https://www.telegraaf.nl/...blijvers-in-dauphine

Terrible hail today: look at what it did to the guy on the left. The guy on the right is Toni Martin who got an inflatable boat to protect himself. It seems that it did not help him missing the time limit.

Froome hanging off the back on the climb up Madeleine today:

Question answered!! TJV looked amazing!! Sepp and Primoz rocked the last few K's. Froome has got some work to do for sure. Has me wondering if he'll even be on the TDF squad.
Lets see what the next few days bring.

what a nice ride by formolo today. i really enjoyed watching the last climb, seeing if he could stay away. good stuff.

roglic looks really, really good. so does TJV as a whole. Can't wait to keep watching the dauphine stages

Well with Froome in 60th place in the Dauphine, he can be a mid pack domestique. I can't see how he magically gains enough fitness in 2.5 weeks to be a team leader of any kind. The first week of the TdF out of Nice is full gas in the mountains. Seems like he can go to the TdF for training for the Giro while being TdF waterboy.

Awesome race by Formolo....and Jumbo, hopefully they are not peaking early. Dumoulin dropped in the final few km and Thomas quite a ways out. Nice to see Quintana hang till the very final few meters when Roglic put the hammer down. I am not sure why Roglic is putting the hammer down now. He needs to put the hammer down in 5 weeks from now. I get that he was trying for time bonuses, but still seems like he is burning some matches that may be needed in 5 weeks.

I doubt he’ll be selected. Even though he could be useful as “the weakest link” on Ineos, I doubt he’ll want to do it, when Thomas won, he was at least a contender. Even if he’s riding as per his plan, he’ll simply not be ready for. Thomas Will be selected, But he won’t be a contender - he looks heavy. Ineos wants to win the tour with Bernal and in my eyes he’s the favourite - i Think roglic Will peak too early, so surely there’s no room for someone focussing on another race, the tour is not a race where you prepare for somthing else. Froome May be ready for the Vuelta, But I doubt we’ll se him on the podium in a GT ever again. At this point, I don’t see him playing a role in the Giro. Maybe next year, But he’s too old, not really comparable injuries, But look where wout Van aert is right now compared to Froome. Froome simply isn’t recovering fast enough.

I don't ever want to miss an opportunity to post this pic of me fitting Davide Formolo back when he was on Slipstream. I could try and couch this is some term of reference that's relevant to the thread - like saying "he didn't blink or gasp as much during the fit as he did in that last 5k today" but that would be disingenuous.[/url][url=https://flic.kr/p/2jwot8s]Cannondale_Fit_Formolo[/url] by [url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/184351070@N02/]Ian Murray[/url], on Flickr[/img]

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Ian Murray
http://www.TriathlonTrainingSeries.com
I like the pursuit of mastery
Twitter - @TriCoachIan

I wonder how much of a beating Chris' organs all took during his recovery process from a near life threatening thing. We all look at orthopedic injuries as if that's what's the limiter, but on the bike with the super low forces involved, its almost never muscular skeletal, and certainly in stage races its mainly about the person with the best cardio vascular system who can rebuild their body all day during today's stage and after today's stage for tomorrow's stage. Froome's organs may just not be able to do it yet (or again).

Heh heh

That’s what Jiffy bags and inhalers are for...

Well, this thread is over. Bernal abandon. Back injury.

WTF....he sounded fine in his interview last night on Flobikes (just saying that Jumbo was the strongest).

haha....well the Blue train also had moto man!!!

All joking aside, this Daphine is really interesting, in the sense with form all over the map, but maybe Ineos will not need to make their make their marginal gains. With Kreuswijk out from a crash and Roglic totally banged up now, maybe Bernal's forced taper from this back tightness puts Ineos back on top for the TdF.

So one moment we feel its over then we have Bernal tapering for TdF while Jumbo bangs themselves up and Thomas will go on the cabbage and water diet and magically show up 5 kilos lighter to the TdF

Sounds like Pinot had a fall today too. Maybe Bernal knew something about today's stage?

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"Human existence is based upon two pillars: Compassion and knowledge. Compassion without knowledge is ineffective; Knowledge without compassion is inhuman." Victor Weisskopf.

What a day of carnage. Pinot, Roglic both crashed but finished, Bernal does not start and Kriusjwijk crashed out. Thomas 16 minutes off the back and Froome 27.

Eight riders in a 35 second time band with the top two banged up

1ROGLIČ PrimožTeam Jumbo-Visma17:45:322PINOT ThibautGroupama - FDJ0:143MARTIN GuillaumeCofidis, Solutions Crédits0:244LANDA MikelBahrain - McLaren0:265MARTÍNEZ Daniel FelipeEF Pro Cycling0:266LÓPEZ Miguel ÁngelAstana Pro Team0:327QUINTANA NairoTeam Arkéa Samsic0:358PORTE RichieTrek - Segafredo0:35

Is Stephen Kruijswijk (thank heavens thats in my dictionary) out of the tour? Not knowing anything myself about dislocated shoulders and their effect on a cyclist (id assume there was one).

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Dan Mayberry
Amateur a lot of things, professional a few things.

His team manager was still hoping he can be ready for the TdF in a post race interview today. Let's see.

Roglic DNS this morning at Dauphine. Needs to recovery for TdF and too banged up from yesterday's crash.

Pinot is now race leader starting today's stage, with 7 others within 20 seconds of each other.

The win may not come from yesterday's top 7. The breakaway is way up the road. Martinez virtual leader with 2 min up on Bardet and Dumoulin in 2nd and 3rd. Sepp Kuss should try to slow this breakaway down to allow Tom D back further to close the gap.

After 400+ days off no racing Dumoulin is coming back strong. He's with Pinot....Pinot needs to close around 30 seconds on the final climb today to take the Dauphine.

Well that was a another wild ride at the 2020 Tour de poo-show. A lot of guys who were 3rd or 4th of the team depth chart ended up leading after 5 days of racing.

Gutsy race from Martinez. This might be his first win as a ProTour rider, but I can't imagine even his mom putting a $1 bet on him to win, place, or show. The bookies made out like bandits on this race.

They give George Bennett the week off and he takes a win and second place. Kuss tows Roglic around all week and still crushes everyone on the last day. Tom D coming back from the wilderness. The depth at Jumbo is crazy while Ineos looks like they could be schooled by a Conti Pro team.. G. Martin looks like he is going to fold on the last day and hangs on for 3rd.

The Tour is looking like it will be crazy. Just imagine 4 times as many stages and everyone TRYING to bring their A-game.

The green jersey competition might be interesting for the first time in a long time. WvA might not get any leash if J-V is in the GC hunt, but I think he'd easily take Sagan right now if he was taken off the chain.

I think the person everyone needs to be worried about is Tom D...after 400+ days of no racing he just kept getting stronger every day. 2.5 weeks from now in the mountains outside Nice, we should have a good view of how well he is rolling and how good Roglic can recover.

Also with no Dylan G on the Jumbo Visma team, WvA does not have that additional baggage in terms of chasing stage wins in the sprints....but hopefully Jumbo Visma utilized WvA for GC protection, not doing the Zabel + Ullrich "get both green and yellow" strategy.

On the original topic, Bernal "hurt", Thomas and Froome not on form yet, and Sivakov crashed today. That's a different team going into this TdF than previous years.