Tour of Britain 2014 - 07/09 - 14/09 (2.HC)

[Pricey_sky]

The 2014 Tour starts on Sunday for another 8 stage route, although the final London stage is split into a small ITT and a flat crit stage similar to last year. Like last year we also have another uphill finish, this time up the Tumble on stage 3.

Provisional startlist - http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/zuvvi/media/bc_files/road/20140902_tob_startlist.pdf
TEAMS (6 riders):
Belkin (Boom, Bos)
BMC (Cummings, P Velits)
Garmin (Bauer, Farrar)
IAM (Haussler, Chavanel, Pineau)
Movistar (Dowsett, Anton)
OPQS (Cavendish, Renshaw, Kwiatkowski, Terpstra)
Giant (Kittel, Ludvigsson, Veelers)
Team Sky (Wiggins, Swift, Sebastian Henao)
Tinkoff Saxo. (Roche)
Bardiani CSF
MTN - Qhubeka
NetApp Endura (Konig)
Novo Nordisk
An Post - Chain Reaction
Madison Genesis
NFTO (Blythe)
Velosure Giordana
Rapha Condor JLT
Raleigh
Team GB

Stages:
Stage 1 - Liverpool - 103km - 8 laps of a 13km circuit around Liverpool.

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Stage 2 - Knowsley - Llandudno - 200km
Climb of Great Orme near the finish (2km @ 6%).

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Stage 3 - Newtown - The Tumble - 179km
The Tumble - 6km @ 7.2%

http://postimage.org/app.php


Stage 4 - Worcester - Bristol - 184km
Tricky uphill finish that will probably be too tough for Cav and Kittel.

http://postimage.org/

 

[Pricey_sky]

Stage 5 - Exmouth - Exeter - 177km
Climb of Stoke hill near the finish (900m @ 10%)

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Stage 6 - Bath - Hemel Hempstead - 205km

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Stage 7 - Camberley - Brighton - 225km
Tough climb's of Ditchling beacon (1.5km @ 9.5%) and Bear Road (1.2km @ 8%) near the finish.

http://postimage.org/


Stage 8a - London iTT - 1 lap of the 8.8km circuit.
Stage 8b - 10 laps of the 8.8km circuit - 88km

http://postimage.org/

 

[pink_jersey]

WTF!!!Frank is already riding after an broken femur?

 

[LittleJo]

Quite excited by this - it's the first time the route has gone anywhere near where I live, so I plan to go watch. Any ideas when the teams are likely to confirm who is riding?

 

[willbick]

Great stuff! Stage 4 in Bristol has a very grippy finish up from the Avon gorge, a bit similar to the finsh of stage 2 last year in Kendal. Lay Cav for this stage. See you up the Tumble!!

 

[Pricey_sky]

Quite excited by this - it's the first time the route has gone anywhere near where I live, so I plan to go watch. Any ideas when the teams are likely to confirm who is riding?

Was supposed to be a provisional startlist sorted by now but nothing as of yet, I believe it will be released tomorrow morning. they were also supposed to have the proper race profiles with sprints/KOM's done but also nothing released yet. Organisers need to pull their fingers out!

Stage 4 start in Worcester is only a few miles from where I live so I will watch there and may make it down to London for the final day too.

 

[LittleJo]

Was supposed to be a provisional startlist sorted by now but nothing as of yet, I believe it will be released tomorrow morning. they were also supposed to have the proper race profiles with sprints/KOM's done but also nothing released yet. Organisers need to pull their fingers out!

Are there not race profiles on the website? I'm pretty sure I saw some when I was looking the other day. I think you have to go on to each individual stage and then there's downloadable pdfs.

 

[willbick]

Are there not race profiles on the website? I'm pretty sure I saw some when I was looking the other day. I think you have to go on to each individual stage and then there's downloadable pdfs.

Yeah yr right

 

[jens_attacks]

the tumble seems like a proper climb. wiggo ftw!

 

[willbick]

the tumble seems like a proper climb. wiggo ftw!

False flat finish and likely headwind will probably neuralize the action sad to say

 

[Pricey_sky]

Giant confirm that Kittel will ride.

 

[LittleJo]

‏@nedboulting Confirmed that @marcelkittel lines up against @MarkCavendish in the @TourofBritain . Splendid.

 

[Bernie's eyesore]

Good to see Cav v Kittel but the GC battle looks pretty weak. As long as this clashes with the two Canadian races then there is no chance of the race attracting a decent field.

 

[willbick]

Good to see Cav v Kittel but the GC battle looks pretty weak. As long as this clashes with the two Canadian races then there is no chance of the race attracting a decent field.

unfortunately the ToB GC competition has always been pretty lame, certainly in the last few years

 

[Pricey_sky]

I have downloaded and updated the new stage profiles as there were a couple of changes from the originally released route. Stage 5 and 6 now include tougher finishes and sprint and KOM points are now included.

 

[Pricey_sky]

Good to see Cav v Kittel but the GC battle looks pretty weak. As long as this clashes with the two Canadian races then there is no chance of the race attracting a decent field.

Looking a the profiles they may only get 2 sprints on the first and last stages. Perhaps stage 6 although that is quite bumpy in the final 30km.

 

[LittleJo]

Provisional start list released (although weirdly not on ToB site yet): http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/zuvvi/media/bc_files/road/20140902_tob_startlist.pdf

 

[Pricey_sky]

Provisional start list released (although weirdly not on ToB site yet): http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/zuvvi/media/bc_files/road/20140902_tob_startlist.pdf

Thanks LittleJo, Just updated the first page.

Have no idea who will go for GC out of that lot, maybe Wiggins if he is motivated. Perhaps even Anton, Roche, Kwiatkowski or maybe Konig?

 

[LittleJo]

Thanks LittleJo, Just updated the first page.

Have no idea who will go for GC out of that lot, maybe Wiggins if he is motivated. Perhaps even Anton, Kwiatkowski or maybe Konig?

Yeah I was interested to see Kwiatkowski in there. There's not a lot of sprint stages, so maybe OPQS are hoping for some overall success as well? Would Nico Roche be going for GC as well? And yeah, Koenig as well I guess.

As someone else said, while the ToB is on at the same time as the Canadian races as well as the Vuelta, they're always going to struggle for really big GC names.

 

[Akuryo]

Thanks LittleJo, Just updated the first page.

Have no idea who will go for GC out of that lot, maybe Wiggins if he is motivated. Perhaps even Anton, Roche, Kwiatkowski or maybe Konig?

Pretty much. It's Brads race to lose. Behind him I expect König, Kwiatek, Roche and Anton (in that order, if all are in decent shape).

Maybe even Chavanel can do something. I read that the only "real mountain stage" wasn't that hard either. And he showed at Plouay that he is in form for the worlds.

 

[willbick]

Im sure Wiggins will be well up for the GC but of course this year he has the disadvantage that the ITT is only 8.8k - about half the distance of last year's so he can only hope to put about 30 secs into his GC rivals.

I think Koenig will take all the beating in this. He did a great TT at the end of the Tour and has done well in the ToB before, taking the Caerphilly stage in 2012. He will be very motivated to win his first stage race GC and Im sure he will see this as a great opportunity

 

[Dazed and Confused]

We just need about 5 solid GC type riders in good form to make a good race here. Small teams will likely make this race dynamic.

Sir Wiggo
Chava
Kwia
Konig
Roche
Edit: Ion naturally

One or two surprises will emerge.

And then the Kittel vs Cav battle.

Looking forward to it.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I think Ion Izagirre will do better than Igor Antón on this route and is perhaps the most likely GC threat on the Movistar squad. Don't think the MTF is enough to create huge gaps in the bunch, and the short climbs near the ends of stages are in his range.

 

[willbick]

We just need about 5 solid GC type riders in good form to make a good race here. Small teams will likely make this race dynamic.

Sir Wiggo
Chava
Kwia
Konig
Roche
Edit: Ion naturally

One or two surprises will emerge.

And then the Kittel vs Cav battle.

Looking forward to it.

Lol. Wont be much of a 'battle'. Kittel has proved himself to be easily the best sprinter around. If they go head to head there is only one winner

 

[Ricco']

Fuji is racing this?

Thought he would be doing the canadian classics.