Tour of Norway 2014 (2.HC)

[Dazed and Confused]

Wonderful race again. 8km to go.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

I've seen more attacks in 15km than in the entire Giro d'Italia

 

[christopherrowe]

This is wild! Attack after attack after attack! Some sticking, some not, groups splitting and coalescing ahead of the peloton. Small teams really animating this race.

 

[jsem94]

I've seen more attacks in 15km than in the entire Giro d'Italia

This. Loving it!

 

[jsem94]

The CCC riders have been dropped.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

Very good win for Vanmarcke. Solid tactics by Belkin.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

That was one big Belkin show

 

[christopherrowe]

Sep Vanmarcke! Excellent stage! Great tactics by Belkin.

 

[classicomano]

Great to see Sep win something, superstrong.

 

[jsem94]

Larsson up to 3rd overall. 6 seconds behind Marc de Maar.

 

[Maaaaaaaarten]

Ohh Vanmarcke won the 'MTF'? Awesome

 

[christopherrowe]

de Maar retains yellow. Cool.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Ohh Vanmarcke won the 'MTF'? Awesome

Yes and top climbers such as Alexander Kristoff and Gerald Ciolek were up front

 

[jens_attacks]

pretty cool finale. bravo sep!

 

[maltiv]

Sep Vanmarcke! Excellent stage! Great tactics by Belkin.

Depends if they want the GC or the stage...

As for the GC, their tactics were absolutely horrible. They had the 2 best climbers in the race (by FAR), yet they chose to send 2 guys up the road who already are far back in the GC, having them drag along some serious GC contenders who, as a result, gained a lot of time on their GC contenders.

 

[christopherrowe]

Depends if they want the GC or the stage...

As for the GC, their tactics were absolutely horrible. They had the 2 best climbers in the race (by FAR), yet they chose to send 2 guys up the road who already are far back in the GC, having them drag along some serious GC contenders who, as a result, gained a lot of time on their GC contenders.

Cogent points. I hadn't even thought about it from the GC angle. Thanks!

 

[christopherrowe]

Speaking of the GC, what do today's UnitedHealthCare finish times/places tell us about de Maar's ability to defend over the next two days?

24 Marc de Maar +00:13
68 Davide Frattini +04:26
72 Alessandro Bazzana +07:01
102 Carlos Alzate Escobar +18:23
103 Robert Förster +18:23
104 Aldo Ino Ilesec +18:23

Those last three were the final bunch to cross the finish line, six minutes down on the group preceding them.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

De Maar is screwed, he'll have to do everything alone

 

[Pentacycle]

De Maar is screwed, he'll have to do everything alone

Let's first see if he can keep up tomorrow, if not it doesn't even matter if he has a weak team.

 

[christopherrowe]

Tomorrow is the Queen Stage. The last two paragraphs of Jean-François Quénet's report on today's race on the main CN site are especially telling. He report's that De Maar felt "a few years older" after the stage because of the amount of energy he expended, and De Maar mentions the difficulties he had at the end covering moves after he was isolated from his teammates. Belkin have Mollema and Nordhaug sitting at 22 and 24 seconds on GC. If the race tomorrow is as animated as today's stage it should be something to watch.

 

[christopherrowe]

The route and profile of tomorrow's stage (with nifty interactive tools showing gradients on climbs and so on) can be be found on the Tour's website here.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

The route and profile of tomorrow's stage (with nifty interactive tools showing gradients on climbs and so on) can be be found on the Tour's website here.

The Giro is scheduled to finish 16:55-17:31 (CET) today and the tour of Norway operates a bit later: 17:30 - 18:10

Almost ideal plan.

Clearly Marc's team will be blown to pieces well before the business end, but it will be interesting to see his jersey defense.

Go Van Asbroeck.

 

[Vetlocipede]

Mollema, Fernández, Eiking and Hansen up front.

Paterski trying to bridge with Nordhaug on his wheel.

 

[jsem94]

This 6 man team thing is really good.

 

[christopherrowe]

I don't have video today and am dependent on the Tour's twitter stream. Is De Maar in the chasing group? Does it look like he's going to keep yellow? (He had 22 seconds on Mollema at the start.)