The Tour of Vancouver kicks off with the traditional mountain prologue up the steep hill to the Simon Fraser University. A challenging climb, that should see the best climbers rather than prologue specialists battling for the first yellow jersey, the first mountain points and showing, who's in great shape and who's not.
Obviously, this ain't the deciding stage (only one of the past four GC winners here had won the opening mountain timetrial, Janez Brajkovic in 2014), but a 6.5km prologue still can make for a difference eventually. Even more, since we've seen very close decisions for the GC win in the past four editions here in Canada's most beautiful city.
Who's up for it today? Andrei Amador is the clear favorite, but Intxausti won this stage last year. Given his extra motivation to finally grab yellow after two close runner-ups in 2016 and 2014, he should be amongst the most dangerous threats for Amador. Just like Ùran, of course.
osorio sets a first notable best time amongst the early starters. His 12'18" would see him leading the provisional ranking at the finish for quite a while. A few other notable early finishers:
#
rider
diff
2
reguigui
+ 1
3
hadi
+ 1
4
poljanski
+ 2
5
ivars
+ 2
6
ortega
+ 2
7
vervaeke
+ 3
8
nieve
+ 3
van den broeck is, despite his age, still a possible threat for the GC here and the veteran surely enjoyed his 2015 outing in Vancouver, when he climbed to a solid 4th place eventually. He's looking good today and sets - though as to be expected - a new best time. The Belgian is 7 seconds faster than Osorio.
samwel his his team's biggest hope for a good result in the GC, but he's not at his best today. He finishes clearly behind his teammate Vervaeke and that's obviously not the result, he had hoped for:
+ 19" on the current best time, which won't be enough for a Top-20 result today.
#
rider
diff
1
van den broeck
12'11"
2
osorio
+ 7
3
reguigui
+ 8
4
hadi
+ 8
5
poljanski
+ 9
6
ivars
+ 9
7
ortega
+ 9
8
bartl
+ 9
9
vervaeke
+ 10
10
nieve
+ 10
11
chiarello
+ 10
12
senni
+ 11
13
haga
+ 12
…
samwel
+ 19
roglic next GC contender on the road and he would surely fancy his chances with the concluding TTT and the team, he got as the support here. Anyway, he's not amongst the best climbers and the goal is to limit the losses in the three key mountain stages (if we count today's climbing challenge as a mountain stage). It ain't going too well for him though and he's not much better than Samwel:
+ 16" on Van den Broeck and therefore he should expect to lose even further seconds on the very best climbers later on!
ratiy with a fairly better showing on the climb then. His motor looks fine today and while he misses out on the best time, he's climbing to a provisional 2nd place with just a minor disadvantahe:
+ 2" and here's some hoping, that this may be enough for a Top-10 result at the end of the day.
marquez as the second of his team's duo of GC contenders. Both him and nazaret won't make their manager happy, as neither Marquez (GC's 10th in 2015) nor Nazaret (9th in 2014) live up to their role as minor favorites for the stage. Nazaret slightly better than Marquez, but both fail to beat teammate Bartl's time!
#
rider
diff
1
van den broeck
12'11"
2
ratiy
+ 2
3
osorio
+ 7
4
reguigui
+ 8
5
hadi
+ 8
…
nazaret
+ 13
ochoa quintero
+ 13
teklehaimanot
+ 14
marquez
+ 14
roglic
+ 16
kozhatayev
+ 17
costagli as the next possible Top-10 contender and opposing to Berg's duo, he's delivering a great prologue. Still a few big names to follow, but at this stage, it's surely a very good sign to set a best time. Which he does: beating Van den Broeck by a second, Costagli is the new leader in the provisional ranking at the finish!
ji with another attempt to do anything special here in Vancouver. The Chinese will surely hope for a better result than his 17th place in the GC last year and today's mountain challenge could be a first indicator, in which direction this race will go for him. He ain't bad, not special either:
+ 10" to finish in the same area as Poljanski, Ivars, Ortega and Bartl. Surely not the names he would have preferred to finish with the same time, but at least he's better than some other premium climbers.
eastman has rather good memories at his appearance in 2015, where he claimed the U25 competition and finished as 7th in the final GC. The wildcard entry has nothing to lose and with no single Canadian on the startlist, the US boy may become a spectator's favorite as well. It may help to deliver a good result today and he's doing fine eventually:
+ 2" to finish as provisional 3rd behind Costagli and Van den Broeck!
shikai is the next rider, who won a young rider jersey here (as 13th overall in 2016). China's best stage racer though has some pressure on his shoulders, but does not prevent him from delivering a great climb. He beats the best time by quite a margin (5 seconds) and may well fight for the stage podium at least:
#
rider
diff
1
shikai
12'05"
2
costagli
+ 5
3
van den broeck
+ 6
4
eastman
+ 7
5
ratiy
+ 8
6
osorio
+ 13
intxausti as the first very top favorite. The Spaniard has a heart-breaking history in the Tour of Vancouver, but he managed to win this prologue one year ago. Motivation shouldn't be a problem for him and neither his legs, it seems, as he is putting up a strong showing to finish ahead of Shikai by 6 seconds!
With only three riders to come, the stage podium looks possible, but will it be enough to repeat his victory from last season? We will know soon.
kudus is approaching the finish at the Simon Fraser University now. The premium stage racer does not only fight for yellow, but also for the young rider's competition at least. Shikai put a strong performance onto the climb and while Kudus does not really disappoint with his finishing time, the first U25 jersey holder will be Shikai:
+ 12" for Kudos on Intxausti's best time as provisional 5th on the stage!
úran next. There's no doubt, that he will aim for more than his 5th place in the GC last year and to open the race with a bang would definitely help his ambitious goal. Just like Intxausti, he's looking good on the climb and just like Intxausti, he's delivering. Even better, he's taking the provisional lead by one second!
And now for the top favorite..
amador finished 3rd in the GC last year, with a clear gap on race winner Ricco and runner-up Intxausti. He will certainly aim for only yellow this year and it looks like he's in shape to do so. Amador climbs with an impressive speed when we thought that Úran and Intxausti delivered some big times onto the climb, we may need to find a new word for what the top favorite has delivered today:
#
rider
diff
1
amador
11'46"
2
úran
+ 12
3
intxausti
+ 13
4
shikai
+ 19
5
costagli
+ 24
6
van den broeck
+ 25
7
kudus
+ 25
8
eastman
+ 26
9
ratiy
+ 27
10
osorio
+ 32
So amador kicks off the Tour of Vancouver with a real bang, crushing the competition to beat his biggest opponents by more than ten seconds. Which is quite impressive on a short climb like today. Obviously, it's just a first advantage gained, but if he's in such a good shape like we can imagine after today's performance, his rivals definitely won't have an easy challenge to contest for yellow.
The next two stages will be flat and as always, all those GC guys will try to avoid any crashes or splits. It's time for the sprinters to perform.
