Watching the Femmes at the Tour de France? Do you know what all the team sponsorsdo? If youve ever wondered if Suez has something to do with water, or what Laboral Kutxa or VolkerWessels are about, here are some answers.Visma-Lease A Bike is obvious as its the sister team to the mens World Tour squad, with Norwegian IT services company Visma sponsoring alongside Lease A Bike, a company that offers bike leasing services to other companies and their employees that belongs to PON, a Dutch congolmerate that has a big footprint in cycling owning brands like Cervelo, Cannondale and Schwinn.FDJ United-Suez sees French state lottery provider and now Europes second biggest gambling company alongside Suez which is a French company that has two main activities, waste management and water services, so think of fleets of garbage trucks and recycling plants, as well as reservoirs, piping and sewage. Beyond the two headline names the jersey is notable for more blue chip corporates with Gan insurance and CB which is Frances answer to Visa payments. Team manager Stphane Delcourt could teach his French peers in the mens World Tour some lessons.Canyon-SRAM is a factory team with German bike brand Canyon alongside US component manufacturer SRAM. The team has just dropped Zondacrypto mid-season after the Polish company vanished taking some peoples savings and has just signed a German retail brokerage platform Scaleable Capital.UAE Team lIMAD is the Gulf state we know from the mens team. IMAD is the sovereign wealth fund that used to be called ADQ and has been chaired by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, the UAEs national security adviser, ie the spy chief, pictured with his trademark shades above, hence the recent name and kit change for the team. It the same backers as the mens team for example Analog is an IT company owned by G42 which has also been chaired by TBZ.Team SD Worx-Protime has Belgian corporate services company SD Worx which claims to be Europes leading HR, pay and time partner, so playing a similar role to Visma. Protime is a brand belonging to SD Worx, its a corporate HR service to track and time workers to measure when they are in the office and logging time spent on a workstation.Movistar is the Spanish telecoms operate Telefonica and its mobile brand and not just with Marlen Reusser today but arguably a team with a consistently better womens team than the men but because of international recruitment, having hired Annemiek van Vleuten in the past while seeing home talent Paula Blasi go abroad. She has been strongly linked to the Spanish squad but things seem increasingly open at the moment.Lidl-Trek is the German discount supermarket alongside the US bike brand and a big budget outfit keen to be cited among the top tier teams for both the men and women. The team is owned by Lidl which is interesting because the retailers premise is low prices and no frills but here they are spending probably 60 million a year on sport, still small compared to 140 billion in annual revenues but a luxury feel.AG Insurance-Soudal is the sister team of the mens Soudal-Quickstep outfit but think of a step-sister because it has had its own independent history before joining up with the mens team and while the kit is similar and they share a bike sponsor, its a Belgian entity while the mens squad is run out of Luxembourg. AG does consumer insurance, like car, travel and accident cover while Soudal is adhesives and other chemicals for construction and DIY.EF Education-Oatly sees Swedish-Swiss language education company EF Education alongside Oatly, an oat drink dont say milk company that was also started in Sweden but has since floated on the New York Stock Exchange.Fenix-PremierTech is led by Italian company Arpa with its Fenix brand, its a plastic surface product offering interior solutions, think wall or worktop coverings that offer colour and are easy to wipe. The Belgian squad is is the sister team of the Alpecin-PremierTech mens team but notable because of the different title sponsor for each. PremierTech is the Canadian horticultural company that started out selling peat but now offers agriscience products and machinery to plant seedlings and package crops.Human Powered Health is a US healthcare company that specialises helping to promote athletic health, offering nutritional advice and VO2 max testing for example and a subsidiary of Optum which is itself part of UnitedHealth group, the American health and insurance giant.Liv Jayco Alula sees Giants womens brand Liv in lights alongside Australian caravan and camping car maker Jayco and Saudi tourist project Al Ula. Like the mens team, its been a pet project of Gerry Ryan who started out backing womens cycling in the 1990s by personally funding individual athletes to train for the Olympics. His long run as a patron of the team, men and women, could be coming to an end.Team Picnic-PostNL is a copy-paste of the mens text, Picnic is a Dutch food retailer start-up that does home delivery, an online grocer and supermarket that is now expanding into France. PostNL is the Dutch postal service. Alas just like the mens World Tour team its also struggling, no wins this season and overtaken by several second tier teams on the UCI rankings.St Michel-Preference Home-Auber 93 is closing its mens team to focus on the women. St Michel is an industrial bakery company making madeleines and biscuits which can be found for sale all over France, from supermarkets to railway vending machines. Preference Home is a house building company operating in the Paris area. Auber 93 is the town of Aubervilliers and Seine-Saint-Denis department, long a working class area just to the north-east of Paris where the team has its HQ. It has had a joint mens team at Continental level but this is stopping to focus on the womens project.Laboral Kutxa-Fundacion Euskadi is the sister team to the Euskatel-Euskadi mens team only with Laboral Kuxta they have a credit union as a sponsor of the womens team, kutxa is Basque for a caja in Spanish. Like other womens teams, it only has a minority of local cyclists with only a few Basques on the books.VolkerWessels is a Dutch construction company building everything from housing in the Netherlands to railway infrastructure projects in the UK and reportedly the countrys second largest builder. Its part owned by the Wessels family with workers also having a share of equity. Construction is not an advanced business but the kit looks like it was designed twenty years ago.Uno-X is the Norwegian retail company Reitan and its service station business, offering fuel and charging points across Norway and Denmark. While the mens team is 100% Norwegian and Danish, the womens team is more international.Lotto Intermarch Ladies is the full name, the ladies suffix does feel like something out of a Bronte novel that could be revised. Lotto is the Belgian state lottery and so by extension the Belgian government with a mission to support womens cycling in Flanders and Wallonia alike although the roster looks very Flemish. Meanwhile Intermarch is a French supermarket giant that operates across Europe from Portugal to Poland via franchise that buy centrally from the company which itself sources and produces a lot of goods, it has extensive agricultural holdings and Europes largest fishing fleet.Ma Petite Entreprise is French for My Small Business and a crowd-funded team backed by small businesses. There are different membership tiers, from individual supporters paying 120 a year to sponsors ranging between access entry point of 750 a year to the pro tier of 15,000, and there are over 642 of these corporate sponsors. Its a novel project as an alternative model to the title sponsor system that every other team relies on and interesting because of this.Mayenne Monbana My Piesees the Mayenne department of France as the lead choice. With local government in France under pressure to make cuts you can see this may not be an essential service but theres a logic to it with local politicians wanting to reach people in France to sell their area as a dynamic and active place to relocate. Monbana is a chocolate company located in the Mayenne. My Pie is a French company selling pies, founded by two entrepreneurs who discovered the New Zealand and Australian staple of pies when on a trip Down Under and decided to import the idea to France. Getting the French to eat new food may not sound easy but meaty sauce inside a buttery pastry is an easy sell and the business seems to be growing well.Mens Pro Team sponsors explainedThe post Womens Pro Team Sponsors Explained first appeared on The Inner Ring.

A post-Tour look at the team standings to see who is up and who is down.Two changes at the top. First the UAE team is still in the lead but theyve pulled out a big lead after only having less than two thousand points on RedBull going into the Tour, now theyre over five thousand clear and with Pogaar racing the Vuelta likely to pull further ahead. The other movement is Lidl-Trek overtaking XDS-Astana, the German team enjoyed a successful team while the Kazakh squad found it hard to get a look in.The grey line on the chart represents the border between 18th and 19th place. Notionally this is the relegation point at the end of the 2026-2027-2028 cycle. Its far away, and also conditional on there being 18 teams in the World Tour. Pinarello-Q36.5 already look like a competitive World Tour team and signing the likes of Mauro Schmid only bolsters this. Movistar and Lotto-Intermarch might be where theyre expected to be but its not a comfortable place.Thanks to a good Tour EF went into the Tour below the grey line, now theyre well above it with Richard Carapaz scoring over 1,300 points. Cofidis are just above the line but Tudor are close, the Swiss team had a discreet Tour de France but have signed Arnaud De Lie who ought to score big for them next year, the team need this. Marc Hirschi for example only has 308 points this season.A poor Tour for Groupama-FDJ, around 300 points of which two thirds came from Clment Russos stealthy top-10s. They will be worried about relegation, especially as theyre still highly reliant on Romain Grgoire. Hes extended his contract with the team which helps but injury or illness could be ruinous for the team. Valentin Madouas is leaving and you can understand why, hes only got 120 points this season when hes been second in the Olympics and the Ronde alike and notionally one of the leaders; the same for David Gaudu with 98 points this season with talk of a breakdown in relations and the team wanting to unload him but hes got a valid and lucrative contract so in no hurry to leave. Having seen Stefan Kng leave and now Madouas there ought to be some budget for some scorers. House sprinter Paul Penhot is leaving too.Picnic-PostNL are in a catastrophic position. Only one win this season is poor but its the absence from podiums, placings and other results that is proving so damaging. Theyre really missing Max Poole, their stage racing talent, but only three riders in Pavel Bittner, Frits Biesterbos and Bjorn Koerdt have a points score in triple digits, with Bittner the top scorer on 580 points. Theyre 4,339 short of Cofidis, to avoid relegation theyre going to need to score at a rate like Soudal-Quickstep just to get back on terms. Fabio Jakobsen could be leaving the team in the coming daysOne year rankingsEverything else being equal* the best two ProTeams this season get automatic invites to the biggest races for next year, so Pinarello-Q36.5 and Cofidis right now but with Tudor jostling for this prize so watch for this during the rest of the season.To be eligible for a grand tour a ProTeam has to be inside the Top-30 at the end of the season so plenty of familiar names including Bardiani which has climbed up. But the rule means the likes of Euskaltel-Euskadi and Modern Adventure Cycling are out of the picture now so new Euskaltel signing Mikel Landa may not have the romantic farewell at the Vuelta.As written before the top-30 rule is based of the rankings at the end of the year which will include teams like Kern Pharma and TotalEnergies and only the first has said its stopping and the second is probably going to stop too but no announcement yet so if they wont exist next year it doesnt make sense to include them.* an open question with an uncertain future for several teams, see Julys Race for Survival postThe post UCI Team Rankings first appeared on The Inner Ring.

Years ago revenue sharing was all the rage with team managers making public calls for the major race organisers to pay them money. Only even if a race owner felt inclined, when you looked at the data the sums available were small.Today the calls remain but the sums have changed so time to look again with current numbers. Especially as its been floated by no less than the New York Times, as the screengrab above shows.The premise of the NYT article (paywall) is that the Amaury family that owns Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) is thoroughly resistant to change, mentioning the FIFA World Cup which is expected to pull in $13 billion, double the sum of 2022s tournament. It started with more teams and matches; interrupting games with hydration breaks that increased the number of television commercials; and enacting dynamic pricing, which sent ticket prices soaring and the suggestion the Tour de France and pro cycling should embrace similar practicesThe article also says The family doesnt share any of the television rights revenue, reportedly worth more than $170 million a year. That starves the sport of capital that could expand the fan base and leaves cycling in a precarious spot.The $170 million comes with a hyperlink to sportspro.com which in turn links to bfmtv.com which uses a 150 million number (roughly $170 million). Only BFM itself says this is an informed estimate and crucially this is total revenue, as in TV income and hosting fees, the publicity caravan, merchandising and more and cites a number of 150-200m. Its not the TV revenue, but were not here to fact check the NYT.Still lets take the $170 million. Lets also assume ASO has no costs, ie no offices, no staff, no suppliers, no tax, and hotels give away rooms in July etc so that $170 million of revenue is still there, untouched. Now compound that wrong assumption with a second where ASO pays out half of this money to teams, a pot of $85 million for the teams. Divided this between 23 teams on the start, thats $3.7 million per team. Nice but it doesnt get teams out of the precarious spot.Rather than use fourth-hand estimates, ASO does publish annual accounts. The 2024 accounts, the latest available, show total revenue of 415 million, costs of 284 million and a profit of 131 million, you can see this highlighted in the screengrab above from the accounts filed with the French government.The government page also helpfully lists the numbers over the years and even plots them in a chart. You can see above how revenue has been growing chez ASO. (For any sticklers, one image has gross revenue of 415m, the other uses net revenue of 375m).ASO is famous as the Tour de France organiser but promotes other cycling races, you can see the portfolio in the screengrab from the Tour de France website. It also does the Dakar motorsport rally, the Paris marathon, the Etape du Tour ride. It was also the organiser for some of the Paris Olympics doing the cycling, triathlon and open water swimming events, apparently the first time a private company was brought into run part of the games.Lets make some more wrong assumptions. Assume the 130 million annual profits all come from the mens Tour de France. Now imagine half of these profits are paid to 23 teams and its 2.8 million per team. Nice again, but even less game-changing and were still relying on wild assumptions.We might as well go full reductio ad absurdum and assume all of ASOs profits must be paid out to mens cycling teams: 5.7 million each.The average World Tour for 2026 is 33.1 million ($38.7m). So 5.7 million is 17% of the average team budget which could help but it still doesnt change the brittle model where teams rely on funding from title sponsors. If Movistar, Cofidis or EF decided to halt sponsorship today and the structures could not find a replacement in time, 5.7 million would not keep a team afloat it, it doesnt make the sponsorship model less precarious. Above all, remember to get this amount weve used wild assumptions.If youre bogged down in numbers by now, lets step back as the concept sounds bold. Teams owned by nation states, billionaires and multinational corporates want money from company that turns over 415 million? It sounds like reverse redistribution.The Tour organisers could turn around and ask teams for money instead, why not charge a start fee knowing that teams depend on participation, and the money could be re-invested in added safety? Or indeed point out that teams make money because of the Tour de France, if the race did not exist then team managers would have smaller budgets to reflect the reduced audience. Audacious? Yes but its more rational than assuming all of ASOs profits come from the Tour, that all of this should be donated to the teams and it would make a meaningful difference.ConclusionRevenue sharing is one of those zombie arguments that wont die. Whether an American newspaper or a social media post, theres an enduring the sense that ASO should share profits, but often with little follow-up on the actual numbers or distribution because the moment you go from ok, but how much is when you can see its not as obvious as it sounds. Even if ASO decided to donate all its profits to mens pro cycling teams it wouldnt alter their brittle sponsorship model.Whats probably behind the sentiment is the monopoly ASO has on the sport, the way the Tour de France is the dominant event and how this matters for sponsorship but also for control over the sport. Its less the money, more the position.The post Revenue Sharing Re-Revisited first appeared on The Inner Ring.

Tadej Pogaar attacked on the Tourmalet with 5km to go before summit and 43km left in Stage 6. In the picture above Jonas Vingegaard is out of the picture but only just, some 30 seconds behind at the top of the pass. But on the descent and then the valley road up to Gavarnie he multiplies this advantage by five to take back the yellow jersey and leave his rivals in no doubt they cant dent him or his team.The race started in Barcelona with a 19km team time trial, which with foresight was a selection trap for several teams who picked riders for the opening day but with less thought for what was to come. The Paris-Nice rules format probably needs a new label but saw Visma-LAB win with Jonas Vingegaard coming home first to take yellow, as good as their and his Tour would get.Sundays stage told us plenty with Tadej Pogaar helping set up Isaac del Toro for the win and seeming more delighted with this than if hed just won himself. Hed win the next day, for all the talk of riders not wanting the weight of the yellow jersey, Pogaar seemed privately determined to defrock Jonas Vingegaard, theres a hint of spice to their rivalry that goes unsaid.After a stage to Foix that saw Mads Pedersen score beaucoup points and put Torstein Tren in yellow we got a classic day in the Pyrenees. UAE set the pace all day and did another team time trial up the Tourmalet with a tailwind to launch Pogaar who set a record time on the climb, with chasers like Vinegaard at 30 seconds over the top and then Paul Seixas leading the others at 1m22s, still beating the old record too. Half a minutes gain in 15 minutes of climbing was strong but it was the remaining 44 minutes of the stage that saw Pogaar extend his lead by over two minutes to finish 2m38 clear of Vingegaard and nearly three minutes on the next eight with the rest of the field scattered to the winds. If Pogaar won here, the selection made among the others was as crucial for the following three weeks.The Tour had to use the Pyrenees given the start in Barcelona but what if the stage had been softened? Then Pogaar would have used the stage to Le Lioran instead, maybe the suspense lasted longer and gap would have been smaller but the psychological blow to rivals would have been as big. If Le Lioran was the next GC appointment when Pogaar attacked nobody even bothered to get out of the saddle and respond. When Pogaar attacked on the Col du Haag the others just chased and like the Tourmalet it was after the climb that Pogaar gained most time.Fast forward the GC race to Paris and here are the GC standings of the top-7 overall plus the broken lines of Vingegaard and Lipowitz, loyal readers should know how the chart works by now and its pleasing to see many other outlets using the same format. Stage 6 sees everyone fall away from Pogaar after his Tourmalet coup. Stage 10 sees the black line of Del Toro dip after he was distanced on the road to Le Lioran, likewise Lenny Martinez lost time and was 9th overall but if not seen as a GC contender, still among the few whod reached Gavarnie just behind Vingegaard.A good Tour ought to see lines rising and falling but here the story is how they all fall away in unison, the order of the weekend in Barcelona is sustained for a long time. Evenepoels storming time trial performance barely registers on the y-axis. Those calling for more time trial kilometres should be satisfied next year you read it here first but you could double the distance on the day, and have three of these TT stages and it might take Evenepoel closer to Pogaar. But only so much and then the Slovenian could respond in the mountains rather than play chaperone to Del Toro.Vingegaards Tour can be seen ending on Stage 15 after his crash on a roundabout. The teams tactics were one contributing factor to their downfall, racing hard on the roads to the foot of the final climb which just suited Pogaar and let his UAE colleagues sit back. Mineralogists use Mohs scale, an index to compare and sort rocks found in the field. Quartz will always scratch gypsum and never the reverse, a diamond will scratch quartz, and so on. In the Tour Pogaar seemed unbeatable and the tactic of trying to wear him down seemed to be like using up a lot of softer rocks hoping to eventually wear down a diamond. Perhaps pushing in the hope of finding a fault was the only tactic left, Visma dont have a co-leader; but Red Bull did and couldnt deploy this tactic either. The chart shows Florian Lipowitzs exit, the stage after hed lost time at the Plateau de Solaison and where two leaders had proved a difficult strategy to execute.Vingegaards exit probably changed the race. We saw this on the stage to Le Lioran where he did not try to match Pogaars winning move but did shape what happened behind, leading the chase. Hed have likely done more in the Alps including the day he left where his pacing probably wouldnt have allowed Pogaar do go at Del Toros rate and this could have affected the GC, some stage results, and possibly the mountains competition if Visma kept trying to wear down UAE.The biggest GC move on the chart is Lenny Martinez who got in the breakaway on Stage 19 and if he cratered his chances of winning the stage by playing (too much) poker he got up on GC and held on the following day to finish 5th overall. This year he was supposed to go for GC in one week races and hone these skills, all while having free reign for stage-hunting and the mountains competition but because he never sat up to lose time and so stayed in the GC race, and benefitted from Ayuso and Skjelmose falling away. One thing he didnt benefit from much was his team, often invisible.Other competitions were more lively. The points competition came alive later in the race. Tim Merlier avoided intermediate sprints to save himself for the stage finishes and with three wins this paid off. Jasper Philipsens quest for a stage win looked difficult on the outside and apparently unbearable on the inside with talk of long silences at the dinner table but he delivered a win in Voiron and was within a handful of points of taking the green jersey with plenty on offer in Paris. Only for Mads Pedersen to go on the rampage and win the competition in the Alps.The mountains competition was competitive throughout the race. It gave Caja Rural something on home soil on the opening weekend (and more than several other teams would get out of July) and while Tadej Pogaar took the polka-dots thanks to crossing the Tourmalet, Richard Carapaz and Valentin Paret-Peintre set about scoring points and duelling for the jersey and Carapaz came out on top thanks to a relentless three days in the Alps.The white jersey and podium went down to the last mountain pass too with Decathlon-CMA CGM trying an all or nothing gamble to dislodge Isaac del Toro. The fact that Paul Seixas was fourth overall and within touching distance of the podium at the foot of the Col de Sarenne felt ordinary in the moment but go back to, say, February and it would have felt like a fever dream of a French fan. Two years ago in July he was doing the junior Ain Bugey Valromey Tour where four out of five stages were under 100km long. If you note the progress hes made in the last year and then think he can find a fraction more then, well you can see why Netcompany-Ineos are flirting with him and his agent and his current team are in the market for Ben OConnor, Laurens De Plus, Pavel Sivakov and others to build a project around him.Speed was a theme for an edition that set the record average speed of 43.227km/h. Sren Wrenskjolds sprint win in Nevers set a new stage record of 50.910km/h, breaking the record from 1999 which had enjoyed a tailwind, and more, while this time the wind barely below. The next day was almost as fast at 49km/h and the day after was ridden at 50km/h despite the Ballon dAlsace in the way; stage-winner Mauro Schmid fitted a 58T chainring, a set of wisdom teeth for the pace. Many times if the peloton was on flat road it was doing over 50km/h. But unlike previous editions there were few crashes and speed as a safety topic was not a big deal.One factor in the speed is having most of the top names in the action. Breakaway days dont see some wildcard riders go clear but you have Mathieu van der Poel, Mads Pedersen, Tom Pidcock and others making the moves. Some of the most entertaining stages were the mid-mountain days, like the stages to Ussel, Belfort and Voiron.The flipside to this exclusivity is the exclusion, the lack of opportunity. Wrenskjolds win was almost the revelation as, excepting Olav Kooij who has hardly raced this season, he was the lowest-ranked rider on the UCI rankings to win a stage; the average number of pro wins for a stage winner in the race was 69; boosted by Pogaar but without him the number is 50. This is a trend and so makes it hard for riders, and whole teams, to hope of a breakthrough win. The romance of sport needs to allow for this.Talking of droughts, this was a dry Tour, taking place across parched landscapes and not just the habitual southern transition stages. Luke Durbridge mentioned that many riders were complaining their shoes smelled from of pouring water over themselves all day but that was a small problem compared the public safety issue of crowds waiting hours in the heat and the outbreak of wildfires which required emergency services to be diverted from Tour duties. Environmental issues came closer to the Tour and the race will have to respond. Despite some polemical headlines, the organisers are conscious of this, current broadcast contracts stipulate timings so any move to a morning slot is off the question now but up for review later on.Another polemic saw anti-doping became a story but this time it was the testers who faced questions instead of the riders, in part because those tested shrugged balefully and got on with the racing even if sections of the media did not. Normally tests that return negative are never reported on but we have had press releases in the past on how the anti-doping procedures including a line that all tests came back negative.The final stage in Paris was a thriller, the Rue Lepic performing alchemy as the peloton went in together and out at the top came a golden selection each time with the last distillation giving us just Pogaar and Van der Poel. The longer approach to the finish heightened the drama with Pogaar grimacing, seemingly prepared to lose to Van der Poel as long as they could stay away. Freezing the times overall before the finish line feels wrong on sporting terms and if it did rain at lunchtime, most of the circuit had dried in time. For all its thrills even in the dry the circuit does have a frantic aspect coming off Montmartre.The VerdictStanding on the top step of the podium put Pogaar alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain more than the two men flanking him on Sunday evening. He was unrivalled this year and if he took five stages he could easily have had more, possibly eight if his team had avoided illness.Evenepoel rode a measured race, his only temperamental expression was reserved for team mate Lipowitz. But how to win, or is a podium sufficient? Still 26 years old the answer might be wait but he saw a 22 year old Del Toro on the other step.Any suspense from the overall classification melted like an ice cream in Julys enduring heatwave but there was plenty left to enjoy, if Pogaar gobbled up riders like Pacman at times, the stage in the Vosges lively, the same for the Alpe dHuez finish. There was plenty going on among the other GC contenders, the race-without-Pogaar was lively.In 1930 the Giro organisers paid Alfredo Binda not to take part and as tempting as it be for fans to crowdfund a start fee for Pogaar to add next Julys Tour of Austria to his palmars, it would quickly leave many frustrated that the best rider was not there.On many other days the quality of the racing high and often action that began and the start and lasted to the finish line and there was satisfaction in seeing the subsidiary jersey contests all battling until the last weekend. And then there was Paris.Quand finit le Tour de France, jai une espce de dpression qui ne ncessite pas que jaille dans une zone de repos, mais je sens quil manque quelque chose : une grande partie de lenchantement paradisiaque de mon t vient de se terminer Salvador DaliThats Dali lamenting on the post-Tour blues. But he didnt have the Tour Femmes starting this weekend.The post The Moment The Tour de France Was Won first appeared on The Inner Ring.

A final stage and abbreviated to Paris only but this wont alter the sport. A prestigious stage win awaits and potentially a duel between Tadej Pogaar and Mathieu van der Poel.Stage 20 Review: if a grand tour is an exercise in hierarchy to quote Antoine Blondin, or a Bayesian simulator to use science, then how much can the last mountain stage tell us? Even a day with 5,450m of vertical gain and 70 points for anyone capable of passing the marked mountain points first was probably going to confirm rather than reveal.Still, Theres plenty to be said for replicating results on a day when many struggled to hoist themselves out of bed and even scaling a bridge over an autoroute was sapping. Richard Carapaz proved he could even improve on the performances of recent days made him the rider of the day, going from a one point lead in the mountains competition to a 56 point unassailable and incontestable win in the mountains competition.Similarly Mads Pedersen hauled himself over the Alps, attacking at one point to bridge across to the breakaway and then take maximum points at the intermediate sprint to secure the green jersey, an immense ride. The Tour has its Supercombatif prize and its surely between Carapaz and Pedersen, probably Carapaz but there are good arguments to litigate either way.The days breakaway was reduced to Carapaz, Sep Kuss and Jai Hindley on the lower slopes of the Col de la Sarenne. Another day, another trio starting the climb to Alpe dHuez with three and half minutes lead. But this time Pogaar wasnt in pursuit mode.The higher slopes of the Sarenne had no crowds, the road closed to spectators. It was pleasant to see the mountain like this, and no bad advert too for cyclists wanting to explore this road. But also a premonition of what awaits us after the Tour when the sport reverts to sparse crowds and silence.Kuss led over the Sarenne, but only just. Carapaz had the American in sight and was closing. Then Kuss crashed twice and the second time he was lucky there was netting on the exit of the bend, while Carapaz sped past. Despite the dirt on his kit from falling Kuss looked the fresher climber and could have reversed matters. Only Carapaz is among the cast of riders who can be impossible to bring back if they get five metres.Behind Decathlon-CMA CGM had tried to ratchet up the pace in an all-or-nothing move to dislodge Isaac del Toro off third place overall only it came to nothing with Seixas unable to sustain the move and cracking, while Del Toro had the luxury help of Tadej Pogaar. Pogaar could have won the stage if he wished but played butler, a high altitude Jeeves.Evenepoel attacked on the final run to Alpe dHuez, symbolic perhaps but notable as hed survived 5,000m of vertical gain, each stomp on the pedals in the final kilometres a serving to every media outlet in Belgium whod declared he was not a grand tour contender.As Pogaar and Del Toro came into the finish together they were photo-bombed by Lenny Martinez who secured his fifth place overall, albeit 13 minutes down but hell take plenty from the consistent performance and how he was one of the few to hold firm in the third week, all while having turned 23 during this years Tour.The Route: On nest pas a Thoiry, ici. Well almost, theres a presentation in Thoiry for the crowds and host politicians but then the riders are bussed to Paris. Its 89km and laps of the 15km long Champs-Elyses Montmartre circuit, reduced from 133km because of a police shortage with the emergency services mobilised to help with public safety, notably in the Cap Ferret/Arcachon area. In pure cycling terms nobody is missing out on the early parade and we might see a lap or two reserved for this before the racing begins.If theChamps-Elyses-Montmartre circuit already feels familiar theres still a difference as after the descent of Montmatre, the course takes the riders to the Place de lEtoile/Arc de Triomphe and then to the Champs-Elyses. Last year the descent led to the Place de la Concorde. The meaning here is that theres 10km to the finish from the top of Montmartre when there was 6km last year so more chance for teams to organise a chase.The Contenders: the circuit has a feel of a spring classic with the repeat cobbled climbs and if its only 89km everyone is tired and so it doesnt need 200km to make the difference.Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-PremierTech) is the obvious pick, the punch to jump away on the climb, the ability to win the sprint and hes had this stage in mind for a long time. Jasper Philipsen is a second card to play in the sprint.Tadej Pogaar (UAE) got beaten here last year, one of the rare moments he lost a bike race in a straight contest. Hes been talking about this stage too and this makes life harder for the sprinters as his moves will distance them. Hell get extra stimulation from going up against Van der Poel, his arch rival for the classics.Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) ought to be tired but so far hes been a force of nature in this Tour.Olav Kooij (Decathlon-CMA CGM) and Biniam Girmay (NSN) can hope for a sprint and an opportunity.Jayco pair Michael Matthews and Mauro Schmid have a chance. Netcompany-Ineos still have chance of salvation and Filippo Ganna might be their best bet. Theres no French stage winner so far and Romain Grgoire (Groupama-FDJ) has a chance but hes looked fried.Van der PoelPogaar, PhilipsenKooij, Matthews, Girmay, Schmid, KanterWeather: sunny and 24C.TV: KM0 is at 5.55pm and the finish is forecast for 7.30pm CEST.The post Tour de France Stage 21 Preview first appeared on The Inner Ring.

The last day in the Alps and a ferocious stage with hardly a metre of flat road.If you want to watch it live, note the early finish.Pacman: a group of 42 riders were away with Lidl-Trek pulling for Mads Pedersen whod made the move and managed to get over the big Col du Noyer. Among the group was Lenny Martinez, 7th overall at the start of the day. Valentin Paret-Peintre won the sprint on the climb to take a virtual lead in the mountains competition.Several riders from EF, Ineos, Visma towed the breakaway as fast as they could for their climbers which was a boost for Martinez. Having worked to pull the move clear for Pedersen, once past the intermediate point Lidl-Trek, Pedersen included, dropped back to pull the yellow jersey group to contain Martinez.The breakaway started Alpe dHuez with about three and half minutes on yellow jersey group and soon Martinez, Richard Carapaz and Sep Kuss left the others behind. Only they quickly started to attack each other, notably Carapaz who was frustrated by Martinez who was either baggage or bluffing. It was a bluff, and Carapaz made five moves, increasingly frustrated as he could not get away. At one point through the village of Huez the trio stopped pedalling as they looked at each other.Meanwhile Pogaar had set off solo, it was like watching an Australian-style handicap race where the best rider has to set off minutes behind the rest. In yellow, he was gobbling up riders from the breakaway like Pacman. Extrapolating his time gain per kilometre suggested the breakaway would be caught but you didnt need mental arithmetic to work this out as the lead trio marked each other and buried their chances.In the finish Carapaz and Martinez were able to latch onto Pogaar but he kicked one last time before the finishing straight and cracked Carapaz. Martinez was on the wheel of the Ecuadorian again and he probably took a pleasure in not moving and thereby ensuring Martinez could not win. Another stage for Pogaar. Easy to bank, to take for granted, to read as inevitable but this time with the Alpe record too.Among the GC contenders Remco Evenepoel came in two and half minutes down, taking 12 seconds on Isaac del Toro and 16 on Mattias Skjelmose and Paul Seixas. The relative loser was Juan Ayuso who lost almost four minutes to his GC rivals, slipping two places on GC. Martinez is up to fifth now and his Bahraini team management swept away all talk of a loss thanks to this overall gain.In the mountains competition Richard Carapaz leads by one point over Tadej Pogaar and seven points over Valentin Paret-Peintre. Carapaz has 91 points and theres the possibility to win 70 points on Stage 20 so all to race for. Pedersen now has 52 points lead on Jasper Philipsen, not arithmetically secure but much more comfortable now.One sour note was Einer Rubio leaving the race after the UAE team car slammed on the brakes going up Alpe dHuez, seemingly when a spectator was in front of the vehicle and the Colombian crashed into the back, sustaining heavy facial injuries and, unable to continue, needing 20 stitches. The upper part of the Col de Sarenne for the next stage is due to be closed to the crowds.The Route: 170km and 5,450m of vertical gain, a huge day in the mountains. The profiles speak for themselves.The Finish: the Col de Sarenne is a backroad that leads to Alpe dHuez and very different from the famous main climb. Its irregular along the way with an early descent and a flat section through Clavans. The upper part in black on the profile has a series of hairpins that come in quick succession.From the top theres still 14.4km to go, first across a plateau-like section thats awkward as anyone dropped before can flounder by themselves here.Once in Alpe dHuez theres a descent out of the ski resort and then the route picks up the final part of the traditional climb with 3.5km to go, some last ramps before crossing the resort to the same finish line as the previous stage.The Contenders: Tadej Pogaar (UAE) has his Alpe dHuez stage now, does he want another? Speaking after Stage 19 he hinted at this but also said he wants to help Isaac del Toro secure the white jersey and the podium.Richard Carapaz (EF) has been on the rampage two days in a row which makes a third time hard especially given all the efforts hes been making but by virtue of being in the polka-dot jersey hes got to be among the movers from the start.Valetin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-Quickstep) sat up on Stage 19. Did he fade from the efforts of pushing a big gear, or was it a case of reculer pour mieux sauter knowing how many points are on offer in this stage? Lenny Martinez (Bahrain) was almost carried to the foot of Alpe dHuez on a Sedan chair but stuffed up the finish. However his time gains have propelled him up the GC and so if he moves both Lidl-Trek and Decathlon-CMA CGM will want to chase. Still he is moving well.Sepp Kuss (Visma-LAB) gets even more climbing to suit and no GC menace.Netcompany-Ineos can still try, is Thymen Arensman the best bet or did Egan Bernal sit up yesterday to save energy. Both are climbing well but how to win against others look livelier.Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) is 9th on GC and at 21 minutes and he could take eight minutes and not worry Lidl-Trek or Decathlon but hes just been struggling on the climbs in recent days.Kuss, CarapazPogaar, VP-P, MartinezPidcock, Arensman, Bernal, Del ToroWeather: sunshine at times and 27C in the valleys but with clouds building and a good chance of rain at times.TV: KM0 is at 11.30am and the finish is forecast for 4.10pm CEST. The start of the Tlgraphe comes around 1.40pm and the top of the Galibier will be around 3.00pm and the Sarenne begins around 3.35pm.The post Tour de France Stage 20 Preview first appeared on The Inner Ring.

Alpe dHuez awaits, the classic climb but this time with a more gentle approach. Can UAE keep a lid on things so that Tadej Pogaar gets a prestige win for his palmars?Festival des Cannes: one of the enjoyable aspects of stage races is seeing multiple races happening at the same time. One saw Mads Pedersen going in the breakaway he managed to make moves all the way to the intermediate sprint in Corps after 129km to take a valuable 25 points.Early on Richard Carapaz and Valentin Paret-Peintre were in a different contest as they battled for the mountains points, the Frenchman picking off each sprint with a sprint that belied his waif-like build.Later a solid move got clear but Carapaz missed it. His EF team mates Alex Baudin and Ben Healy set about correcting this and helped tow a willing counter move across to the front.After Pedersen won the intermediate sprint Felix Engelhardt and Matteo Jorgenson floated away and then Tobias Halland Johannessen got across. Once theyd got a few metres things changed and you could see their backs hunched and elbows going in as they accelerated. Raul Garcia Pierna moved taking Mauro Schmid with him. This allowed Engelhardt to pull harder for his team mate Schmid, prising open the gap before he could do no more. Netcompany-Ineos had missed the move but while Thymen Arensman tried to chase Richard Carapaz darted past with a big counter-attack, taking Paret-Peintre with him. This left six clear with 45km to go and Ineos chasing.Coming to the finish Garcia Pierna had been dropped but got back and looked like the weakest of the six. At times they were spread across the road to Orcires-Merlette, nobody wanting to lead, looking at each other like poker players around a table trying to second-guess who held which cards and scrutinising rivals for the slightest tell in body language.Jorgenson looked the most likely to attack and was the first to move. He prompted a counter-attack from Richard Carapaz and Paret-Peintre dived on the Ecuadorians wheel. Carapaz went again and this time nobody could follow. Paret-Peintre cracked in finishing fourth missed on the points to take the polka-dot jersey for real rather than leasing it.Its a victory for a rider with an artistic and rebellious streak. He attacked on the Puy Mary in an attempt to slip the UAE yoke on Stage 10. And hes not done yet.Elsewhere Brandon McNulty abandoned the stage, another UAE rider to fall ill after Adam Yates and Tim Wellens was among those dropped early. Any team talk of Yatess illness being an isolated affair looked questionable. Tadej Pogaar seems fine but no rivals tried a move on the final climb to test. Also a final plotline in that UAE were spared some duties when the likes of Pinarello-Q36.5, Tudor and Total chased to protect the GC standings of Tom Pidcock, Yannis Voisard and Jordan Jegat.The Route: 128km and 3,500m of vertical gain. Its uphill from the start out of Gap on the Col Bayard. This roads often featured for arrivals in Gap as the climb to take before the white knuckle Rochette descent back into Gap. The Bayard is a big wide road.The Col du Noyer is not, a start amid fields and woodland and then a wild feel. Its 7.5km at 8.5% with the final 2km with 10% sections between the hairpins.The route then crosses back across the landscapes taken on the previous stage via the Route Napoleon.The Col dOrnon is a quiet backroad and a gentle climb. The descent is more remarkable, rarely steep either but with more hairpins and some moments where the road is cut into the cliff. Its technical, cyclings euphemism for a dangerous descent.The Finish: Alpe dHuez is a tough climb, over 13km at over 8% is hard by any measures. The start is the hardest part, the ramps have double-digit gradients. Its famous for the 21 hairpins and they count, a rider can pick their line through these bends to suit and allow someone with energy to spare to accelerate. The slope kicks up for the ramp that leads into the ski resort and from there after the slope eases. Theres a left turn onto the finish line on the Avenue du Rif Nel.The Contenders: having given Richard Carapaz (EF) three chainrings for the previous stage and writing that even if he won hed be tipped again, he is. Watching him race to the finish he didnt ease up when hell need plenty to be be able to go again today. Ben Healy helped set him up and isnt the same force as last year but has a chance too.Tadej Pogaar (UAE) will want the stage win but given several team mates are ill this poses questions above his teams ability to control the stage, and thats before we ponder if hes immune to this. So hes not the shoe-in he ought to have been for this stage.Netcompany-Ineos missed the winning move yesterday and later shut down the chase but does Thyman Arensman have anything to spare? Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-Quickstep) faded on the previous stage but if he can recover this stage will be less intense for him, especially if he gets a colleague in the breakaway with him.Riders who fit the bill and were not riding as hard on the previous stage include Sepp Kuss and Davide Piganzoli (Visma-LAB), Ilan Van Wilder (Soudal-Quickstep), Harald Tejada (XDS-Astana) and Einer Rubio (Movistar).Finally Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) sits eighth overall but has still been making moves and he won the last time the race came to the Alpe in 2022.Carapaz, Arensman, Pogaar, VP-P, KussJorgenson, Rubio, Healy, Tejada, Piganzoli, PidcockWeather: sunny and 29C.TV: KM0 is at 2.15pm and the finish is forecast for 5.25pm CEST. The intermediate sprint at the foot of the Col dOrnon should be reached around 4.25pm and the climb to Alpe dHuez begins around 5.00pm.The post Tour de France Stage 19 Preview first appeared on The Inner Ring.

Alps or Pyrenees? The two mountain ranges are often juxtaposed by the Tour de France. Do you prefer one over the other?If you do, chances are its the Pyrenees. Many cite the wilder feel, the older buildings, the roads that feel more irregular to climb, while the Alps have big ski resorts, crowded valleys and busy roads. Its true in the sense yes the Alps have have big ski resorts, crowded valleys and busy roads but so do the Pyrenees, see Andorra for example. Just like the Pyrenees, the Alps have plenty of wilder corners with roads that werent built by bulldozers to pave access to a ski resort in the 1970s too.Only the Tour is often a poor prism to refract this back to TV audiences and this televisual psychogeography can distort the views.This weekends stage to Alpe dHuez is interesting as the main climb has As-Seen-On-TV celebrity but the Col de Sarenne gets some limelight, in part to persuade visiting cyclists to stay and try more roads in the area. If the Sarenne is rewarding for the scenery and solitude it still begins on the busy Col du Lautaret main road by the industrial Chambon dam.There are plenty of quiet valleys in the Alps that offer tourists plenty of rural charm, cyclists get empty, irregular climbs and residents struggle to access public services just like the Pyrenean clichs too. But these parts dont host the race often, if at all and as a result dont seem to exist among the mythology of cycling locations.Todays stage passes many of these quieter corners. It rides into the Vercors, a spectacular part of the Alps, or pre-Alps if youre a stickler for geology but only via a main road up and then back down rather than any of the spectacular cliff-hugging roads but it could still look good on TV. The Vercors has featured in the Tour but rarely. It is a quiet place, no mass tourism ski resorts and plenty of roads that started out as smuggling trails or forestry paths and then gradually got tarmacked. Once the race quits the Vercors itll take the training roads of Paul Magnier.Nearby is another corner of the Alps called the Trives which offers wide open spaces in the mountains and little in the way of mass tourism nor industry although it does now have a relatively new autoroute. Motorists have to pay but they get their moneys worth with the views along the way.Later in the stage is the Champsaur, another corner of the Alps often passed by in the Tour. But illustrative as the race finishes in Orcires-Merlette, the name of the ski resort. Merlette with its apartment tower blocks is the aberration, but because the Tour visits its easy to remember this rather than all the side roads and smaller passes not seen on TV.Indeed rather than juxtapose, if the Tour doesnt show off all the Alps, it doesnt do the Pyrenees justice either. It sticks to familiar haunts like the Tourmalet, Aspin and Soulor passes. If Gavarnie was a novelty this year its just at the foot of the Tourmalet. So a similar selection bias is evident as the wilder parts of the Pyrenees dont and even cant host the race very often. This years stage to Les Angles touched on a relatively unexplored part of the eastern Pyrenees for the Tour but the race did not stay to explore more. Similarly western parts in the Basque Country are even more unknown to the Tour despite having some of the hardest climbs in France, something that ought to be a draw for the organisers. But these areas are relatively remote.Logistics play a big part. Alpe dHuez can host 23 teams with their 28 bed allocation and supply parking to the fleet of vehicles every team brings. So can the city of Pau but it means the Tour struggles to reach smaller places.One nerdy point on how Tour stages are hosted these days is that increasingly its a regional effort. Rather than one host town taking on all the costs, departments and regions are sharing the burden. This means a small and relatively poor town could get to host the race if theres something to gain for the wider region. So the Col de Mhatch, aka Artazamundi could feature one day if the Pyrenees-Atlantique council wanted to promote what many forums say is hardest tarmacked road pass in France.And yes theres more beyond France for the Alps and Pyrenees but thats beyond a postcard from the Tour de France. But it does speak to the relative size of these mountain ranges, the Alps by virtue of being bigger in France offer a lot that goes unseen.Todays intermediate sprint in Corps comes a relatively flat part of the stage. But turn left and theres the Col de lHomme and beyond to the Notre Dame de la Salette sanctuary, perhaps too sacred for the profanity of sports event and never seen on TV at the Tour but rewarding for travellers.The post Postcard from the Champsaur first appeared on The Inner Ring.

The Tour heads into the Alps for a ski station summit finish. Tadej Pogaar got beaten the last time the race came here and he remembers it but this should be for the breakaways given the bigger Alpine stages to come.Classique du Dauphin: the Tour de France is many things and among them a game of musical chairs. Come the third week and the music plays louder as riders and teams get desperate for a seat and this is not limited to small teams and unheralded riders. If anything theyre the ones already beaten down and struggling to find an opening. So a humdrum transition stage comes alive with plenty of big names making moves. The top-10 to come was worthy of a classic but the race was even better as everyone had to make their moves from the start and keep going.With the Col des Prs and the Alpine part of the stage done the moves kept going against a backdrop of scenic lakes and mountains on the roads of the ancient Dauphin region.We got an early split in the field with Pogaar, Evenepoel and Seixas in a front group with Del Toro and others on the wrong side but it came to nothing, UAE behind were willing chasers only they did not have to as more waves of riders tried to get clear.With groups of riders spread like confetti over the course a group of five went clear with Jasper Stuyven, Ben Healy, Mads Pedersen, Felix Engelgardt and Edward Planckaert. Pedersen won the intermediate sprint and but with Planckaert playing policeman for Mathieu van der Poel and Jasper Philipsen, Stuyven attacked with 25km to go and he was looking good for the stage win but behind a larger group swept up the quartet hed distance which in turn was caught by more and so a 50 rider group was bearing down on Stuyven and crucially with several helpers working for their sprinters.The moves kept going, the group was hard to control and the last one saw Josh Tarling try a flyer in the streets of Voiron. He was closed down and we got a sprint with Mathieu van der Poel able to lead-out Jasper Philipsen and he pulled his team mate clear of the rest to leave Philipsen well clear of Mauro Schmid and Olav Kooij.For Adam Yates the stage in the Isre rhymed with misre, thanks to illness. He was dropped and at times seemed to struggle to turn the pedals but made the time cut. The big question is whether he can recover.Someone more happy was Jordan Jegat, 9th in the morning at over 22 minutes with several riders not far behind on time. He infiltrated the breakaway and thanks the time gain of almost nine minutes finished the day still 9th overall but now 14 minutes while other top-10 contenders were behind.The points competition comes alive with Pedersen in green but now only seven points ahead of Jasper Philipsen who narrowed the gap with 50 points for the stage win; Lidl-Trek will be ruing how things turned out as Pedersen at one point looked like he was a contender to win the stage and Philipsen was out of the picture; although he was never distanced and Pedersen was sapped. Theres a contest and Pedersen is forced to go raiding for fear of losing out in Paris where the finish is a 50-pointer and the intermediate sprint on the Champs-Elyses could be crucial too.The Route: 185km and 3,900m of climbing. Theres 20km on the flat until the race first goes up the road up to Lans via Engins, its not the most scenic road into the Vercors and 11.4km at 5.4% sounds gentle for a first category climb, it is especially as its an even climb up, but its a big prize for the mountains competition, a carrot to move early.Once out of the Vercors and past the town of Vif theres barely a flat road as the race heads for the Champsaur area of the Alps and then onto Orcires.The Finish: a ski station summit finish that was long heralded thanks to the Tour stage in 1971 where Luis Ocaa got the better of Eddy Merckx for once, and by eight minutes. However the race came back in 2020 and a headwind saw the lead contenders huddle between the hairpins and it turned out that the history books and magazine articles supplied more thrill than the days sport. Its still a summit finish but a gradual and even one, all on a wide road.The Contenders: Tadej Pogaar (UAE) came here in 2020 and was beaten in the finish by his senior Primo Rogli, something he evoked on TV after Stage 17 so he may wish to correct the record but at the same time in his interview he said the focus is on Alpe dHuez. Still he gets a chainring because if the breakaway cant get clear, then why not gobble up another stage?Otherwise the breakaway has a great chance, the GC contenders and their teams will want to save energy ahead of the two stages to Alpe dHuez. The summit finish means the stage is almost reserved for a climber, or someone capable of a 20 minute effort uphill.Richard Carapaz (EF) will get tipped for the next three stages and even if he wins here hell be a pick again and hes after the mountains competition too. Ditto Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-Quickstep). Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X) and Einer Rubio (Movistar) were on the move in the Vosges and should feature again but dont have the same finishing kick to deliver a win.Two new names for the breakaway are Sep Kuss and Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-LAB) now they dont have a leader to work for. Thymen Arensman (Netcompany-Ineos) is better suited to the bigger mountains to come but has been trying already, if he can make the winning move his challenge is find a way to win from it.Finally Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) keeps making the breakaway and if this poses a problem for both the GC contenders and the breakaway hes likely to keep trying.CarapazVP-P, Kuss, Arensman, PidcockPogaar, Jorgenson, THJ, Tejada, Healy, RubioWeather: 27C and sunny. A light 10km/h NW breeze means a tailwind for much of the stage.TV: KM0 is at 12.50 and the finish is forecast for 5.15pm CEST.The post Tour de France Stage 18 Preview first appeared on The Inner Ring.

Eight teams have a stage win, 14 dont and this should make for a lively start as this is the last stage open to half the peloton.Contre la montre: the stage win for Remco Evenepoel who blitzed the course, only Tadej Pogaar was within a minute of him and he seemed untouchable from the first time check that he was against the clock rather than his rivals, a quest to find the biggest winning margin.Yes this is his speciality but the margin of victory was big. With Switzerland on the horizon with its watchmakers he looked as precise as some of the timepieces made nearby. His confidence is growing and well see where he takes this in the mountains, moments of being dropped at Le Lioran and on the Col du Haag feel distant but they occurred after multiple, sustained climbs and theres plenty of that to come.Any cheer for Red Bull was muted by Florian Lipowitz crashing, washing out on a bend in the streets of Thonon and sliding into the kerb first, then some padded barriers. He is out of the Tour now with a broken collarbone. Thats two GC contenders out in two days of racing.Mattias Skjelmose was the surprise of the day. Hes always been handy a hilly time trial but he beat expectations, including his own but more so as his team mate Juan Ayuso was 15th and this puts the Dane within a minute on GC now of his colleague but he says the plan is still to ride for Ayuso.Paul Seixas was fourth, easy to bank as unsurprising but astonishing for a teenager. He pipped Isaac Del Toro by five seconds whose strong ride reinforces his stage racing credentials, a potential weakness overcome. The battle ahead for the third podium spot and the white jersey should be something to watch.The Route: 175km and 2,200m of vertical gain. A scenic start after KM0 to past the Bourget lake and then the road climbs to the Massif des Bauges, part of the Alps. It looks the part with jagged peaks below which dairy cows sport clanging bells, only just no steep Alpine passes here, this is a gentle and more approach into the mountains, climbing up alongside a white river to get into the mountains. The descent is steeper and trickier, via a small rise, and takes the race back to the start in Chambry.The rest of the course is on rolling roads. The Col de Couz is a mountain pass inside a valley but a gentle one. Approaching Voiron theres a final climb of 1.6km at 4% on a wide road.The Finish: big boulevards in town and in the final kilometre theres a 90 right bend, 90 to the left and then a 90 to the right. Its the same as the 2019 Dauphin where Wout van Aert took his first World Tour level road race win.The Contenders: a big day for the breakaway. If this was the first week it could be for the sprinters but desperation means too many riders and teams will fight to get something from this Tour. The Tour is so important this kind of attitude ought to be the default from Day 1 but its human nature to start with plans and then if these fail try anything. Also a lot of riders are tired which makes things harder to control, plus with Tim Merlier out of the race, one of the two prime teams that chased wont do so either.If Wout van Aert has won in Voiron before, so canMathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-PremierTech). Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) is another obvious pick, able to make moves at the start and then at the finish, while also able to win from any kind of sprint and he is also boosted by a very strong team that can shape the race, Quinn Simmons and Mathias Vacek are candidates too but can set up their leader for the win.When Mauro Schmid (Jayco) won the stage he brought down the average number of pro wins for a stage winner as hed only won 13 races before compared to 72 wins but the quality came from having Luke Plapp, Ben OConnor and Michael Matthews assist him. He can do the same again and Matthews is a contender too.Visma-LAB are stage hunting now and Victor Campenaerts has won Tour stages in the third week.Breakaway specialists Kasper Asgreen (EF) and Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X) should be in the mix but making the move and winning from it is a big ask.Romain Grgoire (Groupama-FDJ) seems ideal for the stage but has been trying to recover after suffering on the early stages so a harder pick. Likewise Dorian Godon (Netcompany-Ineos) was suited to this on paper but he has been struggling from injuries after being caught up in the crash among sprinters in Chalon-sur-Sane which he probably shouldnt have been contesting and if hes on the mend hes a harder pick now but team mate Filippo Ganna can try.A sprint can still happen, in part because so many teams could ride each other down and any gruppetto forming early has a chance to get back. So Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-PremierTech), Biniam Girmay (NSN) and Olav Kooij (Decathlon-CMA CGM) have a chance with Philipsen in the best place given Merlier is out.Van der Poel, PedersenSimmons, PhilipsenGanna, Campenaerts, Asgreen, Kanter, MatthewsWeather: sunny and 29C. A 10km/h breeze from the north could gust to 35km/h.TV: KM0 is at 1.35pm and the finish is forecast for 5.20pm CEST. The start should frantic.The post Tour de France Stage 17 Preview first appeared on The Inner Ring.