Tour de France Tour de France 2021, Stage 18: Pau – Luz Ardiden, 129.7 km

[Leinster]

"I really wish he'd kept the panda outfit..."

 

[Red Rick]

Is it me or does Pogi have a bodyshape where all fat just accumulates evenly in the legs?

 

[staubsauger]

In their defense, Pogacar is the best climber of the race. Same happened last year and in 2013 when Quintana won.
If someone like Rasmussen wants to win it they have to score points at the end of stages as well. So at the end of the day it is OK. We just don't like one guy taking everything.

Rasmussen is just the one guy that wouldn't have been affected much by the current points system as he actually could win stages or at least score mountain points from the favorites group as well. See 2005 & 2007! No GC and cherry picking stages like in 2006 wouldn't have been a disadvantage either.

Guys like him simply ride for a 9th place on general classification nowadays. Guys like Guillaume Martin & Domenico Pozzovivo have completely wasted careers compared to Barguil's impressive 2017 Tour de France!

 

[75Driver]

Yes, ASO should finally forget about Ala / Pinot winning TdF.
Next time the route should be designated for pure climbers.

The official LeTour site is just shameless in their cheerleading for Alaphilippe. This was in the earlier feed. Laughable especially when he ends the day 85 points behind. Along with constantly mentioning him in stage previews like "look out for" or "this sets up for"...blah blah blah. I know he's the most popular rider in France but this is pathetically blatant homerism.

 

[Breezy1985]

"I really wish he'd kept the panda outfit..."

Is Dan now to be known as "Emerald Mankini"

 

[RedheadDane]

The official LeTour site is just shameless in their cheerleading for Alaphilippe. This was in the earlier feed. Laughable especially when he ends the day 85 points behind. Along with constantly mentioning him in stage previews like "look out for" or "this sets up for"...blah blah blah. I know he's the most popular rider in France but this is pathetically blatant homerism.

Okay... Danish commentators - well, mostly Dennis Ritter - was briefly playing with the thought that if Vingegaard won the stage, and Pogacar was third, or worse, then Vingegaard would've won the dots. He then quickly pointed out that it was very unlikely. I still think that would've been more likely than the scenario mentioned above...
Note this was after they'd gone over Tourmalet.

 

[BlueRoads]

I guess this silly pressure is what makes Alaphilippe attack stupidly even more. Wants to show off the rainbows or something... hopefully it will get a bit better once he got rid of those stripes...

But in Germany many of the viewers questions deal with Buchmann, like he's a factor in this race...

 

[davidsonduke]

Nothing to explain.
They are ridiculous weak.

I read/heard somewhere that Carapaz requested this kind of riding to give him the best chance at getting 1) to the podium, and then 2) into 2nd place. #1 worked. And had he attacked a little later on Col de Portet and Vingegaard not been so strong, #2 would have worked. He just couldn't distance Vingegaard.

 

[fbjim]

it's 2021 and people are still doing the Borat Kazah flag + green thong thing, smh

 

[75Driver]

I don't get why Ineos are ridiculed. They needed to make time for Carapaz and they did. Looked like they accomplished their goals quite well.

 

[Blanco]

Who is going, Pog, Rog, Bernal?? Anyone else of note?

Everybody! It's going to be best GT of the year, as usual...

 

[Finn84]

it's 2021 and people are still doing the Borat Kazah flag + green thong thing, smh

It seems this time he's not just rooting for Astana.

 

[fbjim]

Everybody! It's going to be best GT of the year, as usual...

Going to be really interesting, the best Vueltas are when people have a bad luck/crappy Tour and end up with something to prove.

 

[JosefK]

I just read in an interview with Vingegaard that he was not feeling great today. Maybe his conversation late in the stage with Kuss was about having Sepp ride in front to discourage a Carapaz attack. Just guessing. But if this is a bad day for Jonas, it bodes well for days when he's feeling good.

 

[staubsauger]

Everybody! It's going to be best GT of the year, as usual...

It also has a quite good route this year.

 

[Breezy1985]

Everybody! It's going to be best GT of the year, as usual...

This has been a terribly boring Tour like peak Sky levels of poor which usually means great Vuelta

 

[druthers]

Is it me or does Pogi have a bodyshape where all fat just accumulates evenly in the legs?

he's a 22 year old professional athlete. What is this thing called "fat" that you talk of?

 

[The Hegelian]

I agree with luckyboy. However nothing will change the outcome of Pogacar winning. What I don't want to see are the Indurain's tours. Those were probably the worst. Killing everyone in the Time Trials and then defending in the mountains.

Agree. It was like five years of watching Road Runner cartoons, hoping the coyete(climber) would win, but knowing that such a thing was impossible.

 

[SHAD0W93]

Ineos and working for the yellow jersey.

I’m not going to lie, stage 17 I forgot Pogacar is not on Ineos with him on their wheel and them drilling the front like he was.

 

[Red Rick]

he's a 22 year old professional athlete. What is this thing called "fat" that you talk of?

Let's just say his legs look chubbier than most other riders.

 

[Netserk]

Yeah when the best climber is also the best time trialist you can't do anything.

But in modern cycling we've seen it's much easier for top time trialists to limit losses in mountains vs top climbers learning to be world class in TT.

So the reality is that there are a handful of top clas time trialists but a lot of top climbers. And I think GTs should be designed to have as much competition as possible instead of just sticking to a formula that means only 2-3 people can because of tradition. Even the Vuelta this year has too many TT kms for me lol.

Bissegger, Küng, Ganna etc. can limit their losses in the mountains more easily than Carapaz, Landa, Bernal etc. can limit their losses in the TTs???

Oops, I forgot you restricted yourself to a sample of only top climbers ...

With the same fallacy in play it's also clear that height doesn't matter in basketball.

...

I would much rather see grand racing between 3 contenders than 10 riders following wheels, thinking they can end on the podium that way.

 

[spalco]

Going to be really interesting, the best Vueltas are when people have a bad luck/crappy Tour and end up with something to prove.

Or some completely unknown/nonfactor/discarded guy suddenly smashes records.

 

[Rackham]

This was a dull mountain stage to finish a dull Tour de France which took a nosedive in terms of entertainment once Pogacar hammered everyone in the Alps (& Roglic was out). The stage was badly designed as well (i.e. they needed another climb before the Tourmalet in order to create a bigger selection & have a proper breakaway up the road for riders like Gaudu to join). In the end it was merely a race by elimination & the top 3 guys reached the top first. Boring.

It's also a top-heavy Tour where only a select few teams & riders seem capable of having any impact on the race. Even back in the "dark ages" of the early 2000's there were climber teams like Euskaltel to blow stuff up in the mountains whereas now there's no one.

 

[memyselfandI]

Yesterdays Move podcast was good to point some things in Pogi, in his future as a gc contender and overall it was very good reflecting nationality differences in Gran Tours etc. It was good (did I already sais that).