Tour de France Tour de France 2025 Stage 19: Albertville-La Plagne (93.1k) ‚Historic day, magnificent racing‘ ~ Rob Hatch, probably

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Who will roll the dice?

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I'm dreaming of the OTL in revenge for Mads P. not Pogacar.
Pedersen should have been at this race.
Pedersen has done the Tour for the past five years and won the same number of stages as Milan in one, it's not exactly a hideous stab-in-the-back by the team management. It seems sort of clear that Pedersen didn't want to do the Tour in a Van der Poel style role, and Milan had more than merited a shot at the Tour (and has, even though disappointing on climbs, done his job).
 
To those who are angry about the stage being shortened. Please keep in mind that fouth & mouth desease is a viral desease. Now, it is not known for being able to infect humans, but viruses (or is it virii?) have a habit of mutating and the chance of that virus mutating in a way that it could spread to humans is small, but above zero.

Since Covid at the latest, authorities tend to err on the side of caution, so I think it is only normal that they don't want to take their chances by having thousands upon thousands of people close together on a mountain pass in an area where deseased animals are being disposed of.
I think that caution is fair and the real anger is the stage simply being shortened with less climbing and no replacement climb added to the revised parcours rather than the actual decision to amend the course.
 
Every mountain stage there's been a section of Pogacar fans indulging in a sprinter OTL fantasy. On no mountain stage has it even been close (other than the MTT, and even then it was just Demare and Merlier close).
It's also much different for an MTT, where it's a threshold test.

In a strange way, I think sprinters' climbing tends to be clearly better at zone 3 and undurance climbing than actual threshold tests.
 
With such last-minute decisions, there is still plenty of time to change the route to a 262km Argelès‑Gazost - Pamplona-like, 7MT and finish with a 100km team pursuit between Visma and a further and further trailing/struggling UAE with a blend.

In fact there's hope for a route change while the race is underway. It has been seen before.
So, 2km pre La Plagne climb, ASO announces a streaker with mad cow disease standing with threatening horns at the finish line, and so ASO is forced to change the route, now going around the Col de L'Iseran and from there over the Col de Loze to finish in Val Thorens to serve a race distance far more suitable for professional road bike riders.
 
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Some say the tour has been over since Hautacam but it ends on Sunday. The tour will be decided today. Visma will send SATELLITE RIDERS up the road and UAE will not care. Vingo will launch a half-assed attack on Pre, Pog will turn to the camera with a pain face and take his time latching on. The big two (and maybe a few stray cows) will ride up to the satellite riders and relax. The Visma riders will attack each other knowing that all that's at play is the stage. Pog will win the stage if it's a gimme, otherwise he'll just sprint away from Vingo for a few meaningless seconds. However, all is not lost. Rogla-mania will reach a crescendo with the podium, the stage win and even the yellow jersey being talked about. Bora will lose the podium but will do so in an attractive attacking/bonking style. Lenny will hitch a ride but to no avail. Milan will win the green jersey. We will all be able to get back to our lives which we were using the tour to avoid.
 
With such last-minute decisions, there is still plenty of time to change the route to a 262km Argelès‑Gazost - Pamplona-like, 7MT and finish with a 100km team pursuit between Visma and a further and further trailing/struggling UAE with a blend.

In fact there's hope for a route change while the race is underway. It has been seen before.
So, 2km pre La Plagne climb, ASO announces a streaker with mad cow disease standing standing with threatening horns at the finish line, and so ASO is forced to change the route, now going around the Col de L'Iseran and from there over the Col de Loze to finish in Val Thorens to serve a race distance far more suitable for professional road bike riders.

Why not head over to Italy and climb Finestre as well whilst they're at it? Yates to pace Vingegaard to yellow after 10 hours of racing.
 
I don't complain about shortening this stage - the faster this 3rd week ends, the better.

Pogacar is probably either a little tired or sick, Jonas wasn't able to make any difference anyway. Dynamic stage for the break is highly recommended at this point.
 
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