GP of Industry and Arts&Crafts 🇮🇹 6/9/2026 (1.Pro)

https://ciclismolarcianese.it/edizioni/48-gran-premio-industria-e-artigianato-anno-2026/

All the climbers and punchers who aren’t in Spain appear to go to Italy: T. Pidcock, L. Martinez, M. Rondel, Storer, Jegat, R. Grégoire, Scaroni, Aranburu and others still.

They will perform various loop around Larciano, Tuscany. The climbs are located in the Monte Albano, the low mountain (or rather, hill) range that separates Lucca from Florence.

Stage 13, Friday 4

193 km, D+ 3300m

Once again, a stage with a climb at a distance from the line, 40 km here, before a flat finish. The originality is that first half of the stage is however pretty hard. If it were still to finish in some sort of a sprint, the last half-mile is uphill.

Mühlberger (🇦🇹 Decathlon), best and very close lieutenant of Gall🇦🇹, 9^th in GC, had to withdraw due to a crash early in the stage 😞

Sivakov (🇷🇺🇫🇷 UAE) also crashed and withdrew (or did he not crash? anyway he withdrew). How many UAE riders are still on the race?

A. Laurence (🇫🇷 Ineos) hit the ground in a street corner while he was leading the breakaway (classical Ineos style of losing the front wheel in curves taken too fast). No apparent damage on the rider, but the bike won’t work and his car was still behind the peloton…

Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) once gain went to take the points of the 1^st KOM before Buitrago🇨🇴.

He and Brennan🇬🇧 were in the first 2 groups, and once again, the Brit had to race so that the Belgian could finally win his own stage. It was absolutely whatever, both were always either pulling or chasing, or attacking, for 40 km, they had got good vitamins in their breakfast. Now that he’s got his stage victory (on top of the Green jersey and a podium for the Polka Dots jersey), perhaps will he be less of a PITA for other riders?

Wait, I see that Lutsenko (🇰🇿 NSN) finished 4th? I never noticed him! 🤣 I remember he was on TV at some point, but in my idea, it was somewhere else, not among the last survivors, it couldn’t be… 😄

And this morning, he is DNS according to PCS ❓❓❓

Did he write a clause in his contract saying that if he scores a top-5 in a WT stage, he can retire at once? 😀

Stage 12, Thursday 3

167 km, D+ 4500m

Parts of this stage look similar to the one won by Leknessund on the 1^st week. However there are a few more serious slopes here, in the beginning of the Velefique Pass and then in the beginning of the Calar observatory’s climb . Between 2 easier stages, the GC leaders will certainly battle again here. Will it be for stage victory too, or simply far behind a breakaway?

So, there was breakaway of 30 riders. Sivakov (🇷🇺🇫🇷 UAE) tried to join it, but while the other 2 members of his counter-attack group succeeded, he didn’t. Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) once again disputed all of the first 3 KOM to Buitrago (🇨🇴 Bahrain), and because there are so many ‘flat climbs’ in this 2026 Vuelta, beat him each time. 🙄 Then nobody disputed him the Green jersey points…

The peloton quickly let the breakaway go, and the gap grew up to 7′30″, which meant that the young Omrzel (🇸🇮 Bahrain) got on the virtual GC podium. Movistar was just pacing around, and it was a bit strange that teams from the other top-5 guys were not acting in any way.

Movistar accelerated a bit in the first big climb. The only attack was Carapaz’ (🇪🇨 EF) doing, when the slope got easier: he quickly gained 20-30 seconds, but then the gap stabilised and he was caught before the summit.

In the second, they kept on accelerating, reducing the peloton to a small number. Then Decathlon prepared Gall🇦🇹’s attack. It didn’t work well, as Mas🇪🇸 and Roglitch🇸🇮 rather easily stuck or came up back to him. It was a bit more difficult for Carapaz🇪🇨 and Onley🇬🇧. Onley🇬🇧 had undergone a crash 20 km after the beginning of the stage, and he was dropped later: after one attack too many, his little group of 3 came back without him (a bit like Sivakov earlier in the race).

The breakaway fought for victory, as the best riders there had enough of a gap over the peloton to be safe. From the breakaway, the 2 Movistar riders and the 1 Decathlon rider dropped at calculated times to help their respective leaders behind: it was unusually well executed (it probably helps that unlike in Pogatchar/Vingegaard case, their leaders are not 3 legs above them).

Urko Berrade (🇪🇸 Kern Pharma) was the last rider able to follow Omrzel🇸🇮, after Buitrago🇨🇴 and Bisiaux🇫🇷 were dropped. He was dropped a bit later too, and had a hard time preserving his 2^nd place.

Behind, Mas🇪🇸 left Gall🇦🇹 and Roglitch🇸🇮 stunned when he attacked. His advance quickly grew, he also got the support of R. Garcia🇪🇸 coming from ahead, and reached perhaps 40-45 second. On the line, it was down to 30 seconds, Mas🇪🇸 was getting tired; we can confirm that by the fact that he couldn’t follow the sprint of Vansevenant (🇧🇪 Soudal-QS) whom he had caught a bit earlier.

Overall, it was a confirmation of the levels riders exposed in previous mountain stages. The small differences today were:

• Onley🇬🇧 loses a bit, we may blame this on his crash early in the afternoon;
• Omrzel🇸🇮 jumps to 6^th place thanks to his breakaway and good finish for the stage victory;
• Widar (🇧🇪 Lotto) lost again, he is now 12 minutes behind top-10.

Buitrago🇨🇴 could score max points in the climb before the final one, even though an attack by his own teammate Omrzel🇸🇮 followed by Bisiaux (🇫🇷 Decathlon) endangered him. Luckily, the French rider didn’t relay. And he also

Wait, I see that Lutsenko (🇰🇿 NSN) finished 4^th? I never noticed him! 🤣 I remember he was on TV at some point, but in my idea, it was somewhere else, not among the last survivors, it couldn’t be… 😄

I also see that Vine (🇦🇺 UAE) withdrew today.

Bottles resupply have become a farce. Basically nobody makes an effort any more to go and get bottles; they get them from cars which come up to where the riders are, they get them from standing suppliers in a ton of places, they get them from motorbike without even leaving their position in the group for a second. We can now see riders getting a bottle 4 times in just 1 kilometre… They just press them twice to moisten their jersey, throw them right away and ask fo another one. They throw them anywhere. Bottles are flying anywhere, they don’t care, a ton of them end up where there is no one (of course outside of ‘litter zones’), in buses, in fields. In urban or semi-urban areas, they bounce off walls and gutters and come back inside the pelotons. There are more and more incidents with suppliers.

Today, commissars finally started giving a few penalties and fine. But that’s still ridiculous compared to the number of offenses we can witness (and the number of offenses we can witness is most likely ridiculous to the number of offenses that are performed).

Stage 11, Wednesday 2

151 km, D+ 1400m

Contrarily to the previous day, today the elevation is concentrated in one main climb. Its slope isn’t steep and there are still 30 km to go after its summit. We can note that the first 15 km are designed to create a breakaway. But the whole profile shouldn’t be very hard to control.

Visma and Cofidis rode all day, they even caught the breakaway very early.

Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) went to ‘rob’ 1 Mountain point from Buitrago (🇨🇴 Bahrain) at the top of the climb, I don’t know why.

Coquard (🇫🇷 Cofidis) was left alone by his team in the last miles, but he managed to stay hidden, except for 2 repositionings, one by the left side, to get back into the ‘ball’, and a second one by the right, to put himself right in the wheel of Brennan (🇬🇧 Visma), which he didn’t leave for the last mile. It was a bit funny, because unlike many other races, everybody played it gently, accepting to share a wheel at times: there were no shoulder hits to stay exactly in someone’s wheel, they all accepted to have only half the shelter at times.

So, Brennan🇬🇧 wins again, and Coquard🇫🇷 finishes juste behind him.

Coquard🇫🇷 also did the I.S., just behind Van Aert🇧🇪 (I didn’t see that section of the race, just the results). So it seems that we may finally get a bit of competition for the podium of the Points classification, if not for the Green jersey itself.

Perhaps the failure by Brennan on the previous sprint played a role too.

But yeah, the obvious, classic, strategy on a profile like yesterday, would have been to have Van Aert attack somewhere in the humps between 5 and 30 km from the line, and keep Brennan for the sprint in case the Belgian didn’t succeed in getting away in a group or alone, while teammates would have rested in the peloton and stay fresh to help Brennan in the last miles.

Meanwhile, Laporte never seems to get a chance (so far), either working for Brennan or for Van Aert. He looks fine to us, but perhaps they think he isn’t that much, and we cannot see his limits because he ‘just’ has to work for others and call it a day.

You may wish to watch the 1^st stage of the Tour of Britain which took place today. It was raced as a true classic.

While on the paper he’s scored a 2^nd and a 4^th positions on stages (which isn’t bad in theory), he was indeed transparent all along despite the presence of many ‘Pedersen’ stage profiles, in stark contrast with the level of activity he displayed on the Tour of France.

Stage 10, Tuesday 1

185 km, D+ 2700m

No big climbs, no steep climbs, but a number of them again. The finish may be decided by small hump 5 km from the line, and the survival over the following 4 km long uphill false-flat that brings the riders to the line. Who will win, a puncher? a false-flat sprinter? a breakaway?

The last breakaway survivor was Dvernes (🇳🇴 Uno-X), he even relayed when he was caught by a few guys coming from the peloton a few miles from the line.

In the peloton, Visma was controlling anyone who would try to break away, sometimes with Kuss🇺🇸, most of the time with Brennan🇬🇧. It was obviously meant for Van Aert🇧🇪, in the sprint or through an attack in the last miles. Given how easy Brennan🇬🇧 was in the slopes when he was jumping after attackers, it really didn’t look like a good idea not to preserve the Brit and bet on him in a sprint on an uphill false-flat…

1 km (or 1 mile?) from the line, Fedorov (🇰🇿 Astana ?) attacked, followed by Azparren (🇪🇸 Q36.5). I don’t know what Azparren🇪🇸 was thinking: that guy is able to perform good finishes alone, and he had the chance that the Kazakh was pulling him well, yet he never relayed nor attacked before it was too late. I swear I believe that I even saw him braking! It looked like, “this guy is going to bring me 50 m from the line and I’ll jump him, the peloton doesn’t exist”. By the time he finally accelerated, the first sprinters were already on him…

And Van Aert🇧🇪 failed and only finished 4^th. This is yet another surprise victory for a French (semi-)sprinter: Tronchon (🇫🇷 GFDJ); Coquard (🇫🇷 Cofidis) finishes much farther today, back to his usual rankings. M. Cort (🇩🇰 Uno-X) rewards the good day of his team with a 2^nd place.

I heard it was a good race though I didn’t watch it

Well, there are 2 ways to consider it:

• it was a good race because there were many attacks/counter-attacks, and yet it wasn’t decided until the last km;
• it was one of those crappy Coupe-de-France style of race, where the hills are never enough to make a real difference, and the victory is played on a dice roll in the last miles (wrong position at the single wrong time, or a group of idiots not chasing a lone guy, or one of those sprints on top of false-flat). 😀

BTW, I read it was the first WT classic won by Cofidis in 23 years (that is, since before it became WT)!

Of course, it is one of the weakest WT classics in the year, but still…

You have to wonder where Kamp suddenly found some form

I cannot tell you whether he was good all along, or just lucky. By lucky, I mean that perhaps that may have been the only attack he followed, and then for the last mile there was this ‘group of idiots’ effect. I don’t know. Anyway, he was in the right breakaway while others didn’t manage to be there for various reasons, and he attempted to follow Aranburu without being caught up by the rest of the group.

Classique de Bretagne (ex GP of Plouaix) 🇫🇷 30/08/2026

It was rather pleasant to watch, as there were many (counter-)attacks.

Aranburu (🇪🇸 Cofidis) learned from his mistakes on the Tour of Limousin. This time, once in the final largish breakaway group, he was the one who attacked 1 mile from the line instead of waiting for the sprint, and being beaten at it or letting another guy leave solo while all riders in the group look at each other.

A. Kamp (🇩🇰 Uno-X) did the same a little bit later. While he never could catch Aranburu🇪🇸, he ensured a good 2^nd place. You had to wear Yellow and Red on that day 😁

That’s 2 WT victories in the same week-end for Cofidis, now a Pro-Team!

Stage 8, Saturday 29

172 km, D+ 1300m

I assume this stage is designed to create a fight between punchers and sprinters. However it didn’t work on Wednesday, as everyone wanted a sprint; and this time the slope may be insufficient to get rid of all sprinters.

Nobody but a poor Burgos rider (Fernandez🇪🇸) volunteered for a breakaway.

The peloton was musing around. There was a first crash after a guy at the front took a satchel from a supply assistant and he dropped it or the satchel was ridded, and anyway its whole content went in the middle of the peloton, ultimately causing a crash probably near the back.

Then the peloton started pushing like idiots before the Intermediate Sprint (that basically nobody disputed, Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) just did a 30 m sprint for the points, and Skjelmose (🇩🇰 Lidl-Trek) at a distance for the last time bonus) and kept on pushing after, for no reason at all.

Pogatchar (🇸🇮 UAE) was on the left side of the (straight) road, and suddenly moved rightwards, collided and crashed badly. His shoulder was badly hit, he couldn’t get back on his bike and had to withdraw. There is no clear explanation to why he lost control his bike, there was nobody on his left, he didn’t seem to be on the asphalt limit, the only hypothesis I could make is the rider behind touching his backwheel, but in such cases it is most of the time the rider behind who crashes, and the rider ahead barely feels it. Other than that, something in or on the road.

Nobody did anything in the climb.

Azparren (🇪🇸 Q36.5) did a nice solo after the summit: he was only caught 1 mile from the line.

The sprint result was weird for a flat sprint: 34 y.o. Coquard (🇫🇷 Cofidis) beating M. Pedersen (🇩🇰 Lidl-Trek)! The favourite Brennan (🇬🇧 Visma) was stuck in a wrong place during sprint preparation while his teammates were leading, and when the real sprint started, he sat down after a while.

There was another mass crash in the sprint. Ladies and gentlemen, this was a sprinters stage: sportingly useless, boring for the watcher, and causing many injuries to riders for nothing 😠

NB: there had already been a crash causing withdrawals before the real start…

Morality: when half of the riders have tasted the asphalt during a stage, French riders stand a chance. That’s what it takes 😀

All classifications are now ‘reset’ due to Pogatchar’s accident:

• E. Mas🇪🇸 now leads GC with about 1′ over Gall🇦🇹 and 1′30″ over the good old Roglitch🇸🇮;
• Leknessund🇳🇴 now leads Mountain classification; surprisingly, Van Aert🇧🇪 comes second as he was let pass first on today’s unique climb;
• Van Aert🇧🇪 already started leading the Points classification after taking the I.S. and a good final position yesterday.

Stage 7, Friday 28

150 km, D+ 3600m*

I am not sure how to name this stage. There is quite some elevation, but the vast majority of slopes are smooth. Probably a day for breakaways, coming after an UAE stage.

It was indeed for a breakaway. As everybody wanted in, it was one of those days where there is a long struggle since the start of the race. However it was a km-0 breakaway who won. It sounds contradictory, but it means that today the long struggle concerned counter-attacks.

At some point, a group of 3 broke away from the large-ish counter-attack group and managed to join the first 2 riders who where Van Aert (🇧🇪 UAE) and Leknessund (🇳🇴 Uno-X). The large-ish counter-attack group nevr rode very well, before or after that; nor did it ride very bad; it was really an in-between where on average they were at the same pace as the first group.

In the final climb, Leknessund🇳🇴 left the group of 5. Van Aert🇧🇪, who was in trouble for a little while, rode behind him but never managed to catch him, and was ultimately countered by the other Uno-X, T. Johannessen🇳🇴, who came second and scored a double Norwegian–Uno-X victory.

It is used to be very common a few years ago, but it’s much rarer now with the new way of riding: we had competition at the front of the race for stage victory, and later in the peloton for GC.

Decathlon took the place of UAE in the final climb and started pushing harder (Riccitello🇺🇸 made himself useful in that respect, perhaps for the first time this year(?)). Riders dropped and dropped at the back. There were not many left when Gall🇦🇹 attacked. Only Pogatchar (🇸🇮 UAE) and E. Mas (🇪🇸 Movistar) resisted him. Naturally, when they were 2 km from the line, with 1 hard then 1 easy km to go, the Slovenian countered, then Mas🇪🇸 was dropped and Gall🇦🇹 hanged in between.

Widar (🇧🇪 Lotto) was dropped early again.

No big gaps were created (just many small ones), therefore no big changes appear in GC. Gall🇦🇹 gets closer to Roglitch’s (🇸🇮 Bora) podium position. Carapaz (🇪🇨 EF) is going down, he is still 7^th and among a small pack of 3 riders at a about 6 minutes (that’s barely more than 1 minute behind the podium).

Stage 6, Thursday 27

177 km, D+ 3600m*

Another mountain stage, another Pogatchar day. To make sure of it and remind him of his 3 Stade Bianche victories in a row, there will be 2 km on a gravel road at 12% near the summit of the last climb. Shall the first group to ride down towards the finish line be a one-man group or shall he get a few companions?

Summary: a disappointing Pogatchar (🇸🇮 UAE)… scores a 3^rd victory!

I didn’t quite follow the beginning/mid race. I heard it was one of those days where breakaways take ages to form. Then at some point there was a counter-attack behind the big breakaway, and Pogatchar🇸🇮 was in that chasing group, which returned to the peloton.

Concerning the parts I saw, UAE was pulling the peloton, followed by Movistar. The gap was maintained around 2 minutes and brought back as they were getting near the main climb.

In the climb, Widar (🇧🇪 Lotto-Int.) was dropped on the fast parts before the slope got harder. It was the usual train with Torres (🇪🇸 UAE) as last element before Pogatchar🇸🇮 attacked on the small asphalted road before the dirt track.

Contrarily to the Andorran stage, Gall (🇦🇹 Decathlon) let himself drop when the head accelerated; and it was O. Onley (🇬🇧 Ineos) who tried to follow Pogatchar🇸🇮. The Brit blew up in the process, while Gall🇦🇹 was progressively coming back with the top guys (other than Pogatchar🇸🇮).

Actually, the Slovenian wasn’t creating the large gap we expected. Mas (🇪🇸 Movistar) attacked from the little group, and after a (long) while closed the gap with Pogatchar🇸🇮 on the summit. He even jumped him on the KOM line!

Then there was a descent on a winding and very narrow road with a concrete ditch on the right side and a 6 inches step on the left between the asphalt and the shoulder. E. Mas🇪🇸 told the Slovenian to stay behind him and go easy. However, while the road was about to transition to one of those concrete tracks thye love in Spain, Pogatchar🇸🇮 took him over and started dropping the Spaniard. It didn’t last long as the Slovenian rider came too fast in a curve, slid a bit, and went off the road. Luckily, he had managed to break significantly and was then very slow, and it was one of the rare places where there was a somewhat spacious shoulder. So he was stopped but didn’t crash. Then he just followed Mas🇪🇸 until they were on a less steep and standard-width normal road.

Behind, there were 3 men who had passed the summit about 35 seconds behind, and then 2 other guys a bit later. In the first of these small groups were Gall🇦🇹, Roglitch (🇸🇮 Bora) again, and R. Debruynes (🇧🇪 Alpecin) who was in the breakaway; the second group was made of Carapaz (🇪🇨 EF) and H. Tejada (🇨🇴 Astana).

The Gall🇦🇹 came closer to the front pair in the descent and the beginning of the flat, but then lost a bit of terrain and was caught by the 2 South-Americans.

Contrarily to what I thought, there was no agreement in the front pair for stage victory, despite a very good collaboration on the flat, and Pogatchar🇸🇮 naturally beat Mas🇪🇸 in the sprint.

An attack by Tejada🇨🇴 in the group of 5 didn’t seem to disorganise it. However they started acting like morons in, say, the last mile, and in the fear of losing a 4″ time bonus, all lost an extra 10″ to Mas. Worse, it is Debruynes🇧🇪, who as the last breakaway survivor most likely didn’t relay much in the group of 3 then 5, who beat the others for the 3^rd place and time bonus. Debruynes🇧🇪 was sort of ranked in GC, but farther than others.

1′40″ after the winners, a group of 5 with most of the rest of the GC guys came: Onley🇬🇧, Skjelmose (🇩🇰 Lid-trek), Kuss (🇺🇸 Visma) and the surprise Berthet (🇫🇷 GFDJ). This group (minus Rodriguez (🇪🇸 Astana) who had his teammate Tejada ahead) collaborated until the end and didn’t lose time in the final part contrarily to the previous group of 5.

Widar🇧🇪 lost 4 minutes today 😞

E. Mas🇪🇸 is now second in GC with a relatively significant 45″ advance over Roglitch🇸🇮 and about 1′30″ over the following ones.

Stage 5, Wednesday 26

173 km, D+ 1700m*

With the hills that start 60 km from the line and end 20-30 from it, this should be a game of sprinters vs punchers. Therefore we should see punchers-sprinters having their day.

Summary: Okay… so, punchers / breakawaymen-punchers / punchers-climbers / finishers did nothing at all, therefore there was a mass sprint, therefore Brennan (🇬🇧 Visma) won again.

I heard there were echelons before I turned the telly on, however there were no groups nor breakaway when I came.

Hayter (🇬🇧 Soudal-QS) went ahead a few miles before the Intermediate Sprint. Nobody chased after him, nobody joined him. So he got the I.S. max points, and this was enough to warrant the most combative rider price today, to tell you the extent of nothingness in this stage.

30 seconds behind him, nobody fought for the I.S. points. Nobody fought for the time bonuses in spite of the fact that we have 9 riders in 50 seconds in GC top-10… Visma who was leading the peloton just granted Van Aert🇧🇪 the points for 2^nd place.

Nobody did anything in the hills, except for a short-lived solo by Kron (🇩🇰 Uno-X) after a while. The peloton nevertheless started pushing like maniacs in the false-flats before the last and main hill, but then they rode slower and slower along the climb. So the peloton was still massive at the top of this 3^rd category, the only KOM of the day. UAE was leading the peloton, so they scored the points, as only 1 Astana tried to score them, but started too late…

Then it was mostly a procession again: as everyone agreed on a sprint, there was no hurry and the final acceleration only started about 4 km from the line.

Congratulations to all riders who had only 3 occasions of getting hilly/punchy terrain this week, and did nothing in Manosque, and nothing here. Congratulations to teams like FDJ and Cofidis, whose sprinter finished 13^th and 17^th today (that is, behind 2 Visma launchers…) after finishing 24^th and 15^th in Manosque, but never tried anything in the hills here or there. 🙄

The only positive thing today is that there was no crash in the end.

As I expected, *Cian U*.* (🇧🇪 Movistar) didn’t restart today 😥

Stage 4, Tuesday 25: 🇦🇩Andorra la Vieja–Andorra la Vieja🇦🇩

105 km, D+ 3000m

Visma was very willing to go on a breakaway. But perhaps halfway into the real Envalira Pass, Decathlon took command of the peloton and brought the gap down. They kept pushing in the descent to the Pas de la Case, after after the tunnel, they had caught everyone.

They kept on pulling until the Beixalis Pass started and when they had only one teammate left in front of F. Gall🇦🇹, the Austrian attacked. Hum, no, that’s not what happened. The Slovenian attacked. Gall🇦🇹 tried to follow him for a few hundred yards, and then came back into next group.

So, basically what we’ve already seen again and again, and was expected after we saw Decathlon starting pulling.

After that (there were 50 km to go), I didn’t watch much. The gap grew and grew and grew, although the guys behind Pogatchar🇸🇮 weren’t dawdling around, because they were split in 2 little groups of about 3 to 6 guys each.

Gall🇦🇹 then tried to get rid of other guys, but couldn’t.

The gap, which had grown over 3 minutes, was reduced by 30 seconds in the last 10 km.

A few things to note:

• J. Widar (🇧🇪 Lotto-I.) was often disappointing in the past, but that really wasn’t the case today; it seems that he finally ‘grew up’ to adult strength;
• it is not going to be as easy as everyone (including myself and himself) thought, for Gall🇦🇹 to finish second of this Tour; he isn’t superior to several other climbers, and those may be superior to him on other terrains, and a few of them are ahead of him because he didn’t do very well on the first 2 stages; will Decathlon repeat today’s tactics? no matter what the result over Gall🇦🇹’s true contenders would be, that would grant Pogatchar🇬🇧 several extra stage victories;
• among those, they are two (old) surprises: Roglitch (🇸🇮 Bora) and again Mas (🇪🇸 Movistar) who truly seems to have found his younger legs this year;
• not a comeback, but Onley (🇬🇧 Ineos) was looking very good too, a bit better and certainly fresher, even; let’s wait for his 3 punctures in the same stage 😄;
• Carapaz (🇪🇨 EF) tried hard, but he often missed a little bit, and was relegated to second group, coming back, dropped a bit again… I don’t know what he is going to do in the rest of the race, he certainly hasn’t lost time enough to get a free pass for breakaways;
• Skjelmose (🇩🇰 Lidl-Trek) blew up in the end, but again, he is less than 45 seconds behind all the other guys.
• Cian U*.* (🇧🇪 Movistar) was in trouble again in the first slope of the day; he is injured, he finished in time today, but I doubt he will start tomorrow (?)

Allowed delays were conveniently changed from the 16% that was written in the regulations document, to 20%… 🙄 (equivalent to ‘upgrading’ the stage from difficulty category 4 to difficulty category 5).

Stage 3, Monday 24: 🇫🇷 Gruissan–Font Romeu🇫🇷

175 km, D+ 2600m

After a very long transfer along the French Mediterranean coast, this stage arrives already in the Pyrenees. Amusingly, the destination is basically the same as where the Tour de France entered France from Spain in July. Most of the approach is made of unbearable dozens of kilometres of a slightly then strongly uphill false-flat highway road. The final climb is pretty much the same.

The summary will be short.

Hayter (🇬🇧 Soudal-QS) joined the breakaway and scored max points at I.S.

The peloton was lead by UAE all day long. They accelerated a bit 95 km from the line in an urban area, which caused a split; 90 km they accelerated again in the flat country, which caused echelons; they didn’t do it long and everyone regrouped for a procession until the top. In Mont-Louis, UAE stopped the race because it was raining ice.

Despite the fact that it was just your classical ice storm that, while impressive when you are under it, ends after 5-10 minutes, the race wasn’t restarted in any way.

I think that the two guys who were ahead in Mont-Louis are fucked as the race seems cancelled and not shortened. Wenzel (🇱🇺 Kern) from the breakaway and Fortunato (🇮🇹 Astana) who had attacked from the peloton.

Will they de deprived of the Mountain points for which they sprinted in mont-Louis as well? Will Hayter🇬🇧 be deprived of his I.S. points too? We shall see.

There are 6/4/2 seconds to grab at the I.S. 36 km from the line, and of course 10/6/4 seconds at the finish.

There are a number of more or less likely candidates to take the Red jersey today (2nd stage):

• Hayter (🇬🇧 Soudal-QS) went into the 4-man breakaway, he needs only 1 second;
• Laporte (🇫🇷 Visma) needs 7 seconds, he might get them though a 2nd or 3rd place at the finish and a 3rd or 2nd place at the I.S.;
• Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma again) needs 10 seconds, he may get them though a 2nd or 3rd place at the finish and a 3rd or 2nd place at the I.S.;
• M. Pedersen (🇩🇰 Lidl-trek) needs 17 seconds, he might get them though winning the stage and and a making place at the I.S. and creating somewhere in the peloton a large enough split (unfortunately, I think that the 3-second rule applies today): he is pretty much doomed by 0,07 seconds, otherwise 16 seconds would have ‘sufficed’.

First big failure for Visma and wonderful effort by Hayter🇬🇧: the base pace of the peloton was set by Visma and Lidl-Trek against a breakaway of 3 Spanish ProTeam riders and Hayter🇬🇧, which never gained a big gap, as it is usual nowadays. With a bit more than 20 km before the I.S., Visma put Armirail🇫🇷 and Kruijswijk🇳🇱 to push hard, and the gap quickly dropped down to around 20 seconds. But then Hayter🇬🇧 switched to second gear, and managed to grow the gap from 15 to 25 seconds and keep it that way! The Visma boys only lost time over the last 10-12 km to the I.S.!

Another mistake by Visma: at the I.S., Laporte🇫🇷 lead Van Aert🇧🇪 and… instead of sticking with him, was beaten by Coquard (🇫🇷 Cofidis) for 3^rd place.

Therefore, Van Aert🇧🇪 is now 11+ seconds behind Hayter🇬🇧, thus cannot get the Red jersey only by the time bonus et the finish. And Laporte🇫🇷 also moves out of the 10 seconds limit, he is now at 12+ seconds from Hayter🇬🇧…

Lidl-Trek had decided they didn’t care about the Red jersey.

Regrouped after the I.S., the peloton took the form of parallel trains. Nobody attempted anything, as they all wanted a sprint. Luckily, there were no crash in the finish with the town entry.

Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) attacked at 2 km, where there was a hump. He was only followed by… Pogatchar (🇸🇮 UAE). The EF behind them parked. Pogatchar🇸🇮 didn’t relay the Belgian, nor counter-attacked; Van Aert🇧🇪 wasn’t pushing very hard either in spite of the fact that they had quickly created a significant gap; they were caught up by one Astana rider and soon by the peloton.

edit: the Astana rider was Romele🇮🇹.

In the sprint, Brennan (🇬🇧 Astana) launched from very far, he was followed by M. Pedersen (🇩🇰 Lidl-Trek) but the Dane gradually lost his wheel. Behind him was… Pogatchar🇸🇮 again! The Red jersey took him over near the line, but was at the same time overtaken by a surprise rider: Pau Miquel (🇪🇸 Barhrein) while Brennan🇬🇧 was winning far ahead.

I am waiting for photo-finish recalculation of splits to comment on GC, because there were guys a bit everywhere and I don’t trust immediate classifications in such cases (they tend to give splits where they aren’t).

I am a bit disappointed that nobody used the very hilly terrain (3000m of D+) at any point. They let a mini-breakaway of PT go, and when there was regrouping with still 30 km to go, every single team rode for a sprint.

The hills were enough to create differences, we saw it when Armirail🇫🇷 lead the chase against Hayter🇬🇧: a lot of riders were dropped from the peloton.

We also saw Cian U*.* (🇧🇪 Movistar) in trouble in the hills… I am not sure whether he had crashed or was suffering from a crash that would have happened several days ago, or both. At the same time his arm was bleeding a bit but he had scabs, so it looked like he had ripped off a scab.

… So, they don’t seem to have changed the classification, the splits have remained. Therefore, Hayter🇬🇧 is not rewarded for his spirit and his efforts as he came behind the 2^nd split. 😞

Also, Gall (🇦🇹 Decathlon) lost time too: the Austrian is now 1′08″ behind Pogatchar🇸🇮!

There are only a handful of riders left who can hope to get the Red jersey through time bonuses. Of those, only Van Aert🇧🇪 is (slightly) below 10 seconds. Brennan🇬🇧, Bisiaux (🇫🇷 Decathlon) and F. Fisher-Black (🇳🇿 Bora) are between 10+ and 14 seconds.

There are 6/4/2 seconds to grab at the I.S. 36 km from the line, and of course 10/6/4 seconds at the finish.

There are a number of more or less likely candidates to take the Red jersey today (2^nd stage):

• Hayter (🇬🇧 Soudal-QS) went into the 4-man breakaway, he needs only 1 second;
• Laporte (🇫🇷 Visma) needs 7 seconds, he might get them though a 2^nd or 3^rd place at the finish and a 3^rd or 2^nd place at the I.S.;
• Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma again) needs 10 seconds, he may get them though a 2^nd or 3^rd place at the finish and a 3^rd or 2^nd place at the I.S.;
• M. Pedersen (🇩🇰 Lidl-trek) needs 17 seconds, he might get them though winning the stage and and a making place at the I.S. and creating somewhere in the peloton a large enough split (unfortunately, I think that the 3-second rule applies today): he is pretty much doomed by 0,07 seconds, otherwise 16 seconds would have ‘sufficed’.

Stage 2, Sunday 23: 🇲🇨Monaco–Manosque🇫🇷

214 km, D+ 3000m

The first of the two French stages proposes a very hilly course, over a distance longer than any of the Tour de France stages this year. The finish may be (I don’t know) the same we often see on the Tour de la Provence in the beginning of the season, where it is usually won by sprinters who can handle punchy courses or strong uphill false-flat finishes.

Okay, so I checked the finish. While the riders will enter the town in a different way, the last kilometre is indeed the same. Of the riders on this Vuelta, M.Pedersen (🇩🇰 Lidl-trek) won the last 2 Provence stages finishing there, and Coquard (🇫🇷 Cofidis) the one before.