite of the fact I like Froome, he should pay his price, as everybody who was caught.) I am glad that he is riding so we have the winner without asterisks.


Let the game begin.

This is the spirit!

 

[wouterkaas]

But this year it is going to be really hard for Sky doms. (one less

Remember that Geraint Thomas crashed out last year before things got really exciting and Sky managed just fine with 8 riders, while other teams still had 9.

 

[wheresmybrakes]

Podium: Porte, Nibali, Roglic

Green: Groenewegen

KOM: Quintana

White: Bernal

Next biggest Froome fan: Koronin

I would probably have gone for Froome on the podium, but I have a feeling something bad is gonna happen on course because of recent activity and he will DNF. Hopefully not though.

 

[SKSemtex]

But this year it is going to be really hard for Sky doms. (one less

Remember that Geraint Thomas crashed out last year before things got really exciting and Sky managed just fine with 8 riders, while other teams still had 9.

I remember but as I said I have a feeling this year it is going to be different. (hopefully no more Sky ally)
Competition is much better in GC. Each dom will be worth gold on the end. Especially if Movistar has 3 people who can win the whole Tour and can attack from far.

What a pity TDF miss real hard Ardennes type stages

 

[movingtarget]

Richie's opportunity to become the white knight ? Porte, Quintana Froome for the podium then Nibali and Fuglsang and Yates. Wishful thinking more than logic .......of course. Landa is a big if as he is unpredictable. Uran could crack the top five without surprising. The top 10 is incredibly difficult as it's so open. Thomas should be thereabouts if he doesn't crash into Richie or vice versa. If Zakarin survives the descents and the cobbles he could do okay. Very open.The other jerseys don't interest me much this year as the GC is so interesting.

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

Well, the French punched Merckx in the gut once, making him lose that TDF.