Saturday 19: 12:00β12:15 β 17:05β17:45
The second and last mountain stage in the PyrΓ©nΓ©es. A flat start, and then a hell of 4 passes in a row with little (false) flat in between, starting with the Tourmalet and including climbing Peyresourde again from the same side (not sure Evenepoel will fancy coming back on this slope!).
Weather shall be significantly cooler than on the previous days, and it should be drizzling.
Beware: the stage starts earlier than usual (still not in the morning, though).
It's going to be quite funny watching the sprinters go for that intermediate but then immediately have to tackle the Tourmalet. I wonder if they'll try to get up the road in a break before the sprint, so they have a buffer on the first climb and can take it a bit easier.
I suppose so. The way I see it, there should be a large and long breakaway today, so anyway sprinters wishing to score points would need to get into the breakaway (and with the long flat start, they have it comparatively easy).
GG gaps are such that even guys ranked 10^th^ in the general classification (14 minutes behind) might already be allowed to join the breakaway and win the stage. 12^th^ is 20 minutes behind. Even Johannessen, ranked 8^th^ is more than 10 minutes behind the leader (but only 3 minutes behind the podium, though).
Well, we already got the first part wrong π
No one managed to break away on the flat. They were a number of attempts, but almost everyone seemed powerless compared to the previous breakaway days.
Well to be fair to us, Milan did try!
Yes, he tried, but nobody joined him when he was waiting for more riders. Nevertheless, the consequences of no early breakaway were: 1. no gap for the breakaway before the Tourmalet, 2. a different composition of the breakaway, only climbers.
Point #2 should have been an advantage for the breakaway, but there again, everyone in the breakaway seemed a bit powerless, a bit sleepy. Except for L. Martinez, nobody made a great impression in the first climb(s) like it is sometimes the case before failing in the end (and that was the expected fate for Martinez given his previous stages). Arensman played his card later, others just had no card to play (Johannessen tried, though).
Looking at the conditions so far, I think your prediction of a breakaway win has more going for it. UAE might not consider another stage win as worth the risk on these downhill sections, it looks quite dangerous out there.
L. Martinez did a peculiarly bad descent of the Tourmalet, staying too upright on his bike for his own good (and for the good of his trajectories). Hard to say from TV cameras whether the fog played a role in that.