Road Cycling
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@DrivingMaul Should be an exciting stage tonight that starts to sort out the GC. It's classified only as "hilly", but finishes with an 11 km climb - second half of which averages about 10 degrees.
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@Chris-B said in Vuelta a Espana:
@DrivingMaul Should be an exciting stage tonight that starts to sort out the GC. It's classified only as "hilly", but finishes with an 11 km climb - second half of which averages about 10 degrees.
That last half looks brutal
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You can get daily highlights on GCN channel on YouTube
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@DrivingMaul said in Vuelta a Espana:
You can get daily highlights on GCN channel on YouTube
As a quick (under 10 minutes) package that GCN one is good..
The ITV one is an hour long and usually shows the last 5 km or so in full. -
Big thing that happened last night was a crash that took out (permanently) Uran, Roche and de la Parte - all guys ahead of George in the GC.
However, that's pretty shit in terms of the overall race.
The racing is way more unpredictable than the TdF - in part, I think, because none of the teams is overly confident they've got the best guy. Certainly, no-one is making a concerted effort yet to control things.
As a result, Dylan Teuns grabbed the GC lead from a breakaway last night, while several others temporarily vaulted themselves into the top 10 - de la Cruz and Gesink.
In terms of "genuine contenders", George is probably up to about 10th.
First "Mountain"stage tonight - and look at the profile of that final climb!
A little section at 25%, a lot at 13%+ and finishing at 17%.
Stage 7 - Archidona > Córdoba - La Vuelta 2024
Profile, time schedule, all informations on the stage
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Anyone else listening to the Cycling Podcast?
They are doing daily shows including 2 riders who are giving their view of what it was like in the bunch rather than the story of the day -
The big question, given the interest shown even on this board is why we aren’t getting any of this (or other tour) coverage in NZ.
Eurosport in Europe shows just about everything going both live and with highlights packages. Eurosport in NZ is piss poor. I would buy a streaming subscription from them if the content was available and it looks like others would be interested as well -
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@Bovidae Yep - they're also playing replays of the final two hours many days, although the timing jumps all over the place (sometimes at quite reasonable hours). E.g. Tonight it's at 11pm, but Sunday it is 2.15pm.
I've got no idea why, when they've got at least 10 sports channels they can't do it at the same time every night.
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Didn't realize that George was part of that big crash. Doesn't sound like he's completely unscathed, which doesn't bode that well for tonight.
"It was real nasty. I don't feel too good after it, but I feel a lot better than the guys in hospital. That's part of racing – crashing. It was all going all right with [Primoz] Roglic's results, but we keep hitting the deck, and that's not good."
"What can you do?" he asked reporters. "If you crash, you can't really sulk in a [WorldTour] race. You just got to get on with it, because no one gives a s... if you crash. You've got to keep going," he said.
"It's unfortunate that Tony, Neilson and I all went down, and I'll maybe talk to the doctor. I know the other two are all good. We'll have a look and hopefully in a few days' time we can forget about today."
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Watched that last climb - pretty sure I would have been off and pushing my bike very early on!
Valverde wins, from Roglic, Lopez and Quintana and those four are grouped at the front of the field. Commentators saying the eventual winner will come from those four and it's hard to disagree. On the other hand, one or more of them is bound to crack badly before the end.
Much better climb by George today - he crosses the line ninth. Behind a few guys that he usually looks a bit better than, but still a good effort - especially after yesterday's crash. Moves up to eighth in the GC - but, now 3 min 34 sec behind Lopez. Also has Majka, Pogacar and Esteban Chavez ahead of him - and Aru and Kelderman just 2 seconds behind.
Hilly stage tomorrow - not too awful, followed by the second mountain stage and then a rest day.
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@Chris-B George is really there to set the pace for Roglic which it sounds like he did today.
I'm expecting tomorrow to be a quiet day on GC but you never know -
This might be interesting for Bennerr fans
George Bennett: Vuelta a Espana crash was 'real nasty'
'We don't want to commit guys because we all know what's coming' says Jumbo-Visma rider
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@DrivingMaul I think he's got a lot more freedom to ride for himself in this one compared with the role he was playing in the TdF.
Sepp Kuss was setting the pace on the lower slopes of the climb.
When Quintana launched his initial surge George may, or may not, have initially marked him. The commentators said is was Bennett, but next thing we saw (a minute later) was the Big Four riding away from everyone, so I'm inclined to think it was actually Roglic all along. Need to have another look.
George certainly hadn't done enough that in his TdF form he wouldn't have been able to go with the Big Four for two-thirds of that climb.
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Davide Formolo yet another victim and withdrawal from that crash....
Rigoberto Urán and Hugh Carthy both suffered broken collarbones, CCC Team's Victor de la Parte suffered multiple fractures, and former race leader Nicolas Roche required 12 stitches in his arm.
This is also quite interesting and quite hopeful in regard to George's future...
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Fascinating day of racing on what the commentators think is the the hardest stage. It had a bit of everything, including losing the TV coverage for about 10 minutes of key action due to a major rainstorm.
Racing continued to be waaay different to the usual TdF patterns.
The big contenders let a big group of riders away up the road - more than 3 minutes - including some of their key teammates (e.g. Fuglsang, Kuss and 2 others from TJV, and Soler) and even someone like Kelderman, who is something of a GC threat.
Coming onto the big final climb, Lopez attacked really early and broke away. George gave Roglic a little bit of help to chase, but was struggling and quickly slid out the back.
A smallish group continued to chase Lopez, with Quintana and Valverde also taking it in turns to attack Roglic - who they clearly wanted to break with the ITT pending. Meanwhile some of the key men from the breakaway in front sat up and waited for their leaders - most worryingly, at the time, Fuglsang waiting for Lopez - and those two powered on. Sepp Kuss dropped back and provided some key support for Roglic.
Around this time the TV pictures disappeared and the rain poured down.
While that was occurring, Valverde, Quintana and Pogacar broke away from Roglic. Lopez somehow managed to crash on a graveled section. Edit: Turns out Roglic also crashed on the gravel section - a motorbike somehow got in his way.
When the TV reappeared, Lopez was riding with most of the remnants of the breakaway. V,Q and P were rapidly closing on him and Roglic was 20 or 30 seconds further back. Marc Soler had broken away and was heading towards winning the stage.
Quintana and Pogacar rode past Lopez and made a break on the others. Roglic came surging back and caught and passed Lopez and eventually Valverde.
Much to his disgust, Soler got reined in to wait for, and help, Quintana - allowing the Stage win to fall into Pogacar's lap.
Net result is that Quintana gets the red jersey, 6 seconds ahead of Roglic with Valverde and Lopez both within 30 seconds and Pogacar 1.42 back. Pogacar is a guy who is going to be a major force with Bernal in coming years - I watched him thwart George on the climb up Mt. Baldy in the Tour of California earlier this year.
George battled on, but is now 7 minutes behind in 15th place (though probably 10th in terms of genuine contenders). That's surely enough rope that he'll get a chance to escape up the road and hunt a stage win.
Meanwhile, it's a rest day then attention turns to Patrick Bevin and whether he can win the Individual Time Trial, in which he'll be a major contender.
