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5 days of racing, including one Time Trial, for this class Pro stage race.
Winners of previous editions were Hirschi🇨🇭, Tiberi🇮🇹 and McNulty🇺🇸. None of them is coming.
Van der Poel (🇳🇱 Alpecin) is coming back to the road. Will he be active or just training for the World Championship?
Here is the general map. As you can see, Luxembourg is small, and each stage is already almost a Tour of Luxembourg 🙂
Stage 1: Wednesday 16
158 km, D+ 2400 m
It can’t be seen on the stage profile, but the last 250 m are uphill. There is also a sort of hairpin to cross the river a bit after the flamme rouge.
Stage 2: Thursday 17
167 km, D+ 2000 m
The last 30 km are on a circuit (2.5 laps).
Stage 3: Friday 18
179 km, D+ 3000 m
The last 30 km are again on a circuit (2 laps), a very hilly one.
Stage 4: Saturday 19
20 km, D+ 350 m, ITT
There is a 1 mile climb after 4 km, half of which is around 10% steep. Then very light hills, and then a mini wall followed by an uphill false flat after 14 km. On reaches the line after a 2 km long descent.
Stage 5: Sunday 20
177 km, D+ 2900 m
Guess what? The last 30 km are on a circuit (a bit more than 2 laps), very hilly again.
Stage 1: Wednesday 16
158 km, D+ 2400 m
It can’t be seen on the stage profile, but the last 250 m are uphill. There is also a sort of hairpin to cross the river a bit after the flamme rouge.
Van der Poel (🇳🇱 Alpecin) attacked in the Stafelter climb 10 km from the line. Only 1 guy, a young German from Lotto’s devo, Eike Behrens🇩🇪, stuck to his wheel. Van der Poel🇳🇱 kept on pushing after the top for several miles, but as Behrens🇩🇪 refused to pass any kind of relay, Van der Poel🇳🇱 ultimately gave up as the peloton was closing in.
Yet, in the final climb, he managed to beat Gautherat (🇫🇷 Decathlon). Not by much, and it wasn’t easy for him after his previous effort and then the need to remain well positioned in the 4 (?) km he ‘rested’ in the peloton. The Frenchman had probably started his effort a little bit too soon. Van den Berg (🇳🇱 EF) also came back close.
Based on the result and his attacks, it looks like Van der Poel is here to win, not just as a training session.
In fact, one may even reckon that his stopping his attack can be seen as even more significant: he gave himself a last chance to win in the sprint to come, instead of keeping on pushing in order to train in solo efforts.
Today, he could have called it a day too when he was in a bad split, and rested for a stage victory tomorrow; but he had his team chase in order to stick with other GC guys (well, of course, this choice allowed him to stay in the race for today’s stage victory today too).
Stage 2: Thursday 17
167 km, D+ 2000 m
The last 30 km are on a circuit (2.5 laps).
There was quite a lot of action today.
50 km from the line, Coloquick launched a team attack; their 2 guys managed to close the 1′–1′30″ gap with the breakaway where they already had 1 guy.
After the bonus sprint, the 3 Coloquick dropped everyone else in the breakaway!
Around 20-22 km from the line, Soudal-QS accelerated at the front of the peloton and created splits. Van der Poel (🇳🇱 Alpecin), stuck behind, had to wear out his teammates and work himself to form the peloton again.
1 or 2 miles later, 4 men from different Word Teams broke away. At 13 km from the line, 3 moved back to the peloton, leaving Honoré (🇩🇰 EF) look for a contract alone 🙂
The Coloquick fellows were caught 10 km from the line, as there was a series of attacks at the front the peloton, often by Lidl-Trek riders.
Finally, S. Kragh (🇩🇰 Lidl-Trek) and Vercher (🇫🇷 Total) managed to break away. The Frenchman looked ‘busy’ in the Dane’s wheel all along but he still instantly took every relay the Dane asked.
The peloton chase was successively led by single riders from various teams: Alpecin → Soudal-QS → EF → UAE, and they caught the duo just before the flamme rouge.
The final part was made of uphill false flats section: a steeper one until 400-500 m, a flatter one until 200 m and a steeper one again. I mean, the steeper ones were not as steep as yesterday’s. Van der Poel🇳🇱 launched his sprint from a good position at the right time (around 150 m), but he couldn’t take over many riders and was probably taken over by one or two, and only finished 5th, as Van den Berg (🇳🇱 EF), 3rd yesterday, scored his first victory this year, allowing him to take the leader jersey as well.
Gautherat (🇫🇷 Decathlon) makes it onto the stage podium again, thus takes 2nd place in GC.
A Coloquick rider (Haugsted🇩🇰) had sprinted to get time bonus at the I.S. He managed to stay in the peloton and stick to the first part before the split, so he is close to GC top-10 now.
Coloquick riders also occupy the first 2 position in the Mountain classification. (BTW, all climbs bring the same amount of points, but the number of climbs differs from stage to stage: tomorrow there are plenty, 3 in the first two thirds of the race, and 5 in the last quarter!)
Stage 3: Friday 18
179 km, D+ 3000 m
The last 30 km are again on a circuit (2 laps), a very hilly one.
I had a hard time understanding the situation when I switched the TV on, then I slept through several parts, while there was a lot of action, so my account will be short, coarse and unreliable.
I think the two main points of today could be:
- The peloton was unable to control the breakaway; the gap was growing, there were counter-attacks, but pulling was irregular for long periods of time and inefficient for others (EF).
- When the gap reached 2 minutes, Visma had Piganzoli🇮🇹 break away from the peloton; several Visma riders successively let themselves drop from the breakaway, in order to help him at different cleverly chosen points; the manoeuvre was a success! Directors seem to have finally mastered this tactic, as we could see on the Tour of Spain.
Reinderink (🇳🇱 Soudal-QS) left a few miles from the line and the Total/Visma trio behind him never managed to catch him.
Arrieta🇪🇸 was UAE’s card, he tried but he dropped a couple of times.
A lot of gaps were created today, there are not 2 riders in the GC time!
Van der Poel was unable to follow the attacks, and he arrived in a group at 7 minutes… Same thing for other leaders from yesterday.
Now it is Piganzoli🇮🇹 who leads GC, followed by the two Total riders who arrived with him and Reinderink🇳🇱: Gachignard🇫🇷 and Vercher🇫🇷.
Everyday, yellow cards are handed on this race, the local commissars love to punish the position of riders on their bike. I don’t know whether it is warranted or not, but they act differently than on other races.
MVDP! MVDP! Incredible way to finish it out. Wasn’t in GC contention so he just went for it.
