With route maps and new teams kits starting to come out I thought it a good time to get this going
He has an Irish team mate there with him who had a pretty big win in Italy already this year, so hopefully he has a stage in him aswell.
EDIT: I had a work colleague skim the highlights and she thinks those tweets were way out, Hayter was always out in front she tells me and the FDJ lad was a chaser from the bunch. Even the comms got it wrong until they were summiting the Motorolo.
No GCN coverage of Mont Ventoux :(
Peloton just over it for the first of the two ascents.
It's live on L'Equipe (with French commentary). If you have VLC Player on your laptop or mobile, you can access the live stream
14 km to go
Had it on some french stream the last hour or so, its always a great race.
EF on a mission, thought woods would go well here but he seems to be nowhere
Heat might have done for a few of them in France I think.
Did the domestiques decide to do just one ascent of Ventoux or what... It seemed to be all of the team leaders out front on their own 😂
A great 1-2 for EF. Happy that Storer at least finished on the podium given all the work he had to do and knowing that he was going to be mugged by Chaves
He kept his head, alot of lads would be talking to Chavez and gesticulating. Storer knew the craic and Chavez was sat beside him more than behind so slightly less annoying I think.
Schachmann and Pozzovivo down in a crash
A much needed win for Sagan
Wasn't sure what way he was going to go but looking good especially in holding position in the final 2km
Coquard came like a rocket there to finish second.
LOL at the photographers having to tell Sagan to pick up the flowers and prize on the podium 😂
Been a good week for TE.
I do miss having Sagan around at the big races.
Was almost like a flash of nostalgia.
His positioning from about 2km was phenomenal, he had his elbows out with the DSM riders just making whatever space he wanted
Delighted to see Sagan winning a sprint. Hopefully he can be competitive in the Tour. Thats if he's in it, I've no idea.
Pog on his own pretty much at the Tour of Slovenia, so of course he attacks 60km out on stage 1
Big gap now with 17km to go in Slovenia. 1:30 to the chasing group.
Bennett dropped in Belgium.
Too much racing today!
No surprise, had a quick look earlier and it was on!!!!!
I was just logging on to ask if he had been dropped. Looks like it was a tough stage that has been raced hard
Pedersen dominant today in Belgium & as he is after a yellow jersey in the Tour it bodes well.
Wout Van Aert was putting it out there he was interested in going for the Green jersey too so it could be a real scrap for that if a lot of them are in form.
Or WvA just blitzes everyone
Yeah there's that!!!!! I'd wonder how much the team would be willing to ride for intermediates though.
Heard an interesting point on LRCP, that the sprint points for the green jersey are more spread out this year, in that there are the same green jersey points available at the end of lumpy medium mountain stages, or ones with a small punch at the end, as there are for the pure flat stages. They used to be weighted to the flat stages to keep the sprinters interested but are going the other way this year.
The intermediate sprints are also generally in the middle or the start after a few hills as well. So the green jersey suits someone who can climb well and be there or thereabouts in reduced sprints - WVA, Sagan if he is in form etc
I assume this is a tactic to get a WvA vs MvP battle going for green which ASO know would be good press.
its the way it’s been for a few years. It’s how Sagan kept on winning the green jersey by maybe winning one stage a year. Suited the fellas who could get up into those punchuer type stages they introduced a while back
the year Sam won I think there was five sprinter days. Last year there were loads. That was the outlier year and it’s back to 4/5 this year
The last few years it was changed specifically to stop the likes of Sagan. Points were weighted towards flat stage winners and lowered in other places.
This year could be more like the Vuelta Valverde (green) jersey.
What's the terrain like for Stage 2 of Tour of Belgium today, is a sprint finish likely?
Flat as a pancake
Ramp up the last 100m but can't imagine it'll bother anyone.....
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