Tour de France Tour de France 2025 Stage 21: Mantes-la-Ville – Paris (132.3k)

Page 27 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Pogacar did way too much work in that front group. Pulling on the front more than others, closing gaps, attacking the climb every single time. Not very smart racing but Wout was too strong anyway.
I thought the whole group rode great, especially with horrible surface and conditions. They worked together and negotiated all the surface changes and corners.. and then diced it up for final order..Visma tried to pressure Pogacar for 19 stages it didn't work, today teamwork was awesome and Pogacar had to be looking at Wout, Trentin and knowing his legs were smoking!! Visma made at best 5 good decisions in 3 weeks, I am being very generous, 2 or 3 of the 5 intelligent things that they did happened today!!
 
Pogacar did way too much work in that front group. Pulling on the front more than others, closing gaps, attacking the climb every single time. Not very smart racing but Wout was too strong anyway.
The most important thing wasn't the win (it matters of course) but rather the feeling. Today I saw the old Pogacar and not the one who raced the last week
 
If you like to watch paint dry...

Would be interesting to see how this was raced with no rain and time on the line. Im always in favour of giving the riders an opportunity to race, and Pogacar once again took it!

Great race. SO HAPPY FOR WOUT!

If someone has a neutral viewpoint then Pog is just another rider today, i.e. contrary to what his fans believe (aka his mere presence supposedly makes the race amazing apparently) from my perspective they took a stage where any sprinter in the bunch can win (there's often surprises on the Champs) and turned it into a solo victory from a group of six.

And of course a hell of a lot of riders just noped out and cruised to the finish.
 
If someone has a neutral viewpoint then Pog is just another rider today, i.e. contrary to what his fans believe (aka his mere presence supposedly makes the race amazing apparently) from my perspective they took a stage where any sprinter in the bunch can win (there's often surprises on the Champs) and turned it into a solo victory from a group of six.

And of course a hell of a lot of riders just noped out and cruised to the finish.
The group got reduced from full peloton to 30 to 6 and at least to 1. Its pretty standard classics racing and what we all (well, apparantly not all, most) like to see from a bike race.

And on your last point: This would have been completely the same if they raced the normal parcours. GC times would be neutralized and riders would be rolling over.
 
The most important thing wasn't the win (it matters of course) but rather the feeling. Today I saw the old Pogacar and not the one who raced the last week
I actually wouldn't have been upset if he'd won, because he dared to try, and it would have been cool to watch him win the last stage of a Tour he dominated. It would have been a deserved win, for sure.
 
It has a lot in common with a lot of things in life. It's almost like every zero sum game ever.
I got a chuckle from the comment.. If you take your favorite hundred pro bike racers vast majority will start and finish without ever winning, zip. Like most of regular life, work hard and it's normally a thankless existence!!
Sounds like you said.. Life and bike racing have lots in common!!
 
  • Like
Reactions: dobrien

TRENDING THREADS