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Tour of Britain Discussion
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Posted on 23-11-2024 18:03
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| tsmoha |
Posted on 09-03-2018 19:33
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 Tour of Britain
The Tour of Britain has been downgraded to C2HC status, turning this prestigious event into a key race for CT division: still going with eight stages and the usual mix of hilly profiles (five stages) and an ITT as another important day for the GC contenders. Two flat stages (both 200km long) will give the sprinters an opportunity to shine as well. Two hilltop finish, of which stage seven should probably a key stage for the GC. It will be some entertaining eight days through Great Britain.
No former race-winner amongst the participants, so we will definitely write a new name into the long list of past race winners: Kinoshita (2016), Ben Nasser (2015), Ignatiev (2014), Ventoso (2013), two-time winner Bellis (2012 and 2011), Ponzi (2010), Rollin (2009) and ManGame legend Boonen (2009) make for a great list, obviously.
The Startlist
The GC Contenders | Favorites | HI | TT | REC | AC | Outsiders | HI | TT | REC | AC |  vd Hugenhaben | 80 | 71 | 75 | 66 |  Pellaud | 77 | 66 | 71 | 70 |  Chaves | 79 | 68 | 72 | 72 | Squire | 77 | 65 | 76 | 71 |  Roux | 78 | 62 | 70 | 75 |  Grippo | 77 | 58 | 69 | 69 | | Kratochvila | 77 | 70 | 72 | 64 |  Bratashcuk | 77 | 58 | 69 | 67 | | Diggle | 77 | 70 | 70 | 70 |  Lejman | 77 | 58 | 63 | 68 |  Monfort | 77 | 69 | 70 | 72 | Kebede | 76 | 66 | 71 | 72 |  Vichot | 76 | 65 | 69 | 80 |  R Galindo | 76 | 66 | 69 | 67 |  Gilbert | 76 | 68 | 67 | 69 | Cunego | 76 | 65 | 71 | 70 |  Dennis | 75 | 78 | 67 | 68 |  Taborre | 76 | 62 | 67 | 72 | | Hollenstein | 75 | 73 | 68 | 73 |  Wahyudi | 76 | 61 | 71 | 67 | | Becerra | 75 | 70 | 69 | 62 | Nzeke | 76 | 61 | 67 | 68 |  Wyss | 75 | 69 | 69 | 75 |  Lietaer | 76 | 59 | 70 | 71 | | Reus | 74 | 79 | 78 | 62 | Othman | 76 | 56 | 66 | 76 | | Zoidl | 74 | 76 | 72 | 69 |  Cuming | 74 | 72 | 71 | 69 |  Bille | 74 | 73 | 73 | 75 | Finetto | 74 | 70 | 69 | 72 |  Roe | 73 | 75 | 72 | 74 | Kreuziger | 72 | 77 | 73 | 71 |
Let's behin with van der Hugenhaben, who has enjoyed his last two starts here: finishing 5th in both 2016 and 2015 (against some strong competition), the lack of acceleration didn't play a bigger role for his performances here. His superior hill stat, as well as his good recovery and a solid timetrial ability should be good reasons for him to believe in himself. The podium must be his goal this year. Simple like that.
Monfort finished 5th in 2014, behind such illostrous names such as Ignatiev, Bobridge, Ulissi and well.. Dan Craven. The veteran has already proven that he's still a force at this level and while he may not be amongst the top favorites, his allround package could definitely make him a minor threat for the GC win as well.
With the timetrial being just 16km long, pure puncheurs like Chaves, Roux, Vichot, Gilbert or Wyss will fancy their GC chances. Kratochvila and Diggle as two premium helpers for Hugenhaben and Roux, while Diggle's timetrial skills (and local hero status) may actually get him the role as a co-leader here. The British fans would definitely love to see a local fighting for the GC here. Pellaud, Grippo, Bratashcuk.. they will all need to limit the losses in the TT and to perform big time in the hills. A chance is always there.
Of course we also need to look at the best TT specialists amongst those riders, who can ride hills as well: Dennis as the obvious pick for a possible high GC result then. Also Reus (who took the TT win here back in 2014), Zoidl, Hollenstein, Becerra, Bille or Roe will hope for the timetrial to help them gaining a promising GC position. Reus as the most complete stage racer amongst the GC contenders, even though he's lacking the acceleration, which may give him some losses in the hilly key stages.
The Stage Hunters | Sprinters | STA | SP | AC | | TT specialists | HI | TT | | Castañeda | 71 | 80 | 79 | | Reus | 74 | 79 | | Kip | 67 | 80 | 82 | | Stannard | 55 | 79 | | Haussler | 71 | 79 | 75 | | Dennis | 75 | 78 | | Mezgec | 73 | 79 | 77 | | Mullen | 70 | 78 | | Bennett | 74 | 79 | 79 | | Tennant | 69 | 78 | | Vanderaerden | 71 | 79 | 75 | | Hofer | 65 | 78 | | Lay | 68 | 79 | 81 | | Kreuziger | 72 | 77 | | Kreder | 72 | 78 | 80 | | Grabovski | 71 | 77 | | Corti | 74 | 78 | 76 | | Ma | 66 | 77 | | Angarita | 71 | 78 | 77 | | Hacecký | 63 | 77 | | Jones | 66 | 78 | 78 | | Zoidl | 74 | 76 | | Giacoppo | 72 | 77 | 75 | | Vandousselaere | 69 | 76 |
Reus, Dennis and Kreuziger/Zoidl are also featured high on the list of possible contenders for the TT-win on day three: cycleYorkshire obviously with a big race on home turf, lining up with Stannard and Tennant in addition to Dennis. As always, they will hope for at least one of the guys to take out the stage-win.. Mullen and Hofer, as well as Grabovski, Ma or Hacecký as the main contenders.
For the sprint stages (if they come down to a bunch sprint), we may have a clear favorite with Castaneda. Kip may suffer from the long stages, Haussler and Mezgec lack the acceleration in comparison to Castaneda. Bennett should be motivated on this terrain, Kreder could be a dark horse with the hilly stages surely having an impact for the final stage at least.
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| jandal7 |
Posted on 09-03-2018 20:03
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World Champion
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Diggle and Roux... bring this one home 
Also a big welcome to Afoa and Ambrose, our stagiares 
Edited by jandal7 on 09-03-2018 23:24
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant."
[ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT]  Xero Racing
5x  x5
2x  x2
2x  x2 |
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| Vien |
Posted on 09-03-2018 20:40
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Small Tour Specialist
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Great preview tsmoha, though I'm surprised to see this topic appearing so early. Did Avenir get delayed?
I brought a weakened team, as my big guns are in America. Only Monfort should be capable of a good result here. Ma and Kip look too weak to battle for a stage victory. Nevertheless this race seems to suit Monfort well, so I'm hoping for a top 5 on consistency.
Oh, and this race should be vdH's! |
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| Croatia14 |
Posted on 09-03-2018 20:42
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Directeur Sportif
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Hug can't really loose this. Him ahead of Roux and Chaves. I remember huge gaps from ICL, so I guess the ITT will have less impact on the final result. The hilly stages, besides stage 6, seem to be made for Roux.
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| Yellow Jersey |
Posted on 09-03-2018 20:42
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Classics Specialist
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Hmm we should be looking at just breaks here, luckily there are many opportunities.
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| whitejersey |
Posted on 09-03-2018 21:23
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Pretty much a throwaway race where its down to Golas to create some opportunities. Our season outside of Kigali is more or less done in terms of expecting results after our fiasco at GP Cyclistes.
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| Aquarius97 |
Posted on 09-03-2018 22:53
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I guess a Top15 is what i can hope given that we are still to break into the Top10 of a hilly stage race so far this season. Some breakaway luck later on the race would be nice too, but we aren't a team that has had that this season, so i can't rely on it happening.
I guess that as in San Luis, Gilbert could be in the first places in GC after the TT, and after that all the way down to an anonymous 13th-16th place
@Vien Avenir's nominations aren't even closed. Anyway, as Avenir isn't a normal event, it doesn't really matter whether it's posted on its actual place in the calendar.
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| sammyt93 |
Posted on 10-03-2018 02:19
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Hopefully Zoidl has a strong enough TT to maintain a decent GC spot through the following hilly stages, startlist is stronger than I would have hoped for though so can't expect too much.
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| sutty68 |
Posted on 10-03-2018 03:33
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Tour de France Champion
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All i ask for is that the guys actually try !! |
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| AbhishekLFC |
Posted on 10-03-2018 14:35
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Directeur Sportif
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I hope Wyss keeps his consistency going. He won't be in contention for a win but some more of what he's been doing all season would be good. Plus the Wyss - Kreder combo worked very well in Benelux. Hopefully that partnership bears fruit once again.
Thanks for the preview 
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| Scorchio |
Posted on 10-03-2018 19:23
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Looking forward to this race with a lot of interest. See the hills as key to the GC, with ITT for sorting close battles. WCC are perhaps surprisingly without our normal lead puncheur Boily as difficult decisions had to be made regarding his calendar pre-season. We are very happy with how it has worked out in terms of using RD's productively in HC outings rather than here. Hence leadership falls to last seasons key puncheur Rodriguez-Galindo. With some luck he may scrape arpund the outer reaches of the top 10, and has decent support to assist him in this endevour. To balance the lack of a premium puncheur, we do bring our top sprinting talent in the JAC-Lay duo. No dedicated lead-out rider given only 2 out of 8 stages have much chance of sprint finishes, but desire is to win at least one of these. Thomson of Vandousselaere can act as first lead-out in a pinch management reckons if required. Sven wil also be given the chance to shine in the ITT for some further individual glory in what has been a very steady season for the experienced Belgian.
Reckon this is one of the key races where In-n-Out could score massively and leap decisively towards the CT championship title. The combo of vHug and Reus is stand-out for me on this start-list with more than able support from K + K.
To finish with yet more acronyms, WCC will rely on R-G + JAC here at the ToB to continue to support our P-f-P 2017 season objective  .
Manager of ISA - Hexacta in the MG |
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| ryant |
Posted on 10-03-2018 20:10
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We've had a quiet run recently and I'm kind of worried that this may derail our promotion push :/
Still, Dennis should do well here, hoping that he manages a top 5 overall and we bag the TT win, but we can never be sure on that.
 John St Ledger in Team Bunzl-Centrica and Team U25Red Bull Driver in RFactor
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| Vien |
Posted on 10-03-2018 21:34
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Weird to see gaps appearing here, that's so inconsistent...
Great start for us though, grats jandal for victory #1 here. |
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| jandal7 |
Posted on 10-03-2018 21:37
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WOOOOOOOOOOOOO Awesome win, exactly what we needed and I love to see gaps. Fantastic delivery from the team and especially Nzeke. Yellow pre-time trial and a win already is exactly what I wanted here. Diggle's GC down the drain so all in on Roux for GC I guess - will be hard to beat Hug though. Shame we'll probably never get the depth points we should in these races!
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant."
[ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT] Xero Racing
5x x5
2x x2
2x x2 |
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| Aquarius97 |
Posted on 10-03-2018 21:46
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Grand Tour Specialist
Posts: 4191
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Wow! Gilbert with his best performance since San Cristobal in a key moment of the season! A podium finish is always welcomed, as it's only the second one for the team that wasn't Valls'.
Cunego keeps sucking though... 
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| Yellow Jersey |
Posted on 10-03-2018 21:52
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Classics Specialist
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Congratz Jandal! And to tsmoha for the report!
As expected there isn't much from us, Uwi is the only one in reach of a noticeable GC place, but only his U25 classification will matter in the end likely.
Getting in the breaks everyday is the goal I'd say
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| sammyt93 |
Posted on 11-03-2018 01:57
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Losing a minute on the first stage isn't a very good start for Zoidl, unless he ends up having a crazy TT I get the impression that a 15 GC and maybe even a top 20 GC will be beyond him, especially if he loses similar amounts of time on every hilly stage.
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| Kentaurus |
Posted on 11-03-2018 02:43
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Classics Specialist
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Again the struggle to take a podium spot, but the depth of my team was shown today with 4 riders in the top 15. (I will not ever underestimate Marentes again).
AZTECA - NBCSN  |
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| Tamijo |
Posted on 11-03-2018 04:01
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Congrats to Jandal, impressive start.
Thanks for the report, great stuff.
Look like we may have changed leader after this stage, interesting uhh. 
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| AbhishekLFC |
Posted on 11-03-2018 04:31
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Consistent from Wyss as always. It's funny how Costa gets dropped every time having the same hill stat 
And Roux just keeps on winning! Congrats Jandal and thanks for the report tsmoha
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