Tour de France 2020 | Stage 17 (Grenoble - Méribel Col de la Loze, 170 km)

[Red Rick]

Merged this with the thread on Kuss attacking on Col de la Loze.

 

[topcat]

Merged this with the thread on Kuss attacking on Col de la Loze.

You should have just nuked the Kuss "attacking" on Loze thread. It loses its amusement value when merged into a real thread.

 

[gregrowlerson]

I think there was a small minority of us here, at the very least a non-zero cohort, who expressed the opinion that there was, at the very least, a non-zero chance of Pogacar beating Roglic by more than a minute in the TT. Personally, I assumed it would take a mechanical or some sort of non-athletic incident, rather than Pog just blowing him out of the water. But I don't think I was alone in thinking it wasn't a sure thing.

Point being, given Jumbo's superiority in numbers over UAE, some on here were wondering why Jumbo were happy to just have Pog sit in their wheels all the way up every mountain in the Alps. Especially after Bernal cracked on the Colombier, leaving Pogacar, that day's stage winner, as the only realistic GC threat.

Yeah, it definitely wasn't the biggest surprise in the Tours history that Pog overhauled Rog in the ITT. But if it happened I probably thought that Roglic would have had a worse day than he did; finishing 5th is hardly horrible. And the thing was, was that he could have just finished second in the ITT, and still lost so much time as to lose the Tour.

A slightly likely way that I would have seen Rog losing it all on stage 20, would have been something like:

Dumoulin or WVA winning the stage.
Pogacar + 30
Rog + 1:30 (6-10th on the stage)

This to me was somewhat realistic of an outcome, but in reality it went quite a way beyond that.

 

[gregrowlerson]

After reading through all of tadej's posts, I can only come to one conclusion.

That Jumbo Visma failed to play their race card.

#SeppKussmatters

 

[Gigs_98]

On another note, Meribel right now:

http://m.webcam-hd.com/meribel/meribel_front-de-neige

And that's in the town, there is probably quite a bit more snow on the Col de la Loze right now. I feel like this would also be relevant in the discussion of whether it could snow during the Giro.

 

[Red Rick]

On another note, Meribel right now:

http://m.webcam-hd.com/meribel/meribel_front-de-neige

And that's in the town, there is probably quite a bit more snow on the Col de la Loze right now. I feel like this would also be relevant in the discussion of whether it could snow during the Giro.

That's 1400m or something right?

 

[Mayomaniac]

That's 1400m or something right?

It's raining cats and dogs in Innsbruck, snow until 1300 or even 1100m durning the night, until 1500m further South in the Dolomites.

 

[Red Rick]

It's raining cats and dogs in Innsbruck, snow until 1300 or even 1100m durning the night, until 1500m further South in the Dolomites.

I don't like where this is going.

 

[Mayomaniac]

I don't like where this is going.

Me neither, but a day or 2 with bad weather can always happen in the Alpes, I remember snowfall on the Brenner in July and August durning some years.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Me neither, but a day or 2 with bad weather can always happen in the Alpes, I remember snowfall on the Brenner in July and August durning some years.

Yup, sometimes it happens in the summer so it shouldn't come as surprise in the last part of September, when it's common that cold airmasses advect central Europe.

 

[Gigs_98]

I don't like where this is going.

Realistically I don't think this tells much about what's gonna happen in late October

 

[gregrowlerson]

On another note, Meribel right now:

http://m.webcam-hd.com/meribel/meribel_front-de-neige

And that's in the town, there is probably quite a bit more snow on the Col de la Loze right now. I feel like this would also be relevant in the discussion of whether it could snow during the Giro.

Nibali has just overdone the voodoo slightly in his desire for cold weather.

He will make the necessary adjustments just in time for a safe ascent of the Stelvio

 

[Escarabajo]

Think about the Stelvio and Agnello in October. I won't put my hopes too high TBH.