Tour de Suisse

dastardly00

50km into Stage 5 and no breakway has stuck as of yet.

Lost of attacking earlier , but the break is away

Arman Kamyshev (Astana), Ben King (Dimension Data), Jelle Wallays (Lotto Soudal), Sam Bewley (Orica-Scott), Lars Petter Nordhaug (Aqua Blue Sport) and Jesper Asselman (Roompot)

2 minutes out and peleton has eased up a little. Out to 4 minutes now as I'm typing and looking at the cycling news ticker.

Aqua Blue seem to be going through the team sending someone each day, and why not.

C3PO

No Eurosport Coverage?

buffalo

C3PO wrote: »

No Eurosport Coverage?

Looks like it starts at 15:00 - on the player at least.

15:00 on the player and 21:00 for highlights on ES 2 or pretty much what they showed live.

Route Du Sud live on ES1 on Thursday at 2pm I think and I have no idea what they plan to do with Tour Of Slovenia likely second player channel. Come tomorrow we'll have 3 races to follow till Sunday. Feast or famine I guess.

neris

Aqua blue have nordberg in the breakaway.

dastardly00

neris wrote: »

Aqua blue have nordberg in the breakaway.

You mean Nordhaug

neris

dastardly00 wrote: »

You mean Nordhaug

I was half right

68 lost souls

Is the no bottles within the last 20km rule to prevent finishers bottles being used?

68 lost souls

68 lost souls wrote: »

Is the no bottles within the last 20km rule to prevent finishers bottles being used?

The rules are on the UCI site , sorry on a phone here so too fiddly to check that but my understanding was at that stage the race is is well and truly on in most cases, say you have a break and you plan to attack guy next to you realises this and sticks his hand up for the team car for a drink? What do you do? Do you attack anyway or wait for him to come back?

I'm not sure the reason myself but I always figured it was to stop nonsense like that occurring. I know they allow people on foot to hand out drinks on really hot days etc. so it is a little flexible.

Ahhhh no. Lopez has been taken to hospital after a crash, hope he's not badly hurt. He's only back after a broken leg and had a decent ride yesterday.

68 lost souls

Thanks.

Sounds like it was a bad enough crash, who was the AquaBlue Rider in it with him?

68 lost souls

68 lost souls wrote: »

Thanks.

Sounds like it was a bad enough crash, who was the AquaBlue Rider in it with him?

It was Dan Pearson , he's got back on though.

pelevin

Sagan got very lucky there. If he wasn't way stronger than everyone else he could have been in trouble.

dastardly00

Update on the defending champion Miguel Angel Lopez from Astana...

From http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/fractured-thumb-and-stitches-for-lopez-after-suisse-crash/

López hit the deck on the descent from the Simplon Pass with some 70 kilometres left to race. He tried to continue on but climbed off before long, and was then taken to hospital for evaluation. The 23-year-old Colombian was diagnosed with a fractured right thumb and had sustained abrasions to his right side, and also required two stitches, according to Astana.

A lingering leg injury suffered in a training crash last autumn laid López low through May, forcing him to miss a scheduled start at the Tour of California and delaying his build-up for his debut Tour de France participation. Last week's GP du canton d'Argovie had been his first racing appearance of 2017.

Given this latest setback for Lopez, along with Fuglsang's recent impressive form and Aru's altered schedule due to his own injury, I wonder will Astana decide to bench Lopez for the TdF and get him to ride the Vuelta instead.

Trying to think whats between TdF and Vuelta for him to come back to before Vuelta maybe Poland depending on injury. Unless he can train some how and go Vuelta cold so to speak.

dastardly00

Deleted User wrote: »

Trying to think whats between TdF and Vuelta for him to come back to before Vuelta maybe Poland depending on injury. Unless he can train some how and go Vuelta cold so to speak.

Best stage race options would be Tour of Austria, Tour of Poland or Eneco Binckbank Tour. He could also fit in the Clásica Ciclista San Sebastian one-day classic.

dastardly00

Stage 6 Locarno - La Punt (166.7km)

So the stage profile below is deceptive and makes it look like a mountain-top finish... but it's not.
The summit of Albulapass is at 157.4km, with 9.3km remaining.
There is a descent of ~8km into La Punt followed by ~1km of flat roads to the finish line.
The stages in the Tour de Suisse that finish on a descent can often be quite hairy, so let's hope for more of the same

Tom Dumoulin is a non-starter today. Fatigue, which is understandable.

dastardly00

Deleted User wrote: »

Tom Dumoulin is a non-starter today. Fatigue, which is understandable.

It was a bit odd for him to ride the TdS in the first place, obviously because of his exploits in the Giro and then after doing the Hammer series as well.
He has plenty of time to get in some races before the Vuelta (which I presume is what he is planning on doing). He'll probably do the Bincbank Tour.

I hope he's not too fatigued for the Dutch Nationals next week.

Just a heads up 2 other events on today , tour of slovenia and route du sud. Both on ES1 live.

Highlights later of all 3 races from 21:00

Our own Philip Deignan is out in the break today. 1:15 is the gap.

dastardly00

Michael Woods is going well. It'd be good to see him win as he's improved a lot this year and has won feck all races in his career.

Subpopulus

dastardly00 wrote: »

Michael Woods is going well. It'd be good to see him win as he's improved a lot this year and has won feck all races in his career.

TBF he's won the highly coveted 2015 Clássica Internacional Loulé Capital Europeia do Desporto.

What self-respecting cyclist doesn't dream of winning the Clássica Internacional Loulé Capital Europeia do Desporto?

dastardly00

Subpopulus wrote: »

TBF he's won the highly coveted 2015 Clássica Internacional Loulé Capital Europeia do Desporto.

What self-respecting cyclist doesn't dream of winning the Clássica Internacional Loulé Capital Europeia do Desporto?

I hope you typed that out twice instead of copy & paste

Subpopulus

Looks like it's going to be Pozzovivo's day.

neris

dastardly00 wrote: »

Michael Woods is going well. It'd be good to see him win as he's improved a lot this year and has won feck all races in his career.

was woods not a distance runner who became a pro cyclist late in life? plus hes a cannondale rider, they dont really do winning

thats some descent would look fun and fast if they didnt have the irish weather

Subpopulus

So Pozzovivo wins and takes the yellow jersey to boot.

Edit: Hold on...

Cyclingnews: It seems that Pozzovivo took 15 seconds in real time on Caruso and 10 seconds in time bonuses, meaning that they are both locked on the same time. I think it will come down to the fractions of seconds won and lost in the opening day time trial to separate the two Italians atop the general classification.

Wow provisional yellow for him there according to the on screen times, must be fractions in it.

Subpopulus

Also, Aqua Blue's Lasse Norman Hansen still clinging onto the mountain's classification by a single point. Hard to say what chance he has of winning it overall since there's a HC climb to finish with tomorrow, and then a circuit race on Saturday with 8 climbs of the same hill with points on top each time.