Vuelta a España Vuelta a España 2023, stage 8: Dénia - Xorret de Catí, 165.0k

Page 2 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
The weather might well be the big decider, but this stage could well catch out some GC hopefuls. Kuss to lead out Vingegaard and Roglic, then Roglic to attack on the final climb, would seem likely. Can Remco hold on? Soler, Poels and Landa are still high up on GC so if young Lenny has problems we could see another unexpected name in red at the end of the day.
 
It's a Valverde finish, and in the absence of Balaphilippe, I'd like to see what Romain Grégoire can do. He can help some and get his shot too. With Molard's help, Lenny should be able to keep Kuss under control. If not, it's two days in red, more experience and still a wonderful GC situation. And maybe he can get the jersey back.

JV to test Remco is a given, and with two minutes between the 6th (Landa) and the 20th (Buitrago) in the GC, there will be shenanigans.

If Romain Grégoire (or Lenny Martinez) don't win tomorrow, my hope is that Geraint wins this bike race. Not much luck these days, but a good dude.
 
It's a Valverde finish, and in the absence of Balaphilippe, I'd like to see what Romain Grégoire can do. He can help some and get his shot too. With Molard's help, Lenny should be able to keep Kuss under control. If not, it's two days in red, more experience and still a wonderful GC situation. And maybe he can get the jersey back.

JV to test Remco is a given, and with two minutes between the 6th (Landa) and the 20th (Buitrago) in the GC, there will be shenanigans.

If Romain Grégoire (or Lenny Martinez) don't win tomorrow, my hope is that Geraint wins this bike race. Not much luck these days, but a good dude.
This finish is too hard for Grégoire. Also, Groupama need every bit of firepower they have to defend Martinez' jersey - Davy almost got dropped on the one climb on Wednesday's stage, Watson, Askey and Germani also don't offer too much uphill and they will want to save Storer as long as possible, so that only leaves Grégoire and Molard to prevent a monster breakaway from going on the early climbs. A big shift from both is required here. In any case, it will be a major challenge for such an inexperienced lineup.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sandisfan
It's a Valverde finish, and in the absence of Balaphilippe, I'd like to see what Romain Grégoire can do. He can help some and get his shot too. With Molard's help, Lenny should be able to keep Kuss under control. If not, it's two days in red, more experience and still a wonderful GC situation. And maybe he can get the jersey back.

JV to test Remco is a given, and with two minutes between the 6th (Landa) and the 20th (Buitrago) in the GC, there will be shenanigans.

If Romain Grégoire (or Lenny Martinez) don't win tomorrow, my hope is that Geraint wins this bike race. Not much luck these days, but a good dude.
In this type of climb, Valverde would be murdered by Contador
 
I can tell you this much: Vingegaard, and particularly Pogacar, is stronger than Evenepoel at a 15 min effort at 100%.
Vingegaard did 7 w/kg during almost 17 minutes on marie blanque after a super hard stage, but this guys live in a bubble and think that remco at his best in a 15 min effort, is unbeatable. Maybe he can drop everybody tomorrow, but that would mean that vingegaard is far from tour de france shape, and roglic is not at his best.
 
  • Like
Reactions: repre
Vingegaard did 7 w/kg during almost 17 minutes on marie blanque after a super hard stage, but this guys live in a bubble and think that remco at his best in a 15 min effort, is unbeatable. Maybe he can drop everybody tomorrow, but that would mean that vingegaard is far from tour de france shape, and roglic is not at his best.
Evenepoel did 7.2 w/kg for 12 minutes on Erlaitz in a 225k race and still had enough to solo everyone to death for an hour. That's a bit off the Vingegaard Marie Blanque effort, but not by much. If Evenepoel is at that level, Vingegaard needs to be pretty close to his Tour shape to match him.
 

TRENDING THREADS