Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gallina

[TourOfSardinia]

Stage

Quintana & Valverde +3:19

 

[bambino]

Mas looks bit scary on the line with that mouth.

 

[movingtarget]

Re:

Great day!

- Enric Mas wins the stage and is second overall
- Valverde & Quintana fall of the podium
- Kruijswijk also falls off the podium

SK fifth and fourth still pretty good in his last two GTs.

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Re: Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gal

Definitely not the cleanest sprint but I really think giving the win to Lopez would be very very harsh.

I'm not convinced Mas was gonna win if he hadn't closed off Lopez, though

 

[Dazed and Confused]

Re:

Stage

Quintana & Valverde +3:19

Respectable performance from the movi duo considering the situation.

Will Valverde wear Green in Madrid?

 

[Carols]

Yates looked pretty cooked, this race ended just when he needed it to IMO.

 

[Inquitus]

Re: Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gal

Definitely not the cleanest sprint but I really think giving the win to Lopez would be very very harsh.

I'm not convinced Mas was gonna win if he hadn't closed off Lopez, though

I agree, DQ might be harsh but that move did decide the sprint.

 

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

What the heck was Movistar doing especially yesterday and today. Makes no sense at all.

Movi in 3 weeks is horrible..

I think this is nonsense, they are not horrible at all. Simply that expectations are simply way too high for them these days. They are a middling budget team with very few quality riders. And they are doing way better than most teams with a similar budget.

Regarding 3 week races, they have one potential GT contender (Quintana), who seems to have been badly prepared and off form for over a year now. One guy who can challenge for top 5 if he's on form (Valverde) and one other very good climber (Landa) who has never even won a WT stage race. And nowdays they have a really poor team supporting them, with almost no decent engines.

They punch above their weight in many ways. Plenty of stage wins, week long race wins and one day race wins. And nearly always challenging the podium in GTs.

Well their strategy is still horrible.

 

[GuyIncognito]

Re: Re:

What the heck was Movistar doing especially yesterday and today. Makes no sense at all.

Movi in 3 weeks is horrible..

I think this is nonsense, they are not horrible at all. Simply that expectations are simply way too high for them these days. They are a middling budget team with very few quality riders. And they are doing way better than most teams with a similar budget.

Regarding 3 week races, they have one potential GT contender (Quintana), who seems to have been badly prepared and off form for over a year now. One guy who can challenge for top 5 if he's on form (Valverde) and one other very good climber (Landa) who has never even won a WT stage race. And nowdays they have a really poor team supporting them, with almost no decent engines.

They punch above their weight in many ways. Plenty of stage wins, week long race wins and one day race wins. And nearly always challenging the podium in GTs.

Get out of here with your logic and let us pretend they're a huge budget team filled with stars

 

[The Chicken]

I just feel sorry for Yates having to wear those glasses

 

[movingtarget]

Re: Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gal

Definitely not the cleanest sprint but I really think giving the win to Lopez would be very very harsh.

I'm not convinced Mas was gonna win if he hadn't closed off Lopez, though

That was a smart sprint.

 

[jaylew]

Re: Re:

What the heck was Movistar doing especially yesterday and today. Makes no sense at all.

Movi in 3 weeks is horrible..

I think this is nonsense, they are not horrible at all. Simply that expectations are simply way too high for them these days. They are a middling budget team with very few quality riders. And they are doing way better than most teams with a similar budget.

Regarding 3 week races, they have one potential GT contender (Quintana), who seems to have been badly prepared and off form for over a year now. One guy who can challenge for top 5 if he's on form (Valverde) and one other very good climber (Landa) who has never even won a WT stage race. And nowdays they have a really poor team supporting them, with almost no decent engines.

They punch above their weight in many ways. Plenty of stage wins, week long race wins and one day race wins. And nearly always challenging the podium in GTs.

This. And none of those guys are good enough these days to win a Vuelta on the back of the Tour. Same with SK. No real surprise that the Tour guys had no sustained form.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

Re: Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gal

Definitely not the cleanest sprint but I really think giving the win to Lopez would be very very harsh.

I'm not convinced Mas was gonna win if he hadn't closed off Lopez, though

That was a smart sprint.

Agree. The Mas move was brilliant. Well deserved win.

 

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

What the heck was Movistar doing especially yesterday and today. Makes no sense at all.

Movi in 3 weeks is horrible..

I think this is nonsense, they are not horrible at all. Simply that expectations are simply way too high for them these days. They are a middling budget team with very few quality riders. And they are doing way better than most teams with a similar budget.

Regarding 3 week races, they have one potential GT contender (Quintana), who seems to have been badly prepared and off form for over a year now. One guy who can challenge for top 5 if he's on form (Valverde) and one other very good climber (Landa) who has never even won a WT stage race. And nowdays they have a really poor team supporting them, with almost no decent engines.

They punch above their weight in many ways. Plenty of stage wins, week long race wins and one day race wins. And nearly always challenging the podium in GTs.

This. And none of those guys are good enough these days to win a Vuelta on the back of the Tour. Same with SK. No real surprise that the Tour guys had no sustained form.

Here's the bigger thing. Valverde did NOT want to go to the Tour this year to begin with. He was very unhappy about going to the Tour and I think we saw it as his form of protest was to ensure he was not in form at all.

 

[SlickMongoose]

Re:

Yates looked pretty cooked, this race ended just when he needed it to IMO.

He did and lets not forget that this Vuelta was a lot less tough than the Giro, which I think helped him.

 

[Escarabajo]

And this is why there are 3 weeks in a GT!

Quintana sliding to 8. It is obvious that it doesn't matter for him at this point.

 

[Hugo Koblet]

By the way that was not an irregular sprint by Mas. He just, wisely, took the shortest line to the the finish line.

 

[jaylew]

First time any nation has won all 3 GTs with a different rider. And unless I'm mistaken, only the 2nd time one nation has ever won all 3 in a year.

 

[hfer07]

Re: Vuelta 2018 stage 20:Escaldes-Engordany - Coll de La Gal

That was a very sketchy Sprint
Would have been comical if SY bothered contesting the stage, but at that point the title was secured, so why not let others get the spoils.

What a strange Vuelta has been this one, hasn't it?

 

[jaylew]

Re:

By the way that was not an irregular sprint by Mas. He just, wisely, took the shortest line to the the finish line.

Hard to tell from the angle shown live. I'd need to see the overhead.

 

[BlackWhiteEagle]

I`m not a Lopez fan, but he earned that 3rd place today.

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Re: Re:

By the way that was not an irregular sprint by Mas. He just, wisely, took the shortest line to the the finish line.

Hard to tell from the angle shown live. I'd need to see the overhead.

Yeah, could be that he did take the shortest line. But if he hit the side of the road and closed Lopez off a couple of meters before the turn, then he didn't, and it would be an irregular sprint.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Logical that Tour men Valverde and Kruijswijk lose to the fresher Mas and Lopez

Yates the correct winner of the Vuelta. And a deserved podium for Mas and Lopez. I have no complaints no matter how much i dislike lopez

 

[Squirbos_19]

Are you the next Contador?

No, I’m Enric Mas

 

[LaFlorecita]

Re:

Are you the next Contador?

No, I’m Enric Mas

Love it