2021 Tour De France

Who takes it?

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    18
Zebra Cheeks

Zebra Cheeks

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Alright boys, the Tour De France is just 2 weeks out. Arguably one of the more open fields I’ve seen in awhile.

From early route looks, it would appear to me that the route favors individuals over teams. The mountains are spread and only really come in sets of 1 & 2. Two long individual time trials will certainly favor returning champion Pogacar. Feel free to take a look at the route outline here

Let’s take a look at the favorites.

mq8Zpo8HqrkjAX9UpsGwfe-1200-80.jpg


  • Primoz Roglic +200
  • Tadej Pogacar +300
  • Remco Evenepoel +400
  • Egan Bernal +900
  • Tom Dumoulin +1100
  • Geraint Thomas +1200
  • Richard Carapaz +2000
  • Thibaut Pinot +2200
  • Chris Froome +2500
  • Emanuel Buchmann +3300
  • Enric Mas +3300
  • Aleksandr Vlasov +3300
Of course, one can’t forget that Richie Porte just won’t the Criterium Dauphine, so look for him to get in the mix as well.

The odds would indicate that Vegas is expecting a similar tour to last year, with arguably the most loaded team ever assembled in cycling, Team Jumbo Visma will attempt to use their depth and team work to out wit the most talented individual racer, Pogacar. Doesn’t look like the route is doing them any favors.

VTtmRKN8SZB4UczBHbz9QV.jpg


Or will the pattern of young breakout riders continue as Remco Evenpoel enters his first Tour de France. If he were to win, it would be the third time in a row a new emerging prospect took the victory.
 
Zebra Cheeks said:
@Graves The Elder who you got fella?
Click to expand...
hm, this is a tough one.
Ineos (SKY) always bring a strong team. with froome gone, the leader and GC hopeful would appear to be either Thomas or Bernal.

Pogacar and Roglic have to be favorites as well.
If Evenpoel gets enough team support, he could factor in also.

I haven't checked out the course profiles yet, I'm assuming there's plenty of climbing. I did hear that there are TWO TTs which is stupid but look for GC contenders who
excel at that discipline to be able to gain gobs of time.
 
Graves The Elder said:
hm, this is a tough one.
Ineos (SKY) always bring a strong team. with froome gone, the leader and GC hopeful would appear to be either Thomas or Bernal.

Pogacar and Roglic have to be favorites as well.
If Evenpoel gets enough team support, he could factor in also.

I haven't checked out the course profiles yet, I'm assuming there's plenty of climbing. I did hear that there are TWO TTs which is stupid but look for GC contenders who
excel at that discipline to be able to gain gobs of time.
Click to expand...
Yeah it’s two long ones too. Sometimes they do team, or short little ones where gaps are only 10-30 seconds. These are both 30 KM at least. So the gaps could be well over a minute as we saw last year. I think the tour likes the idea of the big teams trying to take down these young guns like Pogacar and Evenpoel.

Years ago it used to be that the first 7 days were easy. Then half way through the second seven you dip into some mountains. Then the last 7 you get at least 5 big days of mountains.

The mountains are still present but much more spread out. My thought is, it means that those big teams can’t grind out the attrition factor and put Pogacar working solo day after day.
 
Did you know Israel Startup is paying Froome over $6 million a year.....to suck.
That's because he left the dirty team of Sky. I'm convinced they're using/doing something
that there's no test for yet.
Witness Porte winning the Dauphine. Please. He's been on the decline for the last five years and
then he pulls that win out of his ass.
"Marginal Gain". yea right.
 
Graves The Elder said:
Did you know Israel Startup is paying Froome over $6 million a year.....to suck.
That's because he left the dirty team of Sky. I'm convinced they're using/doing something
that there's no test for yet.
Witness Porte winning the Dauphine. Please. He's been on the decline for the last five years and
then he pulls that win out of his ass.
"Marginal Gain". yea right.
Click to expand...

Yeah…6 million for Froome at this point is hilarious. He’s so far removed from even being remotely competitive and it’s not like he’s shown sign of life here or there. He’s been totally useless.

See I thought it was so bizarre that Porte won the dauphine. I won’t lie I was thinking something similar. At the same time there’s seemingly no explanation for Egan Bernals one and done performance. Porte and Thomas in their relative primes would have been fantastic contenders for this years tour. They both can ride time trials quite well.

I think once again Ineos is going to have an internal struggle for power. On paper they are just so beyond stacked it’s a joke. If they perform like last year you’d have to imagine some major changes are incoming.
 
Zebra Cheeks said:
I think once again Ineos is going to have an internal struggle for power. On paper they are just so beyond stacked it’s a joke. If they perform like last year you’d have to imagine some major changes are incoming.
Click to expand...
Oh yea, they have to decide fairly quickly who the team leader/contender is, like in the first 10 days. Brailsford runs a tight ship though, he looks evil IMO with his big ass black framed glasses.
Pogacar and Roglic showed how well they TT. AND they can both climb with the best of them.
btw, did you know who the second most earning is, I happened to look it up after seeing froome shitting the bed.
Sagan with a reported salary of $4.5 million per year.
wow
 
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Graves The Elder said:
Oh yea, they have to decide fairly quickly who the team leader/contender is, like in the first 10 days. Brailsford runs a tight ship though, he looks evil IMO with his big ass black framed glasses.
Pogacar and Roglic showed how well they TT. AND they can both climb with the best of them.
btw, did you know who the second most earning is, I happened to look it up after seeing froome shitting the bed.
Sagan with a reported salary of $4.5 million per years.
wow
Click to expand...

Well to be fair Sagan had a monster stretch there for a while. Not as much recently but he was a beast for years
 
oh mos def.
world champion three years running?
plus his persona?
worth every penny IMO

I actually really like Alaphilippe as well.
Met him briefly several years ago when the Tour of California came up and over
Mt. Diablo, about a mile from my house. I had volunteered to help with descending
traffic from the summit and when he stopped with his team at Juniper turnout, a few of us
chatted it up. Very gracious, unassuming guy. But we forget how tiny these guys are!
 
Pogacar and Roglic battle.

Evenepoel isn't racing the TdF. He's cooked from the giro.

Looking fwd to seeing MVDP take early stages. Should be fun to watch.
 
A fall Paris - Roubaix could very interesting. I hope to be in France by the fall.
 
Smoke Detector Battery said:
Pogacar and Roglic battle.

Evenepoel isn't racing the TdF. He's cooked from the giro.

Looking fwd to seeing MVDP take early stages. Should be fun to watch.
Click to expand...
Is he even on the team? Or you just think he’d be too fatigued?
 
Is Bernal racing? I thought he had covid and Geraint Thomas was the man for Ineos. Obviously he will crash out and Porte will lead the team.
My money is on Roglic but Pog is looking good.
 
robmorpeth said:
Is Bernal racing? I thought he had covid and Geraint Thomas was the man for Ineos. Obviously he will crash out and Porte will lead the team.
My money is on Roglic but Pog is looking good.
Click to expand...

I'd expect Porte to be the first out of the tour by way of crashing.

TBF - Porte and Carapaz look better than Thomas IMO.
 
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