Not sure about TJ because Catalunya and País Vasco are, while both climbers' races, almost diametrically opposed in types of climb. Catalunya is full of long gradual climbs, País Vasco is the land of short-to-medium climbs of brutal steepness, and the TT is full of turns, climbing and descending. While he's certainly more than capable in these, it's not really what he's best known for. You thought a climb with a 13% average in the Vuelta al País Vasco was going to be easy?! The first stage could arguably be the most decisive, I wish they were doing the quick double with Lazkaomendi like they are on the first time around. That would really open things up straight away.
Stage 2 is the "easy" stage with the rolling finale, and at least we'll get to see some of the most beautiful villages and towns in Iparralde such as Ainhoa and Sare, which don't feature on the route often. Stage 3, let's be clear, is also for a sort of bunch finish. Zaldiaran is not exactly hard.
It's rather like an easier version of the first stage in 2013, and is very similar to stage 2 in 2012, when Daryl Impey held off the chasing bunch by a couple of seconds.
Stage 4 is now more or less set in stone, with the usual suspects - Karabieta - Elorrio - Ixua (otherwise known as
all of the important bits from Arrate), the fairly easy San Miguel then the summit finish.
If we must persist with Arrate every year (I really wish we could have Urkiola one year, Bianditz another, Sollube another and so on) then I really wish they'd go back to the old route in doing Karabieta from the southeast via Elgeta rather than the Eibar side, then descending straight into the Arrate climb. That could be linked to Kanpazar or Elgeta from Elorrio, or the easier side of Elosua from Azkoitia, which could in turn be connected to the double climb of Endoia + Azurki from Zestoa, giving us a finale that looks like this:
As it is, however, the gaps will as ever be relatively small on Arrate, which will keep the final couple of stages interesting but hopefully better than in 2011 where gaps were too small. I am rather disappointed with the Markina stage, however, which could have been so much better. Instead we get the
easy side of Ixua followed by the
not exactly mindblowing San Miguel. They could have had Ixua as a final climb and then had the MTF somewhere else instead of doing the same climbs two days running; they could have had
Goierri then the easier side of Lekoitz-Gane back to Markina; they could have climbed the oft-mooted, never-included
north side of Monte Oiz as far as San Kristobál, descended into Iurreta then had
Trabakua as the final climb; or they could have stayed with what they have and finished with a climb to
San Cristobál de Iturreta if there was room (I don't think there is)... I'm a little disappointed even if I'm marking out a bit as one of my friends is from Markina and they're starting the TT outside the original jai-alai frontón.
True story though: the TT is really tough and should probably be the final 20k or so of the road stage into Markina. This is a tough TT even by País Vasco standards, with perhaps only the super technical Oñati route from 2012 tougher.
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