kyle21121 Posted July 13, 2018 Share Posted July 13, 2018 1 minute ago, kempus said: Martin always goes well up those super steep climbs. If Thomas does crash then he is a very serious contender. I doubt Sky gives him any assistance, though. Unless Froome crashes out or looses a massive amount of time. He’s had this roll in the past he is the clear #2 but obviously only a backup plan he likely won’t get assistance but would stay up if Froome crashes or gets dropped. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 14, 2018 Author Share Posted July 14, 2018 Last procession sprint stage before we get into the real meat. I'm pumped for the Roubaix stage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mse326 Posted July 14, 2018 Share Posted July 14, 2018 4 hours ago, kempus said: Last procession sprint stage before we get into the real meat. I'm pumped for the Roubaix stage. Don't know much about cobbles. How much will having teammates that are good help protect you. Froome has Thomas and Kwiatkowski; Porte has Van Avermaet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UKTexans Posted July 14, 2018 Share Posted July 14, 2018 Cavendish will never win another stage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 15, 2018 Author Share Posted July 15, 2018 10 hours ago, mse326 said: Don't know much about cobbles. How much will having teammates that are good help protect you. Froome has Thomas and Kwiatkowski; Porte has Van Avermaet I'm sure it's beneficial. But, it's still an incredible perilous and unpredictable stage. I think one of the major contenders will crash out today, although I hope not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 15, 2018 Author Share Posted July 15, 2018 10 hours ago, UKTexans said: Cavendish will never win another stage. Correct. He has neither the legs or team that he used to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 15, 2018 Author Share Posted July 15, 2018 Roubaix was exactly as expected. Absolute carnage. Also, one of the main GC guys pulled out, as I predicted. Feel bad for Porte, it wasn't even on a cobbled section that he came off. Haven't seen the final stage results, but I'm pretty sure Landa, Uran, Van Garderen and Bardet lost a fair chunk of time, some a lot more than the others. Now we move to the mountains, where the real action begins. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edge Posted July 15, 2018 Share Posted July 15, 2018 Landa and Bardet only lost 7 seconds, which is really surprising. But i'm happy for Bardet, since he had so much bad luck on this stage. Uran lost something around 1:30 minutes and Van Garderen lost about 5 minutes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 16, 2018 Author Share Posted July 16, 2018 9 hours ago, Edge said: Landa and Bardet only lost 7 seconds, which is really surprising. But i'm happy for Bardet, since he had so much bad luck on this stage. Uran lost something around 1:30 minutes and Van Garderen lost about 5 minutes. I'm surprised Landa and Bardet were able to limit their losses so much. Must have been a hell of a ride by their teammates to bring them back into it. Uran and Van Garderen are done as GC contenders, imo. Think it comes down to Froome, Dumoulin, Quintana, Thomas and maybe an outsider shot for Bardet, Landa and Valverde. The first mountain stage will be very interesting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edge Posted July 16, 2018 Share Posted July 16, 2018 11 hours ago, kempus said: I'm surprised Landa and Bardet were able to limit their losses so much. Must have been a hell of a ride by their teammates to bring them back into it. Uran and Van Garderen are done as GC contenders, imo. Think it comes down to Froome, Dumoulin, Quintana, Thomas and maybe an outsider shot for Bardet, Landa and Valverde. The first mountain stage will be very interesting. This year i'm not really sure what to expect. I think there are so many potential candidates, but in the end the time trial might be the decider. So i guess Froome, Thomas and Dumoulin have the best shots atm. But ofc besides them there are still a lot of guys who can be contenders for the podium at least. Valverde, Fuglsang, Yates, Landa, Nibali, Bardet, Quintana, Uran and maybe even guys like Majka, Mollema, Zakarin and even Martin could be (still) in the conversation. https://www.letour.fr/de/klassements These are the current standings. Besides Thomas there is a bunch of people very close to each other, which is surprising to me, since i really thought the Roubaix stage would result in bigger time differences. Now the first mountain stage is even more interesting to me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 17, 2018 Author Share Posted July 17, 2018 First of the mountain stages today. We have three mountain stages in a row, finishing with the Alpe D'huez. I think todays stage will be the least important in terms of time gaps for the GC men. It's not a mountain top finish and there's a fairly long descent before the finish line. We will certainly have a new yellow jersey holder and a more accurate reflection of the top 10 though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 18, 2018 Author Share Posted July 18, 2018 Very uneventful stage. Other than the awesome attack by Alaphilippe and Uran losing 2 minutes, nothing happened. The riders blamed it on Skys high tempo and headwinds. I think the riders were being cautions with the two mountain top finishes in the next two days. Today proves to be much more exciting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mse326 Posted July 18, 2018 Share Posted July 18, 2018 40 minutes ago, kempus said: blamed it on Skys high tempo I've always loved reading excuses like that. "Hey, slow down so we can attack you better" lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 18, 2018 Author Share Posted July 18, 2018 33 minutes ago, mse326 said: I've always loved reading excuses like that. "Hey, slow down so we can attack you better" lol Yeah, how rude of Sky. I'm certain there will be a series of attacks over the next 2 days though. I think Movistar are certain to launch at least one of their three GC guys. I think we will see Froome attack too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kempus Posted July 18, 2018 Author Share Posted July 18, 2018 What a stage. That's the excitement I was hoping for. Movistar sent out Valverde, as I predicted, but he had nothing. The attack by Dumoulin was ballsy, with Sky reeling him back in. Thomas looked incredible and Froome looked very solid too. Quintana, Bardet and Nibali just couldn't live with those three. I think it's going to be a three way battle for the yellow jersey. Alpe D'Huez should be another awesome stage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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