Volta Ciclista a Catalunya 2022 (March 21-27)

[Devil's Elbow]

I can't recall a start to a season where so many riders are ill - You often have illnesses that hit one team or isolated cases spread among teams BUT this year illness seems to have spread to many parts of the peleton.

Yet somehow the best 4 riders in the peloton have all escaped it.

 

[tobydawq]

Yes that's why I say they must be partying or something. It's just way too much illness for it to be a coincidence, even if they have been isolated before in their bubbles this is quite extreme.

Is there any WT team that's spared so far?

Well, with two years of avoiding any sort of germs, I doubt anybody was expecting people to remain healthy when society opened up again...

I don't know whether the riders actually live very differently from what they have before but certainly viruses have been allowed to soar through the general public much more the past few months than since before 2020.

 

[noob]

If it's calivirus it would explain a lot lol.

 

[Mayomaniac]

O'Connor is really good on tempogrinders, I have to admit that.

 

[yaco]

Yeah I think Matthews talked about it in his interview after stage 1, but also said Yates was getting better.
Not that better I guess.

Matthew DNF today.

 

[Carrick-On-Seine]

Yet somehow the best 4 riders in the peloton have all escaped it.

Alaphilippe is ill, so that leaves the top 3.

 

[greyclouds]

Alaphilippe is ill, so that leaves the top 3.

Masnada as well

 

[Salvarani]

What has happened with Sivakov? He lost 12 minutes today...

 

[Strawberry_Jams]

ill probs...
seems this is what happens after places reopen after covid...people lose their tolerance to the flu and are more likely to pick it up after social distancing for more or less the past two years.

 

[RunningRouleur]

Yet somehow the best 4 riders in the peloton have all escaped it.

Pog was also ill after Tirreno.

 

[Lequack]

What has happened with Sivakov? He lost 12 minutes today...

Carlton Kirby talked him up and it was the commentator's curse.

 

[RunningRouleur]

What happened to Yates? He dropped pretty early. Stomach bug going around BEX?

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

What happened to Yates? He dropped pretty early. Stomach bug going around BEX?

not just at BEX. Half the peloton either has bronchitis, a cold, COVID or stomach bugs.

 

[Lequack]

I doubt it's Covid, last year we didn't have so much dropouts when even more dangerous variants were rampant. This must be some other illness.

 

[RunningRouleur]

Who's going to win the GC here? I'm going to say O'Connor is a narrow favorite over Quintana at this point. But it go a lot of different ways, and we could see a spectacular final stage in Barcelona!

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Who's going to win the GC here? I'm going to say O'Connor is a narrow favorite over Quintana at this point. But it go a lot of different ways, and we could see a spectacular final stage in Barcelona!

I don't see O'Connor dropping time on this course tbh. Will be hard to unseat him

 

[Fantastico]

I doubt it's Covid, last year we didn't have so much dropouts when even more dangerous variants were rampant. This must be some other illness.

I think it's just what some of the others have posted above. People have distanced themselves from each other for two years now, have been wearing masks, have paid more attention to hygiene etc., so the cases of flu, stomach bugs or colds have been significantly lower compared to previous years too. This also means that their immune systems has not been trained for these viruses as much for two years. Now, when more and more distance measures are taken back, these viruses may spread extremely fast (edit: or people may have more severe symptoms than they used to have). If I remember correctly I also heard some virologists talk about this phenomenon recently.

 

[Skijumper Roglic fan]

WTF, Ayuso…

No words needed. As I see from your forum reactions, he also does not even surprise anyone any more. The only question seems to be when he will win his first Grand Tour.

 

[ciranda]

Cycling clown of the day goes to Marcus Soler, for trying to bridge a 22 second gap solo instead of pacing for his teammate, who ended up coming second.

Well done Marc!

Marc Soler is one of the best at these kind of attacks and it was a good attempt plus it's his home race. Better move for sure than Trek's decision to sacrifice Skjelmose to lead for Ciccone.

 

[greyclouds]

Mighty impressive by Ayuso - still 19 years old! He has a huge ceiling. In 2/3 years time we are going to see Soler, Bennet and Almeida being Ayuso’s domestiques

 

[KZD]

Mighty impressive by Ayuso - still 19 years old! He has a huge ceiling. In 2/3 years time we are going to see Soler, Bennet and Almeida being Ayuso’s domestiques

Almeida will not like it but with Pogačar and Ayuso that could likely be his fate

 

[tobydawq]

Almeida will not like it but with Pogačar and Ayuso that could likely be his fate

Then he will move away from the team. He is too good to be playing third fiddle but I do agree that it's a tough crowd with those two.

 

[Anderis]

Then he will move away from the team. He is too good to be playing third fiddle but I do agree that it's a tough crowd with those two.

Don't forget the power of a high contract and the best coaching staff etc.

Ineos also had ridiculous numbers of great GT riders at the same time at various points (even now) and they were not leaving for opportunities elsewhere all that much.

 

[noob]

[

Then he will move away from the team. He is too good to be playing third fiddle but I do agree that it's a tough crowd with those two.

UAE said last year they would build a team around Almeida just as they had done with Pog, and that he's there as the second option after Pog. And that they're rarely supposed to ride the same races.

I wonder what they told Ayouso.

 

[noob]

So the pecking order should be 1. Pog 2. Almeida.

I think Covi is above Ayouso too in pecking order tbh but... oh well.