Tour de France 2020 | Stage 15 (Lyon - Grand Colombier, 174.5 km)

[happytramp]

Sagan looks like the clear favorite for green now. Will snatch some points on stages 16 and 18 and then blow Bennett away on stage 19. Even a win in Paris probably won't be enough for Bennett.

Hmmm, i guess that's one way of looking at it. I suppose it could play out exactly like that.... Assuming BORA control every stage and rein in every break from here to Paris.

 

[Leinster]

Sagan looks like the clear favorite for green now. Will snatch some points on stages 16 and 18 and then blow Bennett away on stage 19. Even a win in Paris probably won't be enough for Bennett.

The stage 18 sprint is 13km of false flat into the day.

Stage 16 does have it after 45km with a cat 4 and some tricky stuff in and out of Voiron, but it should take a bit more than that to actually shell Benett out of the peloton.

Stage 19 is a break day. Bora will get about as much out of that as they got today at best.

But it is going to be an exciting race.

 

[LeoMontero]

To be honest I expect N. Quintana to lose the Tour tomorrow. His third crash was quite nasty.

I think Nairo has marked this stage at the begining, but with the crash on friday his chances for tomorrow are done is my guess.
He will try to hang as much as he can and try to limit his loses, and probably try to heal for tuesday-wednesday-thursday.
The other thing with his team is, they will let him attack no matter what, or they are just good enough with a top 5-10. Because i think Arkea in a top 10 is really good for them, and the chance to loose everything is big if Nairo decides to attack and loose.
If he decides to attack, the best thing is Dayer, Barguil and Winner to put a hard tempo in the first mountain, why??? because if they let TJV do the job, at least winer and dayer wont get to colombier with the GC group. so better is to burn matches when you have them. try to isolate the more GC contender as posible, and then is mano a mano from the second mountain to the finish.
My guess, Nairo is not good for the crash, he will not atack and the team will try to save energy for the final week.
My fear, Nairo cant hang with the GC group in the first or second mountain and loose all.
My hope, what i describe before and nuclear attack in the second mountain, ally with someone to cover the valley, and get a lot of time.

 

[Tonton]

Not choosing the GC via Anglefort puzzles me. And to the last post, Arkea can't burn their ammo early on: they will have nothing left when the two big teams still have 2-3 riders. Attacking on LSDF is a huge gamble, that's when you kill doms who pace but are not pure climbers. I'd love to see that and the mayhem that follows. The problem is: Contador is retired.

The break will still be alive in the GC. What JV and Skyneos do will dictate how much of a gap. That's unchartered territory for Sir Dave and his boys. And Skyneos may have the beginning of an inferiority complex. All they know is pace hard...JV can pace harder...Froome isn't there.

I'm afraid that GC wise, we'll see little. Unless Pog tries something...but now, he may begin to think that he has something to defend.

OK...Pinot recovered enough to be in the break and win this bike race. What did you expect ?

 

[gregrowlerson]

Would have loved this to finish in Culoz and have hade a HC MTF in Pyrenees instead.

I would have agreed, but those Pyrenees stages turned out to be surprisingly great.

It's more stage 10 I would change.

 

[CyclistAbi]

If nothing happens tomorrow, stage 15, this will still be an exciting stage.

 

[gregrowlerson]

These profiles somehow always seem to look harder than the cyclingcols ones.

Anyway, I simply can't decide if this profile is great, or just not quit good enough, but I think it should be good enough and if the racing is lame it's not really due to the climb.

Google-Ergebnis für https://nathanarnold.wordpress.com/files/2009/02/ssim51.gif

images.app.goo.gl

 

[Koronin]

Not choosing the GC via Anglefort puzzles me. And to the last post, Arkea can't burn their ammo early on: they will have nothing left when the two big teams still have 2-3 riders. Attacking on LSDF is a huge gamble, that's when you kill doms who pace but are not pure climbers. I'd love to see that and the mayhem that follows. The problem is: Contador is retired.

The break will still be alive in the GC. What JV and Skyneos do will dictate how much of a gap. That's unchartered territory for Sir Dave and his boys. And Skyneos may have the beginning of an inferiority complex. All they know is pace hard...JV can pace harder...Froome isn't there.

I'm afraid that GC wise, we'll see little. Unless Pog tries something...but now, he may begin to think that he has something to defend.

OK...Pinot recovered enough to be in the break and win this bike race. What did you expect ?

If Pinot has recovered at all, I could see him trying for the break and a stage win.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Little Richie looked very good on the climb, when they rode it in l'Ain. I hope he can overtake some of the colombians in front of him in GC, but realistically he is only going to pass Adam "I'm not going for GC" Yates.

I like this. I think it's the equivalent of John "you can trust me around your wife" Terry.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Sepp Kuss's birthday is tomorrow. Sadly I can't see him winning like it happened in vuelta, too much battle for GC

Obvious Sepp Kuss win on steep MTF is obvious.

 

[gregrowlerson]

This stage should, no - let's think positively - will be epic! It's perfectly placed at the end of week 2, so we have a rest day tomorrow, and the riders have suffered at the end of stage 13, and for much of stage 14.

With three fantastic climbs - climbs that are much tougher than what we saw on stage 8 - I don't see this stage being disappointing because of a little bit of valley.

 

[broppo]

dani martinez for the win, whether the break wins or the gc guys depends on ineos imo.

 

[movingtarget]

Little Richie looked very good on the climb, when they rode it in l'Ain. I hope he can overtake some of the colombians in front of him in GC, but realistically he is only going to pass Adam "I'm not going for GC" Yates.

i think you are overrating some of the top 10 riders in front of him and Porte also has the TT to come. Porte improving would be good for the race as it was unexpected. i'm not convinced that Pogacar can continue to attack without maybe having a bad day next week. Roglic is riding much more conservatively. It still looks like the two Slovenians will be on the podium at this point if Pogacar can continue to show up . More questions are about to be answered about Bernal.

 

[movingtarget]

Roglic will be satisfied to win the sprint and pick up another bonus or not lose time to anyone on GC. Pogacar will attack of course. Bernal might be in danger of losing his podium position if he continues to climb like he did two days ago. Some people think he will improve next week. He could also get worse. This stage will help to clarify his climbing form. Porte and Landa look like the best of the rest so far on the climbs. Yates might also struggle on this stage. The green jersey battle should continue on the flat. A Bennett win won't help Sagan's ambitions.

 

[Oliver]

It’s time for Landa to do something. And maybe Lopez.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

These profiles somehow always seem to look harder than the cyclingcols ones.

Anyway, I simply can't decide if this profile is great, or just not quit good enough, but I think it should be good enough and if the racing is lame it's not really due to the climb.

The profile is very good but it's always up to the cyclists if they want to race hard. Steeper first part of the climb (7 km at 8.5%) usually means the front group explodes earlier and the leaders have to race alone for longer. Besides the preceeding climbs look so promising with some super steep sections and only 9 km of separation (in total over 1600 m of climbing in 29 km). Actually all 3 climbs are located on Grand Colombiere mountain. Unlike most Alpine roads these roads are narrow, very twisting and gradient is changing often - simply epic climbs. Hopefully the earlier climbs will at least tire the cyclists but maybe one team will want to kill the group there. Some long-range attack would be great (considering that tomorrow is the rest day) but maybe I'm asking too much.

 

[bob.a.feet]

Roglic will be in the polka dots at the end of the day. And yellow, of course.

 

[Mayomaniac]

The beginning of the end...

 

[Bardamu]

Landa GET IN

 

[macbindle]

The fight over green is going to light up the fight for yellow this year. What would have been sedate days, have been raced full on. The question is whether fatigue will kick in during this final week.

I was going to turn the tv on at 3.30pm today to watch the climbing, but actually I'm fascinated to see what DQS and BH will do from the gun.

 

[Rollthedice]

Obvious Sepp Kuss win on steep MTF is obvious.

Steepp Kuss, terror of the mountain goats.

 

[Salvarani]

Yeah, it might be a race to the sprint. Maybe they will try and go in the break to then drop off.

 

[Sestriere]

It's a bit of a crux for Bora today with the intermediate sprint. Best case scenario would be to get Sagan into a large breakaway without Bennet and take maximum points. Firstly, with the strength of Quick-Step and no hills to work with, this will be very difficult to achieve. Secondly, it would likely cost a large concerted team effort. And this energy spent in the green jersey fight (also yesterday) will cost Bora in the fight for a stage win with Kämna or Buchmann (maybe Schachmann). They desperetely need one and time is running out. They'll have to think carefully if they can continue to afford riding so hard for both goals, green and stage win.

 

[Contador86]

TDF 2020 – Preview : Une troisième semaine d’enfer !

Ce dimanche, le peloton entame le début d’un chapitre décisif de ce Tour de France 2020. Du Grand Colombier au chrono de la Planches des Belles Filles en passant par la terrible étape 17 menant au …

cafecremesport.com

Montain and hell are back. Very exited. I hope for a Mikel Landa show and a nice climb from Nairo Alexander Quintanaaaaa. In France, it's complicated ... 4 French in the top 11 before the Pyrenees. Today for the general classification: Pinot out, Alaphilippe out, Bardet abandonment, Martin diminished ... sad

Your forecast ? For me, Pogacar.

 

[Mayomaniac]

It's a bit of a crux for Bora today with the intermediate sprint. Best case scenario would be to get Sagan into a large breakaway without Bennet and take maximum points. Firstly, with the strength of Quick-Step and no hills to work with, this will be very difficult to achieve. Secondly, it would likely cost a large concerted team effort. And this energy spent in the green jersey fight (also yesterday) will cost Bora in the fight for a stage win with Kämna or Buchmann (maybe Schachmann). They desperetely need one and time is running out. They'll have to think carefully if they can continue to afford riding so hard for both goals, green and stage win.

Germans and their obsession with the Zabel jersey...