The Pyrenees
Over the course of the next three days we will have a clear picture of what is required from each rider come the time-trial on Saturday.
Personally I love the Pyrenean stages, the Basque supporters are incredible, the road surface is generally poor and the climbs have very nasty kicks to them, often leading to gaps in the GC battle.
Today is a 178km stage and is the only one of the three Pyrenean stages not to have a summit finish. It is classified as “Hilly” with four classified climbs along the way, one Cat 4, one Cat 3 and two Cat 1 climbs.
Transition
The rest day often has very different effects on the riders’ form and it will be interesting to see how Jumbo Visma recover from their less than ideal weekend, losing Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk with Jonas Vingegaard donating some skin to the Massif Central tarmac.
For the sake of the race I hope Tadej Pogacar already launches some attacks today but with the last climb peaking at 21km from the finish it will have to be against a depleted Jumbo Visma team or Wout Van Aert will just pull everyone back to his wheel.
We would expect the breakaway to take this stage but it will take a colossal effort to establish the break as has become the norm. The Cat 3 climb after 36km should snap the elastic and drop the dead weight.
Our Top Picks:
Alberto Bettiol
Tadej Pogacar
Max Schachman
Outside Picks:
Fred Wright
Connor Swift
Quinn Simmons
Our Winner:
Alberto Bettiol
