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Tour de France 2019

Page 42 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
I’m probably in the minority but I thought this tour was rather pedestrian. Never felt there was a signature moment that I could point to that made me say wow what a race. The green jersey was a foregone conclusion. Love Sagan and the way he races but there was no real drama involved with the green jersey at any point. We all know that Romain Bardet is not the best climber in the race. I don’t even think he’s in the top 10.

This tour was about the haves and have nots. A few teams dominated the stages everyone else was anonymous. With the exception of Warren Barguil, the four Conti teams were invisible. The same could be said for EF, CCC, UAE & Katusha. Astana was active but tactically lost. Team Ineos did enough to secure the top two spots on the podium but it didn’t feel dominate at all. Egan Bernal is a deserving champion. This is but the first of many Grand Tour wins. This tour will be remembered for Julian Alaphilippe but is that enough? 5/10
 
In the 2009 Vuelta, the highest placed GC rider with a stage win was Philip Deignan, in 9th. Juan José Cobo, in 10th, also won a stage; this has now been altered following the erasure of Cobo's results to mean that eventual maillot oro winner Alejandro Valverde is awarded the latter stage win. Deignan won stage 18, Cobo stage 19. But obviously Cobo was there at the time and that result stood for a decade.

After Deignan and Cobo, the next best placed rider in the GC to have won a stage was David Moncoutié, in 27th, although Damiano Cunego had been well placed before his abandon.
 
Re:

Libertine Seguros said:
In the 2009 Vuelta, the highest placed GC rider with a stage win was Philip Deignan, in 9th. Juan José Cobo, in 10th, also won a stage; this has now been altered following the erasure of Cobo's results to mean that eventual maillot oro winner Alejandro Valverde is awarded the latter stage win. Deignan won stage 18, Cobo stage 19. But obviously Cobo was there at the time and that result stood for a decade.

After Deignan and Cobo, the next best placed rider in the GC to have won a stage was David Moncoutié, in 27th, although Damiano Cunego had been well placed before his abandon.

I was asking about le Tour, but this is interesting.

The 2009 Vuelta had to be one of the most conservatively ridden GTs I can remember seeing....boring as heck LOL!
 
Re:

WildspokeJoe said:
I’m probably in the minority but I thought this tour was rather pedestrian. Never felt there was a signature moment that I could point to that made me say wow what a race. The green jersey was a foregone conclusion. Love Sagan and the way he races but there was no real drama involved with the green jersey at any point. We all know that Romain Bardet is not the best climber in the race. I don’t even think he’s in the top 10.

This tour was about the haves and have nots. A few teams dominated the stages everyone else was anonymous. With the exception of Warren Barguil, the four Conti teams were invisible. The same could be said for EF, CCC, UAE & Katusha. Astana was active but tactically lost. Team Ineos did enough to secure the top two spots on the podium but it didn’t feel dominate at all. Egan Bernal is a deserving champion. This is but the first of many Grand Tour wins. This tour will be remembered for Julian Alaphilippe but is that enough? 5/10

I agree. I was remarking to somebody earlier that the Tour usually feels like the world championship of GC riders, but this Tour definitely didn't feel like that.

No Froome, no Dumoulin, Pinot injured, Nibali and Quintana seemingly spent forces in the GC sense, and Bardet and Aru stuck in purgatory.

I think back to the start of the 2015 Tour when Froome, Contador, Nibali and Quintana all seemed like genuinely 9/10, world class GC contenders and the finest their generation had to offer. It was the best against the best.

This year may go down as the first of Bernal's 500 GT wins, and to be fair, I might slightly remember the weirdness of Stage 19 being cancelled mid-stage - which sums up the tour: lost opportunities. And it was wide open for quite a while. But it was wide open for people like Kruijswijk and Buchmann (Louis Meintjes in disguise), who, with peace and love, probably won't go down as icons of this era.

4/10
 
Needless to say that this edition leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

Since the time of Laurent Fignon, this was the first Tour when the strongest rider in the race was French. And he left injured without even crashing out.

I wanted Bernal to win the stage to Tignes and seal his overall victory with an epic solo ride to ease the pain, but Mother Nature thought otherwise.
 
Re:

Alexandre B. said:
Needless to say that this edition leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

Since the time of Laurent Fignon, this was the first Tour when the strongest rider in the race was French. And he left injured without even crashing out.

I wanted Bernal to win the stage to Tignes and seal his overall victory with an epic solo ride to ease the pain, but Mother Nature thought otherwise.
Completely agree. Super entertaining Tour, but with the Pinot injury, the ending missed a the big explanation that would either crowned Pinot, or made Bernal's win even more special. Instead we got Kruijswijk and Buchmann riding not to lose...
 
Overall, at best average level. In normal circumstances Pino wins. Alaphilippe's exploits gave the race some excitement but in the end the inevitable Sky 1-2 happened and they were not even trying that hard (maybe not being able to). The last two shortened stages put out of misery a few riders.
 
Re: Re:

Forever The Best said:
Red Rick said:
roundabout said:
Right, brainfade.

Highest GT MTF then?
Not close.

The Tour has finished on the Galibier at 2640ish, the Giro on the Stelvio at 2750ish, and the Vuelta on the Sierra Nevada at 2550ish IIRC.
roundabout is talking about the stage to Iseran. ;)
Riiiight.

Then I guess yes. Except no stage winner was awarded and the official thing is that it was neutralised.
 
How many teams will consider this Tour a success I wonder?

Ineos came first and second, but somehow despite that weren't anywhere near as dominant as in the past.
Jumbo-Visma have a podium and four stages.
Bora: 4th, one stage and the green jersey
DQS 5th, three stages
Movistar 6th,8th,9th and the team classification and a stage, but still disappointing
EF and Arkea complete the top 10.
Lotto win three stsges.
MItchelton-Scott got 4 stages, Bahrain 2, FDJ 1, but their GC ambitions came to nothing.
AG2R didn't come for the dots.
Trek invisible bar Ciccone's stint in yellow.

There were 9 other teams in the race.
 
Re:

Northerner said:
How many teams will consider this Tour a success I wonder?

Ineos came first and second, but somehow despite that weren't anywhere near as dominant as in the past.
Jumbo-Visma have a podium and four stages.
Bora: 4th, one stage and the green jersey
DQS 5th, three stages
Movistar 6th,8th,9th and the team classification and a stage, but still disappointing
EF and Arkea complete the top 10.
Lotto win three stsges.
MItchelton-Scott got 4 stages, Bahrain 2, FDJ 1, but their GC ambitions came to nothing.
AG2R didn't come for the dots.
Trek invisible bar Ciccone's stint in yellow.

There were 9 other teams in the race.

For mine:

Top tier:
Ineos - teams depth much weaker than ever before but job done with 1-2 on GC.
Jumbo Visma - stage wins with multiple riders, 1st yellow jersey and a podium finish in Paris.
DQS - sprint win, early hilly stage win and yellow jersey then the biggest story for French cycling in a generation. 5th still a massive result for them.
Bora - The expected green jersey procession and the bonus of a coming of age 4th for Buchmann.
Lotto Soudal - career defining performance from Caleb Ewan demonstrating the signifying was a great move by team and rider with De Gendt and his unique glorious victory plus a valiant challenge from Tim Wellens.

Mid pack:
FDJ - Did little wrong and their race fell apart through heartbreak not bad racing. Great stage win but the what if will linger for a long long time.
MS - Fabulous stage hunting haul and could have had the KoM as well without the truncated Alps stages but they came to ride GC for Adam Yates who had a terrible race.
Bahrain - two MTF wins was a highly respectable haul for a team without any riders likely to go high in GC.
Movistar - won the annual Movistar prize aka team classification but to have 3 in top ten GC but none in the top 5 shows they had strength but failed to harness it well. Good stage win.
AG2R - Flirted with the bottom tier for me as Bardet never got into the GC battle though showed good heart and spirit to reset and salvage a polka dot jersey.
Arkea-Samsic - no wins but Barguil returned to some lovely form and Gesbert got in plenty of breaks.
Wanty Gobert - given their budget they were more visible than you could expect and Meurisse was sensational for the first two weeks.

Bottom tier:
Katusha - Zakarin and Politt did their best to carve out a result but came up empty handed. For a world tour team more should have been delivered.
Trek - Early fun with Ciccone in yellow but Porte GC was the all in plan and while he avoided the bad luck that has plagued him the form was not quite there.
Total Direct Energie - never looked like winning and the punishment ride was almost cruel to watch when they missed a big breakaway.
Cofidis - Perichon deserves an honourable mention but they would have hoped for much more from Jesus Herrada.
Astana - Unlucky to lose Fuglsang to falls but their stage hunting never convinced and only Lutsenko really shone.
EF - Tried hard and prominent in breaks but Uran did not have the legs to challenge the best and Woods not able to hold the best in the breaks either.
Dimension Data - pound for pound the worst team in the race and so bad I nearly forgot their name.
UAE - Dan Martin failed in the mountains and the only real bright spot was a promising debut for Jasper Philipsen.
CCC - GVA did a very creditable GC position but ultimately meaningless and a team packed with stage hunters failed to bring home the bacon.
 
Re: Re:

hayneplane said:
Northerner said:
How many teams will consider this Tour a success I wonder?

Ineos came first and second, but somehow despite that weren't anywhere near as dominant as in the past.
Jumbo-Visma have a podium and four stages.
Bora: 4th, one stage and the green jersey
DQS 5th, three stages
Movistar 6th,8th,9th and the team classification and a stage, but still disappointing
EF and Arkea complete the top 10.
Lotto win three stsges.
MItchelton-Scott got 4 stages, Bahrain 2, FDJ 1, but their GC ambitions came to nothing.
AG2R didn't come for the dots.
Trek invisible bar Ciccone's stint in yellow.

There were 9 other teams in the race.

For mine:

Top tier:
Ineos - teams depth much weaker than ever before but job done with 1-2 on GC.
Jumbo Visma - stage wins with multiple riders, 1st yellow jersey and a podium finish in Paris.
DQS - sprint win, early hilly stage win and yellow jersey then the biggest story for French cycling in a generation. 5th still a massive result for them.
Bora - The expected green jersey procession and the bonus of a coming of age 4th for Buchmann.
Lotto Soudal - career defining performance from Caleb Ewan demonstrating the signifying was a great move by team and rider with De Gendt and his unique glorious victory plus a valiant challenge from Tim Wellens.

Mid pack:
FDJ - Did little wrong and their race fell apart through heartbreak not bad racing. Great stage win but the what if will linger for a long long time.
MS - Fabulous stage hunting haul and could have had the KoM as well without the truncated Alps stages but they came to ride GC for Adam Yates who had a terrible race.
Bahrain - two MTF wins was a highly respectable haul for a team without any riders likely to go high in GC.
Movistar - won the annual Movistar prize aka team classification but to have 3 in top ten GC but none in the top 5 shows they had strength but failed to harness it well. Good stage win.
AG2R - Flirted with the bottom tier for me as Bardet never got into the GC battle though showed good heart and spirit to reset and salvage a polka dot jersey.
Arkea-Samsic - no wins but Barguil returned to some lovely form and Gesbert got in plenty of breaks.
Wanty Gobert - given their budget they were more visible than you could expect and Meurisse was sensational for the first two weeks.

Bottom tier:
Katusha - Zakarin and Politt did their best to carve out a result but came up empty handed. For a world tour team more should have been delivered.
Trek - Early fun with Ciccone in yellow but Porte GC was the all in plan and while he avoided the bad luck that has plagued him the form was not quite there.
Total Direct Energie - never looked like winning and the punishment ride was almost cruel to watch when they missed a big breakaway.
Cofidis - Perichon deserves an honourable mention but they would have hoped for much more from Jesus Herrada.
Astana - Unlucky to lose Fuglsang to falls but their stage hunting never convinced and only Lutsenko really shone.
EF - Tried hard and prominent in breaks but Uran did not have the legs to challenge the best and Woods not able to hold the best in the breaks either.
Dimension Data - pound for pound the worst team in the race and so bad I nearly forgot their name.
UAE - Dan Martin failed in the mountains and the only real bright spot was a promising debut for Jasper Philipsen.
CCC - GVA did a very creditable GC position but ultimately meaningless and a team packed with stage hunters failed to bring home the bacon.

Good summary. Re: DD - wow, yeah. I don't remember a mention of Cummings or EBH who could certainly contend stages like the Gap stage normally, and Kreuziger 16th on GC without ever being in a leading group that I can recall.
 
Re: Re:

hayneplane said:
Northerner said:
How many teams will consider this Tour a success I wonder?

Ineos came first and second, but somehow despite that weren't anywhere near as dominant as in the past.
Jumbo-Visma have a podium and four stages.
Bora: 4th, one stage and the green jersey
DQS 5th, three stages
Movistar 6th,8th,9th and the team classification and a stage, but still disappointing
EF and Arkea complete the top 10.
Lotto win three stsges.
MItchelton-Scott got 4 stages, Bahrain 2, FDJ 1, but their GC ambitions came to nothing.
AG2R didn't come for the dots.
Trek invisible bar Ciccone's stint in yellow.

There were 9 other teams in the race.

For mine:

Top tier:
...

Mid pack:
...

Bottom tier:
...
.

Is really Sunweb not worth to mention? ;)

Personally, I find their decision to stop fighting for points with Matthews very strange.
 

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