Tour de France 2025 (CONTAINS SPOILERS!)

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Dogtrousers

Dogtrousers

Kilometre nibbler
steverob said:
That's only the "Souvenir" Edition. For £5 extra (or at least that's what it was in WHSmith) you can also get the "Premium" Edition which has coasters instead of beermats and a pair of blue socks with Allez written on them in yellow. Bargain!

I didn't stop to see if there was a "Deluxe" Edition or anything else above that level that has different amounts of tat.
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Oh no! You mean I actually purchased the better value tat. I want my tat to be a total ripoff. I'm gutted that I could have paid £5 more.

One year a friend of mine and I each paid €20 from a nice ASO lady at the roadside for a bumper bundle of TdF tat. We then proceeded to wear it all. Including T-shirts far to small for us, silly hats, wristbands and I can't remember what.
 
steverob

steverob

Guru
Location
Buckinghamshire
I have a feeling (though did not check) that there might be a Standard version of the magazine as well, e.g. one that's literally just the magazine and maybe the wallchart and doesn't even come in a box. But where's the fun in that!?
 
M.R.M

M.R.M

Well-Known Member
T4tomo said:
that reads like the sort of bollocks ChatGPT throws out. :laugh:
no offence intended, lets agree to disagree
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Except it's exactly what happened this Giro and what happened in the Hautacam stage in the Tour as Phreak posted. I guess analysis based on actual reality is not your cup of tea. 😛
I never understand why people enjoy watching things and don't want to understand them. To each his own of course. No offence intended. 😉😊
Blazing Saddles said:
You really think that WVA can catch Pogacar, with Jonas in tow? What about on a major climb?
Maybe the two working in tandem could accomplish this feat. Not going to happen otherwise.
Actually, there is more evidence of Jonas being capable of doing that on his own.


Your post reads to me as if you are talking about the WVA we have only seen on one previous occasion.
So far this season, there has been little in his performances to indicate he is on course to replicate that form.
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No, I don't think WVA can catch Pogacar on a climb. I don't even think it's guaranteed he can catch modern day Pog between climbs, however he was definitely able to catch 2021-2023 Pog in-between the penultimate climb and the final climb. That is where the tactics come into play. If it's just the final climb, it's a W/kg test between Pog and jonas. No one is helping there.
However, in the reality of the race with there being GC gaps, IF Pog needs to attack on the penultimate climb in order to make up theoretical 30-40-50 seconds on Jonas (in both of Jonas' Tour wins Pog shipped time and was forced to try and make it up, before exploding entirely for minutes), WVA can pull Jonas to the bottom of the last climb. They will either catch Pogacar on the way there or Jonas will massively limit his loss, because he can recover prior to the final climb, while Pog is riding all out.

WVA up ahead is also a significant deterrent to actually trying to attack to get back time for this very same reason as well.

I understand it maybe sounding all theoretical and war gamesy, but it did happen in this Giro and has been a staple of Jumbo tactics for years. 🤷‍♂️
 
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mjr

mjr

Comfy armchair to one person & a plank to the next
Location
mostly Norfolk, sometimes Somerset
As widely suspected (and mentioned by team manager Vaughters in a podcast), EF are sending Ben Healy and Nielson Powless to the Tour. Healy was at the Dauphiné and Powless is at Suisse this week, both frequently ridden by Tour hopefuls.

Florian Lipowitz (RBH) is also going to the Tour after the Dauphiné, which he basically said in interview there.

Thibaut Nys (Lidl) is also going to the Tour. He's expected to ride Baloise and the Belgian nationals before.

Just as an aside, Isaac Del Toro (UAE) is the top-UCI-ranked rider expected to be going somewhere other than the Tour, 14th-placed at the moment. Ciccone (15th), Gee (16th) and Pidcock (19th) are the others missing from the top 20. Even for the Tour, this seems pretty stacked.
 
mididoctors

mididoctors

Über Member
M.R.M said:
Not really. An in-form WVA is a luxury almost no other team, outside of maybe Trek with Mads, have. WVA is such a good domestique that he gets overrated into "all time great classics leader" status.
The advantage manifests itself in the following, almost no other team (outside of Trek) has a rider who is capable of almost always making the breakaway when he needs to in a 3 week race. The starts are brutally fast and attacks go again and again and you need incredible raw watts that you can produce repeatedly. Most good breakaway riders can produce those watts 1-2 times, but not so often to be sure of getting away. they get away because they are allowed to. WVA & Mads and the absolute top classics riders can force the issue by raw power.

Unlike most of the other classics riders or big ITT specialists like Tarling or Ganna, WVA is able to stay ahead of the peloton even on mountain days. This was instrumental is both of Vingegaard's wins, because the moment Vingegaard takes a decent amount of time time on Pogacar in an ITT or on a bad Pog day, let's say 38-68 seconds e.g, it becomes almost impossible for Pogacar to get that time back.
Pogacar cannot just attack on the last climb and take back that amount of time. Jonas is too good for that and can ride defensively in his wheel. He has to attack from longer out and that means Jonas can do exactly what Simon Yates did in this Giro and ride tempo until he bridges to WVA and WVA will pull him to Pog. Jonas gets an armchair ride while Pog has to ride all out the entire time.
Jonas can then counterattack Pog on the final climb to put Pog away, or limit his losses greatly.

No one else has that to the extent Jumbo have. UAE don't have that and you cannot flip that scenario for them. They may have a weaker version of it with McNulty or Wellens on only hilly days, but they don't have that level of team synergy. Furthermore they wasted that tactical option in the Giro by having McNulty ride for 9th on GC and Wellens is often not good in the heat.
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For WvA to get up the road on the.obvious days that matter you need a UAE team that's fatigued.

You need to isolate pogacar from Adams when it matters . The opposite is less true .

That said after the hautacam you would think UAE would have learnt the lesson especially after the finestre . If they do allow it they have some mental block . My fear is pog will just trump the move anyway
 
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T

TakeTheHighRoad

Active Member
As I was cycling to work yesterday, I pondered the hockey stick stage to Ventoux and thought that we haven't had a stage like in a Grand Tour for a while (certainly not in the Tour, anyway)

They were "removed" due to the dominance of Team Sky in the early 10s, when they would essentially do a lead out up the final climb and Froome would finish it off.

With 2 teams of equal strength, as you would say UAE and VLAB are, it will be interesting to see the results of that stage, and how each team chooses to ride it
 
P

phreak

Well-Known Member
TakeTheHighRoad said:
As I was cycling to work yesterday, I pondered the hockey stick stage to Ventoux and thought that we haven't had a stage like in a Grand Tour for a while (certainly not in the Tour, anyway)

They were "removed" due to the dominance of Team Sky in the early 10s, when they would essentially do a lead out up the final climb and Froome would finish it off.

With 2 teams of equal strength, as you would say UAE and VLAB are, it will be interesting to see the results of that stage, and how each team chooses to ride it
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Not sure it makes a great deal of difference to be honest. Let's say that Remco was on VLAB. He was blown away in the early slopes in the Dauphine so wouldn't have been much use to Vingegaard, and no one would be really as Pogacar is that much better.
 
T4tomo

T4tomo

Legendary Member
rich p said:
Interestingly, or not perhaps!, @Adam4868,
the bookies have Rog at 33/1 and Lipowitz at 28/1 since the latter's decent showing in the Giro. 👍
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Lipo is less likely to fall off on an innocuous roundabout...
Lipo must be hoping Rog has his disaster early so he can assume leadership!
 
S

stage hunter

Active Member
M.R.M said:
If WVA has this form at the Tour, Vingegaard shouldn't even be considered an underdog vs Pog. I think they are on par with each other with it being a 3 week race and all. UAE team help hasn't shown to make a massive difference in contrast to Jumbo.
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There a couple of Alps stages where there is a substantial bit of valley
rich p said:
Interestingly, or not perhaps!, @Adam4868,
the bookies have Rog at 33/1 and Lipowitz at 28/1 since the latter's decent showing in the Giro. 👍
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Dauphine.

But yes, I think they are right.
 
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