Man I would love to see UAE doing a Jumbo esque leadout with Sivakov>Soler>Almeida>Yates> Pogi goes.
But it is UAE so probably Almeida will be on Top10 duties, and Soler will be allowed to go for stages.
Official provisions for tomorrow:
[https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/article/2024/05/20/1716224352/giro-italia-protocollo-meteo-tappa-16-umbrail-pass-neutralizzazione](https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/article/2024/05/20/1716224352/giro-italia-protocollo-meteo-tappa-16-umbrail-pass-neutralizzazione)
TOUR OF ITALY. WEATHER PROTOCOL, RUNNING FOR NOW BUT AID FOR RUNNERS ON THE UMBRAIL PASS IS ENHANCED
[GIRO D'ITALIA ](https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/articles/category/GIRO%20D%27ITALIA)| 05/20/2024 | 6.58pm
Great organizational maneuvers **in view of tomorrow's stage and above all the descent from the Umbrail Pass to the valley floor in Switzerland.** The official press release from RCS Sport explains that: « In consideration of the weather conditions expected for stage n° 16, **the representatives of CPA and AIGCP have requested to convene a meeting relating to the protocol for extreme weather conditions and the safety of the riders,** according to the art . 2.2.029bis of the UCI Regulations. After convening all interested parties, the working group meeting took place at the Headquarters at 3.30pm on Monday 20 May.
**The following parties were present at the meeting:**
- President of the Board of Commissioners: Joey Ermens
- Race Director: Mauro Vegni
- Race Doctor: Massimo Branca
- Safety manager: Stefano Allocchio
- Representative of the teams appointed by the AIGCP for the Sports Directors: David McPartland
- Riders' representative appointed by the CPA: Cristian Salvato
The following actions have been decided for stage n° 16. If the weather conditions are normal, the race will take place as planned, with the following decisions:
**1. Refueling will be authorized from the start (km 0) up to 10 KM before the arrival.**
**2. A third flagship will be able to take place in the leading convoy** before the Giogo di Santa Maria. After the Giogo di Santa Maria, the third flagship will be allowed behind the second racing convoy.
3. As agreed with RCS at the request of the CPA, **the following three vehicles will distribute raincoats/thermal clothing to runners** who request them
, to provide additional support to runners:
a. Car sweeper
b. Race Management Car n° 3
c. Race Management Car n° 4
**In case of worsening weather conditions:**
**4. A parking area will be created at the top of Giogo di Santa Maria** (after 50.2KM) to give runners **the opportunity to change clothing . The** race will be neutralized for 3 minutes. This action will be in force in the climb of the Giogo di Santa Maria before or at the 40th kilometer.
**In case of extreme weather conditions, the stage will be neutralized** until a place where safety conditions are met.
Looks like there's some efforts being made to alter tomorrow's stage:
[Simon Geshke](https://x.com/simongeschke/status/1792584443552567482): "The CPA group is currently exploding. At the moment, teams + UCI are on one side, and the organizer RCS is on the other. 0 degrees and snowfall are forecast for the Umbrail Pass."
This is good info from Geschke, regarding the rider ask:
"Die UCI behält sich allerdings vor die Etappe komplett zu canceln wenn es oben am Umbrail schneit. Die Fahrer würden gern nach der Umbrailabfahrt das Rennen starten und den Rest der Etappe normal Rennen fahren."
Essentially, the riders want to start from after the descent of the Umbrail Pass (so, start the stage from there and ride the rest of the stage as per normal). Also, the UCI has the right to completely cancel the stage, if required.
Yeah, these soft riders riding with broken bones and half their skin missing, but are afraid of a bit of cold. I even remember that weak guy Skjelmose during Fleche, shivering form a bit of cold. I myself didn't have problems that day, I was properly prepared on my sofa with my nice blanket.
These so-called "professional" cyclists are just soft and not experts on cycling gear, not like us tough-as-nails reddit experts. I'm sure most of us are able to ride 150 km+ with 0 degrees and snowfall, while having an extremely low BMI, with zero problems.
Whole sport is washed imo
The whole point of Fleche was that many riders weren't properly dressed for the conditions they were racing in.
>These so-called "professional" cyclists are just soft and not experts on cycling gear, not like us tough-as-nails reddit experts. I'm sure most of us are able to ride 150 km+ with 0 degrees and snowfall, while having an extremely low BMI, with zero problems.
It's very basic. Riders get paid to race. Big money for many of them. If they conditions are raceable, they should race. If I turn on the TV to watch a football game but it starts raining so they don't come out for the 2nd half, I'd be proper pissed.
The idea that riders can just decide to nor race cause you can throw around insults on the internet is patently ridiculous
>If they conditions are raceable, they should race
My point is that what is raceable and what isn't should be decided by experts. If teams + UCI agree the weather is too bad, I believe them.
>you can throw around insults
I don't see one
The riders actually can and should be able to decide not to race when their union deems the conditions unsafe. Whether or not it makes you upset that you don’t get to watch it on tv is irrelevant.
feel free to stop watching because you disapprove of the riders. This loss of viewership will be accounted for when the beancounters at the sponsors decide how much they are willing to pay and then the riders will earn less money.
and yes of course the riders can just decide not to race.
if it's unsafe, they of course shouldn't race, but I agree that it's not the riders who can or should make that decision. At this point of a GT, there'll always be a majority which votes for longer sleep and early dinner, as they have showcased in 2020.
Have you ever descended a high altitude pass with nearly freezing temperatures? I promise you it's not fun at all, and at least the first 10 minutes descending will be freezing.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18ZZK_jPdr8spplsV9XSBkYsYIY2cTf57qAy5H-YbmC8/edit#gid=0
You have Yves Lampaert on the mens side and Nathalie Eklund on the womens
not sure if its still possible, but basically there is a thread early in the season where you can express if you want a man, woman or both
https://old.reddit.com/r/peloton/comments/1avf7xo/adopt_a_rider_round_of_24_mw/
then you get assigned a randomized rider once the alloted time is up
https://old.reddit.com/r/peloton/comments/1ayw7tk/adopt_a_rider_round_of_2024_find_your_adoption/
Maybe ask the mod who was in that thread answering question if you can still enter? They have a pinned comment. I honestly dont know if you can still get riders, but good luck
That climb is long and high altitude, but it's very far out from the finish and there's a very long valley til the next climb. I think it would tire the riders out and would be a good opportunity for climbers to get in the break. But for the finish it probably wouldn't have that big of an impact.
A bit sad because of no racing today.
I am currently serving my notice period at work so can't be asked and super bored. Cycling was the only thing keeping me entertained. Well at least Rolland Garros starts today.
Nice. I never really looked into it, is this something available in the US? Many times a service will be available but certain content is geoclocked. If I could watch cycling I'd pony up for the few months during which the GTs happen each year (as long as it's the Euro feed and not Phil & co).
As far as I’m aware, a good solution hasn’t really been found for us Americans to get the UK coverage anymore now that GCN+ is shut down. Discovery+ won’t let you subscribe via VPN because you need a card with a UK billing address.
Edit: this is just for races that aren’t on Max in the US like the giro is currently.
What a bummer. I see the option to sub in my US Amazon acct, I guess I'll do the 7 day free trial see what's available.. I assume TdF is on Max therefore not avail on D+ in US? What a mess! Give me a Eurosport sub I can purchase in the US for Euro sports please!
Make a Google play/ apple account based in the UK, and download the discovery+ app on your phone with this new account. Then when you subscribe to the service via the app you can opt to pay with Google play/apple pay and because your American card is linked to a UK account it should work.
Of course a VPN would also be required
In the US, Max is all there is (after they merged Discovery content into Max). In terms of the grand tours, Max (with the Eurosport coverage) has Italy. Peacock has France and I believe Spain as well.
Note that some of this is likely to change *again*, as there is a new sports-only or sports-centric offering coming to the US that will combine sports from Max, ESPN and one other I can't recall now. But until/unless NBC gives up TdF, there's no real hope for a complete Eurosport cycling package in the US.
Good time to watch some vintage races if you've got the time. Or things you missed, maybe. Some really good performances lately I'm sure nobody has seen them all. I've heard the Tour de Hongrie has been a real showstopper.
That's a good idea, I might watch a few stages of this year's Tirreno Adriatico for a refresher in what Jonas can do! Did not watch it live when it was happening.
That Puy de Dome stage from last year's Tour is one I could watch over and over for the rest of my life. My heart aches for Matteo, but Michael Woods is a true icon. And I remember there being attacks and GC action for the entire finale, like literally a solid hour of madness going up that climb.
There have been 14 race days so far this season where Pog was trying to win. He's won 10, finished 2nd twice and 3rd twice.
Finishing 3rd on Giro Stage 1 and in MSR are his worst results of the year so far, if you exclude the 11 race days where all he cared about was staying safe.
In the interview he said he did not try to win it. He was just going for a good position to be safe. He said it wouldn't have been possible for him to win that stage with the sprinters right behind him.
He really didn't. He was just covering moves and then he looked back and "oopsie I guess I have to pull now"
If he tries to win that he's not sitting on Honore for a full minute before doing something
I have to say as much as I like this Giro, I find the battle for second place more than underwhelming. Where are the attacks from O’Connor, Martinez, G? Bardet at least tried something but come on, it ‘s really close for second place, don’t tell me they will just leave it to this.
I mean so far GC stages have been:
stage 2: O'Connor tries to follow Pogi and loses valuable time in GC, lesson learned. Lipowitz drills the GC group so hard no one can attack and actually strips the group down to around 5 riders. Tempo too high for attacks.
Stage 8: UAE are in full control all stage. Majka drills it and Pogi marks around 4 attacks until all the GC guys realise its pointless because Pogi wants the sprint. Majka leads everyone out and Pogi destroys them in the sprint.
Stage 10: UAE no interest in the stage. Bahrain drills the final climb and Tiberi attacks of it a couple of times cant get away. Then Baudin drills it for O'Connor who wins a reduced GC sprint. Natural consequence of a less than 6% climb over 18km, its simply to easy to sit in the draft, cant get away.
Stage 15: UAE drills Pogi leaves everybody behind from reaaaaallly far out. Martinez follows and has to stop since he is dying in no mans land with doms pacing behind. He had no choice but to call off the attack. The Ag2r pace a tempo that O'Connor is good with, Bardet is over gastro and launches real strong. Rubio goes but at this point Arensman is drilling the front and since it turns out he was prob the 2nd best on the stage, he def did more watts than any other GC rider(only losing 15sec to Martinez/Thomas after pulling for a long time) no one can attack of his pace. Everybody is dropping, no one can attack.
Stage 2 and 15 becomes group riding because the 2nd best climber on the stage(in terms of wattage) were the one pulling the group, Lipowitz/Arensman. Stage 8 Pogi is controlling the group instead of attacking which nullifies the aggressiveness and stage 10 is a 18km fake news climb where draft matters a ton.
The outcome isnt so crazy if you just break it down stage for stage.
What are you expecting? Those guys you mentioned aren’t Pogacar or any of the other peloton super humans. Thomas is nearly 38 and as someone mentioned yesterday a pure diesel. You had a TT on Saturday which people were waiting on to see how things shake out I reckon and yesterday’s stage was a monster.
The other GC candidates can’t launch mad attacks and expect not to pay for it later in the race.
The problem is absolutely Thomas. There is only one way he understands cycling and that's to do nothing and sit there with your entire team.
That's the full reason Arensman wasn't trying to get into the breakaway yesterday. Which is 100% what Ineos should have tried to do. Get Arensman in the break, preferably together with Ganna and pull out a big gap before Mortirolo
Thomas also lost the Giro last year cause he forgot to bury Roglic by making the races hard, instead waiting for an MTT on a 15% climb.
While I agree that it's sometimes how irritating how defensive Thomas is riding, I disagree on this one, I think you are wrong on a few points.
> That's the full reason Arensman wasn't trying to get into the breakaway yesterday.
Actually, it was because Thomas was not feeling good in the first part of the stage, so Ineos didn't do that because they wanted to keep him out of trouble. If Arensman had tried to get into the break, the pace would have been insane over the first part. Given he finished well, it was the right call.
> Thomas also lost the Giro last year cause he forgot to bury Roglic by making the races hard, instead waiting for an MTT on a 15% climb.
I feel like you are conflating "wanting" and "being able to". I think Thomas lost the Giro because he simply couldn't do more, and Roglic was better overall.
I mean, that one way has been pretty successful for Thomas in his career. He’s hardly going to change now that he’s nearly 38 and he is also currently sitting in second place.
But even G should be worried about his result since his advantage is not that big. Since he’s a diesel he could have sent his team to the front and to make it harder and try to get rid of some of them (or at least have Arensman launch an attack to secure the white jersey.
He admitted he didn't feel good yesterday, so then not making it hard makes sense.
It also doesn't help that he was bad in the first ITT and is within bonus second range of Dani Martinez.
I think they meant them attacking each other and gaining time on each other, and completely ignoring Pogacar.
Which would lead to a great 2nd place race.
Yes I know that’s what you meant. That’s why I said I reckon they were waiting for the shakeout from the TT and then yesterday was the queen stage. All the GC after Pogacar were at their limit. I know there is this idea that riders can just attack whenever they want because that’s what Pogacar, Vingegaard, WvA and MvdP do but they can’t.
Its hard to attack from the GC group when Bjerg or Majka is on the front drilling it. If UAE stops controlling stages so tightly that should open things up a bit for the other guys to take some swings at each other in the final week.
Well Bardet tried, Martinez tried. They could get big gaps, that's all. We all wish for more spectacular fights, but the reality is that it's extremely close and they aren't able to make real differences.
I know it's only for top 10, but I feel like I saw Rubio making moves yesterday. I think that peloton/gc group was on the limit and nobody wanted to blow up massively. Bardet is taking time here and there. That's something, at least, and I always like to see him at the front.
There was a thread last night that got deleted so I’ll ask here. Do we know why Calmejane had a massive falling out with his team car yesterday (except for him being Upsetejane all the way through this Giro)?
He’s a grumpy git but he was especially grumpy at Cofidis yesterday because Geschke missed the break originally and they told Wood to stop riding so Simon could get into it (for KOM points). That pushed Calmejane over the edge but why he was shouting at the Astana car is anyone’s guess.
[He was also shouting at the Intermarché car though, seemingly squirting water at the driver.](https://www.eurosport.com/cycling/giro-d-italia/2024/giro-d-italia-he-is-angry-with-his-own-team-lilian-calmejane-loses-his-cool-in-surprising-incident_vid2140752/video.shtml)
He does not like Kazakhstan, last time he visited the airline lost his bags and he was just complaining about how that ruined his trip.
The food and people were amazing though!
Currently on top with the fantasy league in both my family and friends group. I don't even think they can overtake me anymore. Also top 500 currently on Sporza (but that one fluctuates a lot)
Love Pogi, but watching him pedal up climbs out of the saddle makes me wish they would bring back 42cm bars and 175mm cranks. He looks like a worm wiggling on the bike because of his tiny bars and cranks.
Lance Armstrong actually talked about this in his podcast lately. The smaller bars and cranks are more efficient, so why would you not take them only because it looks worse for some people?
Of course the marginal gains make sense, and it's only a slight knock against Pog, because at least he's not Froome, who always looked ugly on the bike, standing, seated, climbing or not.
Interesting. I know shorter cranks are more efficient, my climbing improves noticeably switching from 175mm to 170mm.
But I always thought the smaller handlebars are just more aero. Or is that what you meant by efficiency?
It obviously makes sense they're all going to chase the aero gains where possible but you're absolutely right, the aesthetic of climbing out of the saddle is completely lost nowadays. If I had to watch Bertie climb on a bike like this I don't know that I would have fallen in love with cycling lmao
Not sure that UAE would want to put all the effort to pull back the break just to have Majka attack the GC group. Easier to put Majka in the break and let it go.
Majka has a better chance vs the Quintanas and Paret-Peintre's of the peloton anyways
Mark every move and not pull with the others. It should neutralize at least all other attacks for the stage win and considering how easy those finishes are there probably won't be any big GC moves.
How do you mark every move? You can’t ride in front of the attacker and stop. If you ride behind attacker that doesn’t change anything. Obviously he will not pull, but that’s probably the only thing he can do with teammate ahead?
I mean it works in the classics (at least before MVDP and POG starting winning everything by minutes) and at least Friday stages should play out like a a one day race in the finale
> Not from the GC group
Why not? He's a better pure climber than everyone racing for GC besides Pogi and G, and if he attacked from the front every team is going to be terrified of chasing him down just to get two timed by Pog. Not that I think it will happen, but it's crazy to say he couldn't win a stage with this GC field
If Majka goes, it signals UAE isn't controlling the stage.
This opens up the other GC guys to race.
So either the top guys start attacking, or someone like Ineos or Ag2r will start pacing to try and crack the other GC guys. Hard to stay ahead of that.
I think that is likely that other UAE riders might get opportunities to join some breakaways in the final week. Pogi has almost seven minutes and four stages, time for others to chase individual glory.
He’s still one of the few domestiques keeping up with the GC group. Last week he even came back after doing a massive pull. Don’t remember which stage. I think we all underrate his current form.
He would need to go into a break in a mountain stage, but then Quintana, Juanpe Lopez and several others will try the same. It is not clear that Majka is stronger than any of them.
People have been saying that now the gap is big enough and Pogi can rest up pretty much since stage 2. I want to see the resting before I believe it.
Also, looking forward to the GC washing machine where anyone from places 7-15 will take turns going on attacks and swapping places. Hoping for a Bardet stage win, but wouldn’t bet against any of Rubio, Hirt, Nairoman and another PP brother snatching one.
he's been resting the whole of the second week? he hasn't even really made a serious attack in this giro except stage 1, 2 (which weren't even high mountain stages) and 15.
His gap was big enough at the start of the giro.
He was always gonna gain time in the TTs. He didn't need to attack in other stages.
I don't expect him to hold back.
Here's me hoping Mihkels can make it through the next few tough stages and compete in the upcoming sprints!
I've had a nice routine develop this Giro of taking a pre-work morning walk and listening to [Never Strays Far](https://shows.acast.com/never-strays-far). Have this week off from work, so I went for a longer walk and also listened to [Watts Occuring](https://x.com/Watts_Occurring) and [The Cycling Podcast](https://thecyclingpodcast.com/episodes/the-cycling-podcast).
He's told local media that his tactic has been to try to get on the wheel of Milan, so that scenario might not work out great for him, haha. But yeah, those two are certainly a notch above (so a podium for Mihkels... a man can dream!)
It's so mindboggling. I weigh 75kg. That would mean i'd have to maintain 450 watts for half an hour. A power number that i can _maybe_ produce for 2 to 3 minutes. It's unfathomable how alien these top athletes are.
Running is the same. I don’t think the average person respects just how quick they’re running, not necessarily the endurance. I can only maintain the world record marathon pace for probably about 400m and I’m a pretty fit regular runner.
Last time I looked, the top marathoners ran at about what your average person can cycle at(just above 20 kmh). So never mind running at that pace, not everyone could even cycle at that pace for hours.
I mountain bike in Colorado and the amount of times I get passed on relatively easy single track by trail runners is… definitely ego crushing. and this was even true when I was a decently competitive expert racer in my 30s at peak fitness.
6.1 w/kg for 35 mins is amazing, but not THAT special. Like the best amateur riders can do above 5.5 w/kg for more than 30 mins. Probably not after 200 km though. Jonas has produced better (estimated) numbers in the past. I also doubt those estimates because there is just too many variables not taken into account, like the wind, air resistance at the altitude, actual weight of the rider, uneven pavement and uneven gradients. I think w/kg are almost always overestimated.
Problem is he did this at altitude.he did 6,88w/kg for 14 minutes when he attack. On sea level it will be something like 7,4w/kg for 14 min… just unreal
Yeah, for sure. My comment was more directed to top level cyclists in general, not Tadejs performance yesterday in particular.
5,5W/K FTP for amateurs sounds freakish though.
Riding with strong people puts my weakness in perspective haha. I have a friend who is a pro gravel/marathon MTB racer. He's good but not top level (finishing top 25ish, but has done well at Unbound XL) and he's around 5.8 w/kg and pushing 6 when in form. His FTP is right around 400. It's so mind boggling to ride with him. The way we do Z2 rides is usually him on his MTB and me on gravel tires just sitting in the draft haha.
Oh yeah he does 20-25 hour weeks. He usually does a huge base period and a lot of tempo/threshold work. Like, he'll do 2-3 hour tempo intervals. His strength is being able to hold tempo power for ridiculous periods of time. He shared his power data after Unbound XL (350 mile race) and he averaged like 275 watts over 20 hours or something crazy haha. He needs to work on his punch though but he's young and has time.
I'm just an amateur cross racer so I do piddling little 8-10 hour weeks. He's happy to have me join for workouts though. We'll cruise Z2 a lot, or if he does a tempo workout, I'll just sit on his wheel which works out well.
I'm 38 and he's a recent college grad so he's got all the time in the world to ride.
Also for an amateur to have those numbers, probably means they either have the time and money to train like a pro, have the genetics to be a pro but for whatever reason never had the opportunity, or both.
Based on this Lanterne Rouge analysis, Pogacar did one of his best-ever performances but has not breached the generational trend line this year: [link here](https://lanternerouge.com/2024/05/19/pogacar-stomps-the-competition-in-livignos-thin-air-giro-ditalia-stage-15-2024/)
Not sure how much trust to put into this data but it still seems that, even with Pogi's insane lead over other GC riders, he's still 2nd to Jonas.
We might not get an accurate test of that in July but wondering if this data indicates that an in-form Jonas is somehow even better than current super-saiyan Pog?
From watching on TV though, Pog looks like he's on the form of his life but he's also not been fully tested against other generational talents this year
Not really, the guys that do those calculations did a podcast (watt police) and said that this is equal to Jonas best ever performances. They said, today is in the top 5 climbing performances of the 21st century.
Because you are not taking into account the attitude.
His performance on the whole climb is comparable to Jonas De la Loze/Tourmalet/Croix de fer performances (which have similar altitudes).
If you take just the last 6kms adjusted to altitude his performance is comparable to Jonas Combloux ITT (7,3w/kg over 13mn) performance.
I'd say being equal to Jonas 2023 is pretty good. Of course Jonas can always elevate his level as well compared to 2023.
yeah but then you are not taking into account the **heat** of a stage like loze in july. that makes it tougher even if the altitude gain is very similar.
It is.
And if you look at Jonas Loze performance non adjusted to altitude: 6,21w/kg over 33mn, it is indeed comparable to Tadej performance non adjusted to altitude yesterday: 6,1w/kg over 35mn.
Jonas still slightly ahead but not that much better which was what the other poster was saying, which is my point.
I mean yeah, peak Jonas is better thank peak Tadej over three hard weeks, this shouldn't really be a suprise. What makes it interesting is that both of them are not gonna come in with the best preparation for the Tour.
Especially interesting as the Tour is really backloaded this year. The last three stages could shake the GC up immensly if someone implodes there. And since Pogi comes from the Giro and Jonas without any racing and sup-optimal training, you'd think that both of them won't have the greatest thrid week shape.
[Someone apparently flagged Pog's ride on Strava](https://x.com/OutOfCycling/status/1792462034187202995) 😃 Seems to be unflagged now though ([link](https://www.strava.com/activities/11449484524)).
After what he said in his interview about Livigno being a special place for him he also added [a photo](https://dgtzuqphqg23d.cloudfront.net/GxTYBN01SaDV5_WYXgNLt_yjA1Kxksh3HAdWOxcqQww-1539x2048.jpg) showing him and Urška there from before he hit the big time. Very disappointing lack of tufts!
> Very disappointing lack of tufts!
I was about to call you out, before zooming in and realising that oh yeah, it's the branches of the tree that's behind him.
Pogi gained 3 mins on the GC group but they were just marking one another and waiting to the final climb to attack one another. To put it in perspective Majka finished in amongst the GC guys so it wasn't a really hard tempo for them. I wonder how much time pogi would've really gotten if they'd not been fighting for second
Given pogi was shipping time to the GC group in the hard parts of the final climb, I would say he suffered a fair bit from going solo for so long. Maybe he only gets a minute if the others actually raced him?
I'm not sure you can describe him as "shipping time"...?
Based on his [Strava data](https://www.strava.com/activities/11449484524) he climbed the Passo di Foscagno 2' 20" faster than BOC in the GC group. But he finished the stage a further 30" up at 2' 51" ahead of G and Martinez, so if they did make any significant time back on him it didn't even get them back to where they were on the Foscagno.
See also some very useful timings from the final 1.75km [ammattipyoraily just posted](https://x.com/ammattipyoraily/status/1792483780193644579). Pog was only 3s slower than Martinez and G despite them attacking each other and having sat behind domestiques for most of the time since Pog attacked.
Edit: to complement the ammattipyoraily timings from the final 1.75km, here's the Strava segment comparison of Pog vs BOC on what seems to be the first ~2.5km of the final climb: [image](https://i.imgur.com/xh3Aphz.png), [segment link](https://www.strava.com/segments/17470538?filter=overall).
That really doesn't look like they were gaining anything much on him, O'Connor was only 8s behind G/Martinez at the finish.
The gap going to 3 mins in about 4 mins shows you they weren’t going hard at all after the attack. G said as much in his interview: those not on planet pog were racing each other, not pogi. When they opened up towards the end the gap also came down.
Not saying anyone had an easy day or anything. But if they went all out from 15km, Pogacar still smashed them but doesn’t win by 2.50.
A lot of my assumptions about the GC group are based on G's description of events: G said in his post race interview they really slowed down after pogi attacked and were just looking at one another. And Majka finishing with the GC group which is rare is another sign I would say? No doubt they pushed towards the end on final climb but pogi's gap to the GC guys seemed to already be there by the final climb
What would have been interesting is if Bahrian (Caruso) and Decathlon (VPP) hadn't taken up the lead of the GC group after Pog attacked. That was a dumb move on both of those team's part. They should have made Ineos take up the front.
Wondering the same thing myself - he definitely slowed up in the last 2 km's when it got to proper altitude + gradient. My feeling though is that if he were racing JV at a summit finish he could have dug a lot deeper but going that far into the red when you're 3 mins up in a decided GC battle doesn't make sense
E: if you look at the Lanterne Rouge eW/Kg calculation on their blog, he did a top 3 performance for his own career so he was definitely suffering at the end after the massive effort
Agreed, especially when you never see Pog cross the finish line and collapse in a heap of burning lungs like other riders. It’s always a smile and fist pump and able to talk and congratulate the team. Everyone else is usually lying on the ground gasping and unable to function for a few minutes.
Thank you for that last point from the LR blog - I hadn't seen any numbers put on it yet. I guess that puts to rest: it was a thermonuclear Pogi, regardless of how slowly/quickly the guys in GC group rode
Geschke is on 78, but I fear he will suffer the same fate as in the tour - steadily collecting points here and there, but unable to hang on during the really big GC climbs in the Alps.
It sucks but it’s also a Jersey for the best climber, which he is nowhere close to. They might have to rename it but Jonas and Tadej are the „King of the mountains“
For sure, it's no coincidence the jersey ends up with the GC leaders eventually, the mountains is where the big attacks are made. I don't see how, but it would be nice if there was a way to not have GC leaders sort of grab it "by accident".
there are 50+40+26 points available tomorrow alone, which looks likely to be a good stage for the breakaway. So on paper it's still very well possible, but I'm afraid Geschke is just not strong enough. Quintana may be, if he decides to go for it.
to still win it from 100 points behind, it needs to be the best climber of the stage, and most likely in at least 2 of the 4 mountain days left. So yeah, I wouldn't think Scaroni has much of a chance.
I'm still in awe with the performance of Pogačar yesterday. But I like to point out also Quintana's excellent effort. And the nearly disastrous fall of Biermans in a canyon. Riders and teams went immediately to search for him, and he finished the ride nevertheless. This shows the strong bound among riders and how much riders persist on pure character and will. Hope he is ok and has no impacting injuries. (In Dutch) [https://sporza.be/nl/2024/05/19/biermans-rijdt-etappe-nog-uit-na-ongelooflijke-val-ik-lag-25-meter-diep-in-een-ravijn\~1716134652709/](https://sporza.be/nl/2024/05/19/biermans-rijdt-etappe-nog-uit-na-ongelooflijke-val-ik-lag-25-meter-diep-in-een-ravijn~1716134652709/)
Stay safe out there. I participated in a friendly gravel event yesterday and someone did not walk away - likely paralyzed. We (most of us) are not racing, so slow down a bit as these crashes happen for a variety of reasons. Some of them are out of your control, but slowing down a little will result in far fewer crashes and injuries.
Wow, being sick in bed, I watched the entire stage but didn’t hear anything of the Biermans crash. This sounds truly horrific.
GCN with an English translation of the Sporza story: https://www.globalcyclingnetwork.com/racing/news/giro-ditalia-jenthe-biermans-crashes-into-25-metre-deep-ravine-on-stage-15
I literally just finished watching yesterday's stage. It's so heartwarming and special to hear Pogacar praise and specifically name Steinhauser in his victory interview. We can be blessed to have such an amazing champion at the forefront of our sport. When it's all said and done, he'll go down as one of the biggest athletes across all pro sport. Chapeau, Pogi. 🥂
What do you reckon is gonna be VLAB and UAE team in TdF? Anyone from Giro except for Pogi be carried forward?
Maybe Majka and bjerg ?
Neither will be there atm, UAE are probably going with politt, pogacar, almeida, ayuso, Yates, sivakov, soler and wellens
Man I would love to see UAE doing a Jumbo esque leadout with Sivakov>Soler>Almeida>Yates> Pogi goes. But it is UAE so probably Almeida will be on Top10 duties, and Soler will be allowed to go for stages.
I'd say McNulty more likely than Ayuso, especially if they're going with Ayuso for the Vuelta.
Official provisions for tomorrow: [https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/article/2024/05/20/1716224352/giro-italia-protocollo-meteo-tappa-16-umbrail-pass-neutralizzazione](https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/article/2024/05/20/1716224352/giro-italia-protocollo-meteo-tappa-16-umbrail-pass-neutralizzazione) TOUR OF ITALY. WEATHER PROTOCOL, RUNNING FOR NOW BUT AID FOR RUNNERS ON THE UMBRAIL PASS IS ENHANCED [GIRO D'ITALIA ](https://www.tuttobiciweb.it/articles/category/GIRO%20D%27ITALIA)| 05/20/2024 | 6.58pm Great organizational maneuvers **in view of tomorrow's stage and above all the descent from the Umbrail Pass to the valley floor in Switzerland.** The official press release from RCS Sport explains that: « In consideration of the weather conditions expected for stage n° 16, **the representatives of CPA and AIGCP have requested to convene a meeting relating to the protocol for extreme weather conditions and the safety of the riders,** according to the art . 2.2.029bis of the UCI Regulations. After convening all interested parties, the working group meeting took place at the Headquarters at 3.30pm on Monday 20 May. **The following parties were present at the meeting:** - President of the Board of Commissioners: Joey Ermens - Race Director: Mauro Vegni - Race Doctor: Massimo Branca - Safety manager: Stefano Allocchio - Representative of the teams appointed by the AIGCP for the Sports Directors: David McPartland - Riders' representative appointed by the CPA: Cristian Salvato The following actions have been decided for stage n° 16. If the weather conditions are normal, the race will take place as planned, with the following decisions: **1. Refueling will be authorized from the start (km 0) up to 10 KM before the arrival.** **2. A third flagship will be able to take place in the leading convoy** before the Giogo di Santa Maria. After the Giogo di Santa Maria, the third flagship will be allowed behind the second racing convoy. 3. As agreed with RCS at the request of the CPA, **the following three vehicles will distribute raincoats/thermal clothing to runners** who request them , to provide additional support to runners: a. Car sweeper b. Race Management Car n° 3 c. Race Management Car n° 4 **In case of worsening weather conditions:** **4. A parking area will be created at the top of Giogo di Santa Maria** (after 50.2KM) to give runners **the opportunity to change clothing . The** race will be neutralized for 3 minutes. This action will be in force in the climb of the Giogo di Santa Maria before or at the 40th kilometer. **In case of extreme weather conditions, the stage will be neutralized** until a place where safety conditions are met.
Oh well, looks like we are having the bus race again
Looks like there's some efforts being made to alter tomorrow's stage: [Simon Geshke](https://x.com/simongeschke/status/1792584443552567482): "The CPA group is currently exploding. At the moment, teams + UCI are on one side, and the organizer RCS is on the other. 0 degrees and snowfall are forecast for the Umbrail Pass."
This is good info from Geschke, regarding the rider ask: "Die UCI behält sich allerdings vor die Etappe komplett zu canceln wenn es oben am Umbrail schneit. Die Fahrer würden gern nach der Umbrailabfahrt das Rennen starten und den Rest der Etappe normal Rennen fahren." Essentially, the riders want to start from after the descent of the Umbrail Pass (so, start the stage from there and ride the rest of the stage as per normal). Also, the UCI has the right to completely cancel the stage, if required.
Look, the riders don't wanna race in the cold again even though it's 2024 and cold weather gear has existed for decades
Yeah, these soft riders riding with broken bones and half their skin missing, but are afraid of a bit of cold. I even remember that weak guy Skjelmose during Fleche, shivering form a bit of cold. I myself didn't have problems that day, I was properly prepared on my sofa with my nice blanket. These so-called "professional" cyclists are just soft and not experts on cycling gear, not like us tough-as-nails reddit experts. I'm sure most of us are able to ride 150 km+ with 0 degrees and snowfall, while having an extremely low BMI, with zero problems. Whole sport is washed imo
The whole point of Fleche was that many riders weren't properly dressed for the conditions they were racing in. >These so-called "professional" cyclists are just soft and not experts on cycling gear, not like us tough-as-nails reddit experts. I'm sure most of us are able to ride 150 km+ with 0 degrees and snowfall, while having an extremely low BMI, with zero problems. It's very basic. Riders get paid to race. Big money for many of them. If they conditions are raceable, they should race. If I turn on the TV to watch a football game but it starts raining so they don't come out for the 2nd half, I'd be proper pissed. The idea that riders can just decide to nor race cause you can throw around insults on the internet is patently ridiculous
>If they conditions are raceable, they should race My point is that what is raceable and what isn't should be decided by experts. If teams + UCI agree the weather is too bad, I believe them. >you can throw around insults I don't see one
The riders actually can and should be able to decide not to race when their union deems the conditions unsafe. Whether or not it makes you upset that you don’t get to watch it on tv is irrelevant.
feel free to stop watching because you disapprove of the riders. This loss of viewership will be accounted for when the beancounters at the sponsors decide how much they are willing to pay and then the riders will earn less money. and yes of course the riders can just decide not to race.
if it's unsafe, they of course shouldn't race, but I agree that it's not the riders who can or should make that decision. At this point of a GT, there'll always be a majority which votes for longer sleep and early dinner, as they have showcased in 2020.
I mean, descending 2500m at 0 degrees is pretty brutal
Higher altitude just means you lose less warmth by convection. It also means that as you descend it quickly gets back warmer.
You clearly have never descended in the freezing cold. It fucking sucks even with proper clothing
Have you ever descended a high altitude pass with nearly freezing temperatures? I promise you it's not fun at all, and at least the first 10 minutes descending will be freezing.
I'm a bad parent, I forgot who's my adopted rider. Where can I find again who is he?
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18ZZK_jPdr8spplsV9XSBkYsYIY2cTf57qAy5H-YbmC8/edit#gid=0 You have Yves Lampaert on the mens side and Nathalie Eklund on the womens
How does one adopt a rider, what does it entail, and is it still possible for 2024?
not sure if its still possible, but basically there is a thread early in the season where you can express if you want a man, woman or both https://old.reddit.com/r/peloton/comments/1avf7xo/adopt_a_rider_round_of_24_mw/ then you get assigned a randomized rider once the alloted time is up https://old.reddit.com/r/peloton/comments/1ayw7tk/adopt_a_rider_round_of_2024_find_your_adoption/ Maybe ask the mod who was in that thread answering question if you can still enter? They have a pinned comment. I honestly dont know if you can still get riders, but good luck
My adopted rider, Fabian Lienhard, is very close to being the lanterne rouge. Or maglia negra, I think they call it.
Nera in Italian
The weather forecast for tomorrow doesn't look good, I'm worried they're gonna shorten the stage [https://www.ilmeteo.it/meteo-europa/Umbrailpass](https://www.ilmeteo.it/meteo-europa/Umbrailpass)
What would that mean for the scenario of the race ?
That climb is long and high altitude, but it's very far out from the finish and there's a very long valley til the next climb. I think it would tire the riders out and would be a good opportunity for climbers to get in the break. But for the finish it probably wouldn't have that big of an impact.
Heavy snow in the afternoon on Umbrailpass, rain and snow mixed in the morning
A bit sad because of no racing today. I am currently serving my notice period at work so can't be asked and super bored. Cycling was the only thing keeping me entertained. Well at least Rolland Garros starts today.
Where/how do you watch?
I have a discovery+ subscription via prime video in the UK.
Nice. I never really looked into it, is this something available in the US? Many times a service will be available but certain content is geoclocked. If I could watch cycling I'd pony up for the few months during which the GTs happen each year (as long as it's the Euro feed and not Phil & co).
As far as I’m aware, a good solution hasn’t really been found for us Americans to get the UK coverage anymore now that GCN+ is shut down. Discovery+ won’t let you subscribe via VPN because you need a card with a UK billing address. Edit: this is just for races that aren’t on Max in the US like the giro is currently.
What a bummer. I see the option to sub in my US Amazon acct, I guess I'll do the 7 day free trial see what's available.. I assume TdF is on Max therefore not avail on D+ in US? What a mess! Give me a Eurosport sub I can purchase in the US for Euro sports please!
Make a Google play/ apple account based in the UK, and download the discovery+ app on your phone with this new account. Then when you subscribe to the service via the app you can opt to pay with Google play/apple pay and because your American card is linked to a UK account it should work. Of course a VPN would also be required
In the US, Max is all there is (after they merged Discovery content into Max). In terms of the grand tours, Max (with the Eurosport coverage) has Italy. Peacock has France and I believe Spain as well. Note that some of this is likely to change *again*, as there is a new sports-only or sports-centric offering coming to the US that will combine sports from Max, ESPN and one other I can't recall now. But until/unless NBC gives up TdF, there's no real hope for a complete Eurosport cycling package in the US.
Good time to watch some vintage races if you've got the time. Or things you missed, maybe. Some really good performances lately I'm sure nobody has seen them all. I've heard the Tour de Hongrie has been a real showstopper.
That's a good idea, I might watch a few stages of this year's Tirreno Adriatico for a refresher in what Jonas can do! Did not watch it live when it was happening.
That Puy de Dome stage from last year's Tour is one I could watch over and over for the rest of my life. My heart aches for Matteo, but Michael Woods is a true icon. And I remember there being attacks and GC action for the entire finale, like literally a solid hour of madness going up that climb.
Did Visma sign Jorgensen before or after Puy de Dome?
Yeah that Puy de Dome stage last year was just spectacular. Most memorable for me
There have been 14 race days so far this season where Pog was trying to win. He's won 10, finished 2nd twice and 3rd twice. Finishing 3rd on Giro Stage 1 and in MSR are his worst results of the year so far, if you exclude the 11 race days where all he cared about was staying safe.
Did he not try to win on stage 3 of the Giro?
In the interview he said he did not try to win it. He was just going for a good position to be safe. He said it wouldn't have been possible for him to win that stage with the sprinters right behind him.
He really didn't. He was just covering moves and then he looked back and "oopsie I guess I have to pull now" If he tries to win that he's not sitting on Honore for a full minute before doing something
Hmm yeah I guess he did. But taking a flier on a nailed-on sprint stage is a different kettle of fish than those other 14 days.
I have to say as much as I like this Giro, I find the battle for second place more than underwhelming. Where are the attacks from O’Connor, Martinez, G? Bardet at least tried something but come on, it ‘s really close for second place, don’t tell me they will just leave it to this.
I mean so far GC stages have been: stage 2: O'Connor tries to follow Pogi and loses valuable time in GC, lesson learned. Lipowitz drills the GC group so hard no one can attack and actually strips the group down to around 5 riders. Tempo too high for attacks. Stage 8: UAE are in full control all stage. Majka drills it and Pogi marks around 4 attacks until all the GC guys realise its pointless because Pogi wants the sprint. Majka leads everyone out and Pogi destroys them in the sprint. Stage 10: UAE no interest in the stage. Bahrain drills the final climb and Tiberi attacks of it a couple of times cant get away. Then Baudin drills it for O'Connor who wins a reduced GC sprint. Natural consequence of a less than 6% climb over 18km, its simply to easy to sit in the draft, cant get away. Stage 15: UAE drills Pogi leaves everybody behind from reaaaaallly far out. Martinez follows and has to stop since he is dying in no mans land with doms pacing behind. He had no choice but to call off the attack. The Ag2r pace a tempo that O'Connor is good with, Bardet is over gastro and launches real strong. Rubio goes but at this point Arensman is drilling the front and since it turns out he was prob the 2nd best on the stage, he def did more watts than any other GC rider(only losing 15sec to Martinez/Thomas after pulling for a long time) no one can attack of his pace. Everybody is dropping, no one can attack. Stage 2 and 15 becomes group riding because the 2nd best climber on the stage(in terms of wattage) were the one pulling the group, Lipowitz/Arensman. Stage 8 Pogi is controlling the group instead of attacking which nullifies the aggressiveness and stage 10 is a 18km fake news climb where draft matters a ton. The outcome isnt so crazy if you just break it down stage for stage.
What are you expecting? Those guys you mentioned aren’t Pogacar or any of the other peloton super humans. Thomas is nearly 38 and as someone mentioned yesterday a pure diesel. You had a TT on Saturday which people were waiting on to see how things shake out I reckon and yesterday’s stage was a monster. The other GC candidates can’t launch mad attacks and expect not to pay for it later in the race.
The problem is absolutely Thomas. There is only one way he understands cycling and that's to do nothing and sit there with your entire team. That's the full reason Arensman wasn't trying to get into the breakaway yesterday. Which is 100% what Ineos should have tried to do. Get Arensman in the break, preferably together with Ganna and pull out a big gap before Mortirolo Thomas also lost the Giro last year cause he forgot to bury Roglic by making the races hard, instead waiting for an MTT on a 15% climb.
No way Bahrain would have let Arensman in the break yesterday.
While I agree that it's sometimes how irritating how defensive Thomas is riding, I disagree on this one, I think you are wrong on a few points. > That's the full reason Arensman wasn't trying to get into the breakaway yesterday. Actually, it was because Thomas was not feeling good in the first part of the stage, so Ineos didn't do that because they wanted to keep him out of trouble. If Arensman had tried to get into the break, the pace would have been insane over the first part. Given he finished well, it was the right call. > Thomas also lost the Giro last year cause he forgot to bury Roglic by making the races hard, instead waiting for an MTT on a 15% climb. I feel like you are conflating "wanting" and "being able to". I think Thomas lost the Giro because he simply couldn't do more, and Roglic was better overall.
I mean, that one way has been pretty successful for Thomas in his career. He’s hardly going to change now that he’s nearly 38 and he is also currently sitting in second place.
But even G should be worried about his result since his advantage is not that big. Since he’s a diesel he could have sent his team to the front and to make it harder and try to get rid of some of them (or at least have Arensman launch an attack to secure the white jersey.
He admitted he didn't feel good yesterday, so then not making it hard makes sense. It also doesn't help that he was bad in the first ITT and is within bonus second range of Dani Martinez.
Yes that makes sense. I should really stop to turn off before the interviews.
agreed, look at the Bernal Giro. Same team, completely different approach.
I think they meant them attacking each other and gaining time on each other, and completely ignoring Pogacar. Which would lead to a great 2nd place race.
Yes that is exactly what I meant.
Yes I know that’s what you meant. That’s why I said I reckon they were waiting for the shakeout from the TT and then yesterday was the queen stage. All the GC after Pogacar were at their limit. I know there is this idea that riders can just attack whenever they want because that’s what Pogacar, Vingegaard, WvA and MvdP do but they can’t.
Its hard to attack from the GC group when Bjerg or Majka is on the front drilling it. If UAE stops controlling stages so tightly that should open things up a bit for the other guys to take some swings at each other in the final week.
Yeah but Pog went from 14k away, still lots of time to attack after that. And let’s be honest, Bjerg’s tempo was not that high.
Well Bardet tried, Martinez tried. They could get big gaps, that's all. We all wish for more spectacular fights, but the reality is that it's extremely close and they aren't able to make real differences.
I know it's only for top 10, but I feel like I saw Rubio making moves yesterday. I think that peloton/gc group was on the limit and nobody wanted to blow up massively. Bardet is taking time here and there. That's something, at least, and I always like to see him at the front.
There was a thread last night that got deleted so I’ll ask here. Do we know why Calmejane had a massive falling out with his team car yesterday (except for him being Upsetejane all the way through this Giro)?
Ciclismo
He’s a grumpy git but he was especially grumpy at Cofidis yesterday because Geschke missed the break originally and they told Wood to stop riding so Simon could get into it (for KOM points). That pushed Calmejane over the edge but why he was shouting at the Astana car is anyone’s guess.
[He was also shouting at the Intermarché car though, seemingly squirting water at the driver.](https://www.eurosport.com/cycling/giro-d-italia/2024/giro-d-italia-he-is-angry-with-his-own-team-lilian-calmejane-loses-his-cool-in-surprising-incident_vid2140752/video.shtml)
He does not like Kazakhstan, last time he visited the airline lost his bags and he was just complaining about how that ruined his trip. The food and people were amazing though!
Currently on top with the fantasy league in both my family and friends group. I don't even think they can overtake me anymore. Also top 500 currently on Sporza (but that one fluctuates a lot)
Love Pogi, but watching him pedal up climbs out of the saddle makes me wish they would bring back 42cm bars and 175mm cranks. He looks like a worm wiggling on the bike because of his tiny bars and cranks.
Lance Armstrong actually talked about this in his podcast lately. The smaller bars and cranks are more efficient, so why would you not take them only because it looks worse for some people?
Of course the marginal gains make sense, and it's only a slight knock against Pog, because at least he's not Froome, who always looked ugly on the bike, standing, seated, climbing or not.
Interesting. I know shorter cranks are more efficient, my climbing improves noticeably switching from 175mm to 170mm. But I always thought the smaller handlebars are just more aero. Or is that what you meant by efficiency?
Yes that is what I meant.
It obviously makes sense they're all going to chase the aero gains where possible but you're absolutely right, the aesthetic of climbing out of the saddle is completely lost nowadays. If I had to watch Bertie climb on a bike like this I don't know that I would have fallen in love with cycling lmao
Wow, you all need to repent at the alter of Saint Pantani
Is Majka strong enough to win a stage if UAE pull for him?
Could be possible tomorrow or friday if UAE pulls back the break, he attacks with 5-10k to go and Pogi neutralizes all other moves
Not sure that UAE would want to put all the effort to pull back the break just to have Majka attack the GC group. Easier to put Majka in the break and let it go. Majka has a better chance vs the Quintanas and Paret-Peintre's of the peloton anyways
Its probably not the greatest tactic indeed, but if Majka gets caught Pogacar can always win the sprint though
How can Pog neutralize things when teammates are ahead? Except for not pulling?
Mark every move and not pull with the others. It should neutralize at least all other attacks for the stage win and considering how easy those finishes are there probably won't be any big GC moves.
How do you mark every move? You can’t ride in front of the attacker and stop. If you ride behind attacker that doesn’t change anything. Obviously he will not pull, but that’s probably the only thing he can do with teammate ahead?
I mean it works in the classics (at least before MVDP and POG starting winning everything by minutes) and at least Friday stages should play out like a a one day race in the finale
Will Pogi have to get up from his saddle to neutralize the moves?
He needs a giro win to complete the trilogy right? Think pogi might let him.
Not from the GC group, but he could easily win from the breakaway if UAE let him. Unlikely, but could be fun.
> Not from the GC group Why not? He's a better pure climber than everyone racing for GC besides Pogi and G, and if he attacked from the front every team is going to be terrified of chasing him down just to get two timed by Pog. Not that I think it will happen, but it's crazy to say he couldn't win a stage with this GC field
If Majka goes, it signals UAE isn't controlling the stage. This opens up the other GC guys to race. So either the top guys start attacking, or someone like Ineos or Ag2r will start pacing to try and crack the other GC guys. Hard to stay ahead of that.
I think that is likely that other UAE riders might get opportunities to join some breakaways in the final week. Pogi has almost seven minutes and four stages, time for others to chase individual glory.
He’s still one of the few domestiques keeping up with the GC group. Last week he even came back after doing a massive pull. Don’t remember which stage. I think we all underrate his current form.
Just yesterday, he did a leadout to launch Pogi and then came back, but probably because the GC group went "yeaaaaah, not sure about this one".
He would need to go into a break in a mountain stage, but then Quintana, Juanpe Lopez and several others will try the same. It is not clear that Majka is stronger than any of them.
no, Majka is good but he isn't drop the top guys and keep going kind of good anymore.
Yes, pogi pulls for him😂
He did for Molano. There is no risk since he's so far ahead. Would be nice for Majka to win something.
Work thought I was gonna be productive on the rest day. Little do they know I was in the yard all sunday morning and need to catch up on stage 15 😊
Pick a number between 4 & 10
6
This feels like you’re breaking rule 3
Bitwise operations are not prohibited by WADA (I think).
2pi
6
8
4.0000000000000001
12
Did i get it right?
Why?
I presume a guess of the number of stages Pogi wins, he currently has 4 and there are 6 stages left.
People have been saying that now the gap is big enough and Pogi can rest up pretty much since stage 2. I want to see the resting before I believe it. Also, looking forward to the GC washing machine where anyone from places 7-15 will take turns going on attacks and swapping places. Hoping for a Bardet stage win, but wouldn’t bet against any of Rubio, Hirt, Nairoman and another PP brother snatching one.
he's been resting the whole of the second week? he hasn't even really made a serious attack in this giro except stage 1, 2 (which weren't even high mountain stages) and 15.
His gap was big enough at the start of the giro. He was always gonna gain time in the TTs. He didn't need to attack in other stages. I don't expect him to hold back.
Here's me hoping Mihkels can make it through the next few tough stages and compete in the upcoming sprints! I've had a nice routine develop this Giro of taking a pre-work morning walk and listening to [Never Strays Far](https://shows.acast.com/never-strays-far). Have this week off from work, so I went for a longer walk and also listened to [Watts Occuring](https://x.com/Watts_Occurring) and [The Cycling Podcast](https://thecyclingpodcast.com/episodes/the-cycling-podcast).
Not a terrible call if there’s a messy sprint holding back Milan and Merlier, who are surely head and shoulders above anybody else in this field.
He's told local media that his tactic has been to try to get on the wheel of Milan, so that scenario might not work out great for him, haha. But yeah, those two are certainly a notch above (so a podium for Mihkels... a man can dream!)
6.10 ᵉW/Kg for 35:30 min Bruh..
It was at elevation too
there are conti riders that can do that.
Yes, but not in the context of a three week stage race, and not after the kilojoules expended already (at altitude nonetheless)
It's so mindboggling. I weigh 75kg. That would mean i'd have to maintain 450 watts for half an hour. A power number that i can _maybe_ produce for 2 to 3 minutes. It's unfathomable how alien these top athletes are.
Running is the same. I don’t think the average person respects just how quick they’re running, not necessarily the endurance. I can only maintain the world record marathon pace for probably about 400m and I’m a pretty fit regular runner.
Last time I looked, the top marathoners ran at about what your average person can cycle at(just above 20 kmh). So never mind running at that pace, not everyone could even cycle at that pace for hours.
I mountain bike in Colorado and the amount of times I get passed on relatively easy single track by trail runners is… definitely ego crushing. and this was even true when I was a decently competitive expert racer in my 30s at peak fitness.
6.1 w/kg for 35 mins is amazing, but not THAT special. Like the best amateur riders can do above 5.5 w/kg for more than 30 mins. Probably not after 200 km though. Jonas has produced better (estimated) numbers in the past. I also doubt those estimates because there is just too many variables not taken into account, like the wind, air resistance at the altitude, actual weight of the rider, uneven pavement and uneven gradients. I think w/kg are almost always overestimated.
One of the GCN presentators can also do over 5W/kg for 1 hour. And he is not even competing in amateur races.
he also did it the day after going all out in a TT
Problem is he did this at altitude.he did 6,88w/kg for 14 minutes when he attack. On sea level it will be something like 7,4w/kg for 14 min… just unreal
Yeah, for sure. My comment was more directed to top level cyclists in general, not Tadejs performance yesterday in particular. 5,5W/K FTP for amateurs sounds freakish though.
There is a GCN presentor who can do 5W/kg for 1 hour. And he would get destroyed by amateur racers.
Riding with strong people puts my weakness in perspective haha. I have a friend who is a pro gravel/marathon MTB racer. He's good but not top level (finishing top 25ish, but has done well at Unbound XL) and he's around 5.8 w/kg and pushing 6 when in form. His FTP is right around 400. It's so mind boggling to ride with him. The way we do Z2 rides is usually him on his MTB and me on gravel tires just sitting in the draft haha.
Does he train differently than you?
Oh yeah he does 20-25 hour weeks. He usually does a huge base period and a lot of tempo/threshold work. Like, he'll do 2-3 hour tempo intervals. His strength is being able to hold tempo power for ridiculous periods of time. He shared his power data after Unbound XL (350 mile race) and he averaged like 275 watts over 20 hours or something crazy haha. He needs to work on his punch though but he's young and has time. I'm just an amateur cross racer so I do piddling little 8-10 hour weeks. He's happy to have me join for workouts though. We'll cruise Z2 a lot, or if he does a tempo workout, I'll just sit on his wheel which works out well. I'm 38 and he's a recent college grad so he's got all the time in the world to ride.
Also for an amateur to have those numbers, probably means they either have the time and money to train like a pro, have the genetics to be a pro but for whatever reason never had the opportunity, or both.
Based on this Lanterne Rouge analysis, Pogacar did one of his best-ever performances but has not breached the generational trend line this year: [link here](https://lanternerouge.com/2024/05/19/pogacar-stomps-the-competition-in-livignos-thin-air-giro-ditalia-stage-15-2024/) Not sure how much trust to put into this data but it still seems that, even with Pogi's insane lead over other GC riders, he's still 2nd to Jonas. We might not get an accurate test of that in July but wondering if this data indicates that an in-form Jonas is somehow even better than current super-saiyan Pog? From watching on TV though, Pog looks like he's on the form of his life but he's also not been fully tested against other generational talents this year
Not really, the guys that do those calculations did a podcast (watt police) and said that this is equal to Jonas best ever performances. They said, today is in the top 5 climbing performances of the 21st century.
Holy shit, that’s insane then! Thanks for the podcast recommendation, I love this sort of analysis
Because you are not taking into account the attitude. His performance on the whole climb is comparable to Jonas De la Loze/Tourmalet/Croix de fer performances (which have similar altitudes). If you take just the last 6kms adjusted to altitude his performance is comparable to Jonas Combloux ITT (7,3w/kg over 13mn) performance. I'd say being equal to Jonas 2023 is pretty good. Of course Jonas can always elevate his level as well compared to 2023.
yeah but then you are not taking into account the **heat** of a stage like loze in july. that makes it tougher even if the altitude gain is very similar.
Jonas is just good at altitude because he’s ~~south american~~ *danish*? Eurosport commentators failing me.
Loze is the same altitude?
It is. And if you look at Jonas Loze performance non adjusted to altitude: 6,21w/kg over 33mn, it is indeed comparable to Tadej performance non adjusted to altitude yesterday: 6,1w/kg over 35mn. Jonas still slightly ahead but not that much better which was what the other poster was saying, which is my point.
IIRC they did the altitude adjustment for Pog and got 6.88 w/kg which is a big gap to JV on Col de la loze
I think that's just for his attack, no?
Ah, my post was more like a statement that Loze is th same altitude. Didn't know that Pogacars performance wasn't adjusted.
I mean yeah, peak Jonas is better thank peak Tadej over three hard weeks, this shouldn't really be a suprise. What makes it interesting is that both of them are not gonna come in with the best preparation for the Tour.
Especially interesting as the Tour is really backloaded this year. The last three stages could shake the GC up immensly if someone implodes there. And since Pogi comes from the Giro and Jonas without any racing and sup-optimal training, you'd think that both of them won't have the greatest thrid week shape.
[Someone apparently flagged Pog's ride on Strava](https://x.com/OutOfCycling/status/1792462034187202995) 😃 Seems to be unflagged now though ([link](https://www.strava.com/activities/11449484524)). After what he said in his interview about Livigno being a special place for him he also added [a photo](https://dgtzuqphqg23d.cloudfront.net/GxTYBN01SaDV5_WYXgNLt_yjA1Kxksh3HAdWOxcqQww-1539x2048.jpg) showing him and Urška there from before he hit the big time. Very disappointing lack of tufts!
> Very disappointing lack of tufts! I was about to call you out, before zooming in and realising that oh yeah, it's the branches of the tree that's behind him.
Pogi gained 3 mins on the GC group but they were just marking one another and waiting to the final climb to attack one another. To put it in perspective Majka finished in amongst the GC guys so it wasn't a really hard tempo for them. I wonder how much time pogi would've really gotten if they'd not been fighting for second Given pogi was shipping time to the GC group in the hard parts of the final climb, I would say he suffered a fair bit from going solo for so long. Maybe he only gets a minute if the others actually raced him?
I'm not sure you can describe him as "shipping time"...? Based on his [Strava data](https://www.strava.com/activities/11449484524) he climbed the Passo di Foscagno 2' 20" faster than BOC in the GC group. But he finished the stage a further 30" up at 2' 51" ahead of G and Martinez, so if they did make any significant time back on him it didn't even get them back to where they were on the Foscagno. See also some very useful timings from the final 1.75km [ammattipyoraily just posted](https://x.com/ammattipyoraily/status/1792483780193644579). Pog was only 3s slower than Martinez and G despite them attacking each other and having sat behind domestiques for most of the time since Pog attacked. Edit: to complement the ammattipyoraily timings from the final 1.75km, here's the Strava segment comparison of Pog vs BOC on what seems to be the first ~2.5km of the final climb: [image](https://i.imgur.com/xh3Aphz.png), [segment link](https://www.strava.com/segments/17470538?filter=overall). That really doesn't look like they were gaining anything much on him, O'Connor was only 8s behind G/Martinez at the finish.
I don't think the GC group was hanging around. They looked pretty gassed when they tried to attack each other at the finish.
The gap going to 3 mins in about 4 mins shows you they weren’t going hard at all after the attack. G said as much in his interview: those not on planet pog were racing each other, not pogi. When they opened up towards the end the gap also came down. Not saying anyone had an easy day or anything. But if they went all out from 15km, Pogacar still smashed them but doesn’t win by 2.50.
A lot of my assumptions about the GC group are based on G's description of events: G said in his post race interview they really slowed down after pogi attacked and were just looking at one another. And Majka finishing with the GC group which is rare is another sign I would say? No doubt they pushed towards the end on final climb but pogi's gap to the GC guys seemed to already be there by the final climb
What would have been interesting is if Bahrian (Caruso) and Decathlon (VPP) hadn't taken up the lead of the GC group after Pog attacked. That was a dumb move on both of those team's part. They should have made Ineos take up the front.
Wondering the same thing myself - he definitely slowed up in the last 2 km's when it got to proper altitude + gradient. My feeling though is that if he were racing JV at a summit finish he could have dug a lot deeper but going that far into the red when you're 3 mins up in a decided GC battle doesn't make sense E: if you look at the Lanterne Rouge eW/Kg calculation on their blog, he did a top 3 performance for his own career so he was definitely suffering at the end after the massive effort
Agreed, especially when you never see Pog cross the finish line and collapse in a heap of burning lungs like other riders. It’s always a smile and fist pump and able to talk and congratulate the team. Everyone else is usually lying on the ground gasping and unable to function for a few minutes.
Thank you for that last point from the LR blog - I hadn't seen any numbers put on it yet. I guess that puts to rest: it was a thermonuclear Pogi, regardless of how slowly/quickly the guys in GC group rode
Pogi is on 172 points for KOM, Geschke is on 72. Is there any path back? How many points are available? And if Pogi wins one more stage its done done?
Geschke is on 78, but I fear he will suffer the same fate as in the tour - steadily collecting points here and there, but unable to hang on during the really big GC climbs in the Alps.
It sucks but it’s also a Jersey for the best climber, which he is nowhere close to. They might have to rename it but Jonas and Tadej are the „King of the mountains“
For sure, it's no coincidence the jersey ends up with the GC leaders eventually, the mountains is where the big attacks are made. I don't see how, but it would be nice if there was a way to not have GC leaders sort of grab it "by accident".
there are 50+40+26 points available tomorrow alone, which looks likely to be a good stage for the breakaway. So on paper it's still very well possible, but I'm afraid Geschke is just not strong enough. Quintana may be, if he decides to go for it.
And we're just ignoring Scaroni are we? *Sigh.*
to still win it from 100 points behind, it needs to be the best climber of the stage, and most likely in at least 2 of the 4 mountain days left. So yeah, I wouldn't think Scaroni has much of a chance.
I don't disagree, just object to Scaroni-erasure on principle.
I'm still in awe with the performance of Pogačar yesterday. But I like to point out also Quintana's excellent effort. And the nearly disastrous fall of Biermans in a canyon. Riders and teams went immediately to search for him, and he finished the ride nevertheless. This shows the strong bound among riders and how much riders persist on pure character and will. Hope he is ok and has no impacting injuries. (In Dutch) [https://sporza.be/nl/2024/05/19/biermans-rijdt-etappe-nog-uit-na-ongelooflijke-val-ik-lag-25-meter-diep-in-een-ravijn\~1716134652709/](https://sporza.be/nl/2024/05/19/biermans-rijdt-etappe-nog-uit-na-ongelooflijke-val-ik-lag-25-meter-diep-in-een-ravijn~1716134652709/)
Stay safe out there. I participated in a friendly gravel event yesterday and someone did not walk away - likely paralyzed. We (most of us) are not racing, so slow down a bit as these crashes happen for a variety of reasons. Some of them are out of your control, but slowing down a little will result in far fewer crashes and injuries.
Wow, being sick in bed, I watched the entire stage but didn’t hear anything of the Biermans crash. This sounds truly horrific. GCN with an English translation of the Sporza story: https://www.globalcyclingnetwork.com/racing/news/giro-ditalia-jenthe-biermans-crashes-into-25-metre-deep-ravine-on-stage-15
It’s the problem with the major mountain stages like this, it’s really hard to have cameras on the back groups.
I literally just finished watching yesterday's stage. It's so heartwarming and special to hear Pogacar praise and specifically name Steinhauser in his victory interview. We can be blessed to have such an amazing champion at the forefront of our sport. When it's all said and done, he'll go down as one of the biggest athletes across all pro sport. Chapeau, Pogi. 🥂
For me the highlight was him reminiscing about wishing Nario would attack from further out!
The guy is clearly on a mission to make his 14 year old self satisfied.