Tour de France 2016 route prediction

[Gigs_98]

To be fair, although the flat stages are absolutely horrible, there are still only 4 flat stages in the first week which is less than usually. The problem is rather that all the stages which are new and we haven't see profiles for are completely boring. Especially for stage 10 and the stage to Bern I thought there would be some interesting hills, but even these profiles look absolutely horrible. A great route for pure climbers and pure sprinters like Kittel but pretty bad for riders like Sagan or Van Avermaat.

Oh, and the categorizations are absolutely ridiculous. Arcalis is HC although the climb this time is even easier than for example in 2009, Grand Colombier is also HC, but 2 stages later the Col de la Forclaz which is both steeper and longer (and generally definitely a HC climb) is only 1st category, and even in the same stage the definitely easier mtf is rated HC again. And last but not least on stage 20 the Ramaz is 1st category and the similar Joux Plane HC. That just all doesnt make sense.

 

[portugal11]

This route is a mess, horrible horrible horrible!!! Where are stages for pure attackers like wellens? Second week has too many flat stages

 

[portugal11]

To be fair, although the flat stages are absolutely horrible, there are still only 4 flat stages in the first week which is less than usually. The problem is rather that all the stages which are new and we haven't see profiles for are completely boring. Especially for stage 10 and the stage to Bern I thought there would be some interesting hills, but even these profiles look absolutely horrible. A great route for pure climbers and pure sprinters like Kittel but pretty bad for riders like Sagan or Van Avermaat.

Oh, and the categorizations are absolutely ridiculous. Arcalis is HC although the climb this time is even easier than for example in 2009, Grand Colombier is also HC, but 2 stages later the Col de la Forclaz which is both steeper and longer (and generally definitely a HC climb) is only 1st category, and even in the same stage the definitely easier mtf is rated HC again. And last but not least on stage 20 the Ramaz is 1st category and the similar Joux Plane HC. That just all doesnt make sense.

You forgot the altitude

 

[Broken_Leg]

You forgot the altitude

Is it ironic ?

Because there is almost no altitude difference in each of the two examples given by Gigs:
Forclaz is 1526 m high vs Grand Colombier @ 1498.
And in the other example : Ramaz is 1610 m vs Joux Plane @ 1691.

 

[Netserk]

Ramaz has always been 1st cat and Joux Plane HC.

Both have the correct categorization according to Linkinito's graph:

Ramaz has a difficulty score (Length * Average grade^2) of 701
Joux Plana has a difficulty score (Length * Average grade^2) of 838


Forclaz on the other hand...

 

[Miburo]

Eh i'm ok with the route, i've seen way worse in recent years

 

[Gigs_98]

Re:

Eh i'm ok with the route, i've seen way worse in recent years

Yeah, I think that if we would have gotten those profiles in autumn nobody would have complained, but now all the mountain stages are nothing new anymore and all the stages which are new for us are horrible.

 

[Red Rick]

They made it so Kittel is gonna win the stage with the highest climb in the Tour. it's that *** awful

 

[Gigs_98]

Re:

They made it so Kittel is gonna win the stage with the highest climb in the Tour. it's that **** awful

Kittel wont be able to get over the little bump near the finish...hopefully

 

[Valv.Piti]

Re: Re:

Eh i'm ok with the route, i've seen way worse in recent years

Yeah, I think that if we would have gotten those profiles in autumn nobody would have complained, but now all the mountain stages are nothing new anymore and all the stages which are new for us are horrible.

I agree with this assessment. Hopefully the sprinters won't win in Revel and Bern and if they do, they should work very, very hard for it. 7-9 sprints stages.. too much. Where are the stages for the classic specialists, the good rouleurs, the punchers? Stage 2?

Edit: Anyways, I like the route very much. Notice the first 6 days average +200 kilometres which is great! Stage 5 is a good little appetiser for the upcoming Pyrenees which I also like a lot - I didnt realise the descent from Aspin only was 6 kilometres. Definitely Froome and Sky-terrain. The minus is that Arcalis looks like the hardest stage on paper.

 

[Red Rick]

How the hell is Forclaz a cat 1? Anyway, mountain stages are nice. I like the 3 descent finishes. Apart from that, nothing really stands out, the Culoz stage starts great, but it could be so much better I think. There's no great spots to attack from far out. For the rest, sooo many unintersting stages that just do nothing. 9 sprint opportunities?! But hey, gotta keep dem Germans happy since they're getting back into cycling.

Basically, it's 10 sprints (one uphill), 1 medium mountain stage, 8 high mountain stages, 1MTT, and a medium length, hilly TT.

This tour is a shipwreck.

 

[Tonton]

It's a decent design IMO. Better than many in recent history. Mine (in the Design thread) is better tho' .

But the priorities are different: ASO historically looks for the $, then writes a story...like the BS in '14, the tribute to Verdun, when the battle took place in 1916 . Verdun petitioned for being on this year's map. Nope...instead, until it was cancelled due to public outcry, a rap concert was scheduled. That, in a nutshell, summarizes the ASO-French Government lack of vision, lack of respect for the sport and the country.

Make a contest each year, let the Libertine Seguros of the world do the job, and you get the TdF that all the posts above want to see. Pay the winner 10K. Or free VIP pass, accommodations and ride in the red car for three weeks. Whatever.

The entire Atlantic coast, and the North to a certain extend, are a nightmare for a good design. But I roved it's possible to be creative and do something good. And I'm not the smartest guy on the planet.

At the end of the day, it's up to ASO and France to put the TdF first and their interests second.

 

[Valv.Piti]

Im still waiting for Libertine to chime in and wreck Prudhomme.

 

[Tonton]

Re:

Im still waiting for Libertine to chime in and wreck Prudhomme.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

It's so uninspiring that I can't even summon up the effort to properly dissect it. Stage 5 is a pretty good mid-first-week GC shakedown that will help prevent the péloton being so nervous, since all I can see happening in the first four stages are stupid and avoidable crashes that take a few people out, Marcel Kittel winning stage 1, announcing he doesn't care about defending his jersey on stage 2 because there's a hill, but the organizers desperately want him to wear leader's jerseys anyway because they don't care about people respecting their race, and some pre-arranged breaks being held at 3-4 minutes. Stage 2 at least has an uphill finish so whoever wins that gets the jersey for three days. I guess stage 7 could give us some action, but Aspin, meh. I am ready for Luchon to have a decade-long stretch away from the Tour, and I would gladly carve down the mountain that the Tourmalet is built on for the Japanese to build another off-shore city. Then in stage 9 we have an MTF (logically placed in the position best suited to neuter racing on the much superior stages 7 and 8) to the outright worst MTF in the history of the Tour, while avoiding the tougher connecting passes. Stage 10 would only be interesting if VINO à la 2010. I'm concerned at the frequency of Ventoux in recent years, part of its lustre was due to the rarity of climbing it so that, unlike Alpe d'Huez which was every other year, a victory there still seemed special; while it's a great climb for a one-climb stage as it's so tough it guarantees gaps anyway, it will also mess up the GPM. The complete MORONS at ASO have YET AGAIN put a pointless, unnecessary flat stage on the penultimate weekend, with almost nothing but mountains or TTs either side. This now seems like it's a deliberate ploy to irritate cycling fans who have the temerity to work Monday to Friday and earn a living the way the vast majority of people in the whole of the world they're marketing do. "If you want to see cycling that doesn't involve Marcel Kittel, you've got to book holiday to watch our crappy Le Bettex stage!" I sure as hell won't be booking any time off to see any of this sorry spectacle. That said, the Culoz stage is very good, but the Berne stage is downright insulting. I love the Col de la Gueulaz, but placing that stage a day before a tough uphill ITT seems counter-intuitive. Le Bettex is dire. The Morzine stage is actually pretty good, but this does mean an entire week of stages you could throw a small blanket over for their geographical diversity. It's almost as bad as the first week of the Vuelta.

Just garbage, generally. 2004 Giro-level bad.

 

[CheckMyPecs]

It might have escaped some of you that creating a GT route is rather more difficult than just drawing lines on a map. Logistics and financing are two important factors.

 

[Red Rick]

Libertine Seguros on route or race analysis. Never disappoints

 

[Valv.Piti]

And there it was!

I think you are a little harsh on the GC-relevant stages. Le Bettex is rather anticlimactic, yes, but you didn't mention the Forclaz-Emosson combo on stage 17! And the finale towards Arcalis is rather hard. I've seen much, much worse.
I think we all agree that the other stages suck tho. Really, really uninspiring...

 

[Squire]

Add 50km of flat TT, mix up the order of the Pyrenean stages and add some spice to one or two flat stages, and you have a great route. I don't mind a few obvious breakaway stages. Some stages will be raced conservatively anyway, regardless of how they're designed, unless we have a Giro 2010 race situation.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Re:

It might have escaped some of you that creating a GT route is rather more difficult than just drawing lines on a map. Logistics and financing are two important factors.

Yes, and in some cases what they do is fine. In other cases, they could get between the towns that are hosting via much more interesting routes without a detrimental effect on the logistics. It's not something I've done but a couple of posters on the RDT have tried re-designing previous GT stages or routes using only the same host towns and logistical links. Stages through the Gironde and so on, they're always going to be sprint stages. But stages like the one to Bern is Österreichrundfahrt level deliberately avoiding the obstacles.

Valv.Piti, I did mention Emosson - the Col de la Gueulaz is the "pass" at the dam on the MTF there and was always what the climb was called before they started to pay to host the race. It's similar to saying "La Farrapona" instead of "Lagos de Somiedo" or "El Purche" instead of "Alto de Monachíl"; both the same climb, no confusion intended.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Re:

Add 50km of flat TT, mix up the order of the Pyrenean stages and add some spice to one or two flat stages, and you have a great route. I don't mind a few obvious breakaway stages. Some stages will be raced conservatively anyway, regardless of how they're designed, unless we have a Giro 2010 race situation.

Agree with the need for a long flat TT. I hate the Megève TT and its placement. But the Pyrenean stages need more than mixing up the order. The Andorra stage needs nuking. The stage is far too easy for an Arcalis finish because of that climb's aura, to make gaps there they will need to ensure legs are properly tired beforehand to an extent not made possible by grinding at 4% on the Port del Cantò; if they're going to finish there they need to do something like La Gallina-Beixalis-Arcalis and then it wouldn't be too bad tbh; otherwise use another station (the same people who operate the Arcalis station operate Pal and Arinsal, the latter of which I'd prefer, before anybody throws the financing argument at me).

You will always get some conservatively-raced stages, but here they're almost begging for riders to do nothing; the only stages that don't reward the cowards are stages 5, 8 (hopefully the weakness of Arcalis as a mountaintop will mean this isn't impeded as much as better-designed stages often are by MTFs or TTs the next day), 15 and arguably 20.

 

[Valv.Piti]

"But the Pyrenean stages need more than mixing up the order. The Andorra stage needs nuking."

I don't quite agree I must admit. I think the review after it was released was very good among CN-posters comparatively to previous years, I'd say about 7/10 in average, no? So whats your take after seeing all stages... surely, that isn't more bad than 2006, 2009, 2012, fx?

 

[MikeTichondrius]

There's not a lot of medium mountain here. It's the Lioran stage and I guess Payolle as just the Aspin doesn't really qualify as a mountain stage IMO (Colombier is a different beast).

I'd consider Lioran, Finhaut and the Grand Colombier stages to be the most interesting stages here as the Morzine finish, albeit a great one, isn't much of a surprise IMO.

Thing is, most of the others seem to have at least room for some gripes...All the climbs are really spaced out between each other like Ramaz to Joux-Plane, Bonaigua-Cantò-Beixalis, Bisanne-Bettex. Others are mostly one-climbs except for Colombier and the Luchon stage (and they do it pretty much every year, heh!). I think everyone was mostly happy about ASO showing willingness to try new stuff. I never expected to see Bisanne in the TDF with Les Saisies right next door. I'm really hyped for Finhaut and a *maybe* proper Grand Colombier stage.

Also I think Arcalis might be actually good this time around.

 

[Red Rick]

Re:

"But the Pyrenean stages need more than mixing up the order. The Andorra stage needs nuking."

I don't quite agree I must admit. I think the review after it was released was very good among CN-posters comparatively to previous years, I'd say about 7/10 in average, no? So whats your take after seeing all stages... surely, that isn't more bad than 2006, 2009, 2012, fx?

Lol, I was at least hoping for there to be some interesting stages beside the ones we got to see already dammit. Now all I got to see extra is like 10 sprints, a medium mountain stage and the Lac Payolle stage

 

[Tonton]

Re:

It might have escaped some of you that creating a GT route is rather more difficult than just drawing lines on a map. Logistics and financing are two important factors.

Financing: you said/wrote it. To my point. Since when is it OK to for for maximum $ at the expense of...well pretty much everything else.

When French taxpayers finance the police, road blocks, security, don't hey deserve to actually see the TdF? Or do they need to move to Bourg d'Oisans?