Yeah cobbles are ridiculous in grand tours

It would also be nice if everyone else in the peleton stopped riding for Pogacar

What an insane stage, god I love cobblestones, as brutal as they are.

That being said I was obviously hoping it would be Pogacar and not Jumbo who suffered, but the cobbles don't care and Pogacar proves once again that he is unstoppable.

van Aert's superhuman effort saves both Vingegaard and his own jersey (I think?), but Roglic has probably just lost any chance he had of winning the race, it will be Vingegaard or bust now. Ben O'Connor will be having nightmares about cobblestones for a while.

Insanely unlucky for Jumbo all things considered

I like cobbles bringing some chaos into the race, it fits the spirit of cycling and the brutality and ruthlessness of a race imo. Plenty of races are decided by crashes and punctures or bad luck already, cobbles just doubles it. I like that there is a cobble stage once every 3-5 years to create some chaos, but I can understand why people would feel differently.

Obviously it's not just the RNG I like, otherwise a lot of silly ideas would work just as well, but cobble stages are also almost always some of the most interesting ones to watch.

We ran pretty bad this time with the main favorite being the "luckiest" and Roglic losing minutes, but if it had been the other way around this would have set up greatly for the mountains.

Yeah it was a bad day, but considering how bad it looked at one point, they stopped the bleeding fairly well (obviously not for Roglic, but one team can only save so many captains).

I'm happy about van Aert keeping the yellow after his monumental effort today, he deserves it.

Roglic is saying he dislocated his shoulder, sat on a spectator's chair to pop it back in, what a badass

also don't be this idiot

Did it help Pogacar just to be out there alone rather than be caught up in this team strategy racing that Roglic was part of?

I don't follow why you'd think that, Roglic crashed over Ewan who crashed over a hay bale that was pulled onto the street by the camera moto, it had nothing to do with team strategy. Having team mates around whose only job is to help you is pure upside and I absolutely think Vingegaard would have lost a lot more than 13 seconds to Pogacar yesterday if it wasn't for van Aert.
Pogacar looks like he doesn't need it because he is that good and on top of that appears to have some god given plot armor but if something went wrong for him he'd be happy to have teammates around to give him a bike and help him chase back.

Pogacar wins the first climb finish in convincing fashion.

Tomorrow will probably be a similar story, except I expect him to gain more time on the other favorites.

Who's left now that are still in a position in the race and motivation to beat him? He could win by a record breaking time gap over his opponents in this year's tour.

I guess if Jumbo Visma and Ineos team up and take turns attacking him, they would have a chance. Reality every year is that teams don't want to risk their podium position, so often they end up defending a 2nd or 3rd spot.

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I'm equal parts impressed by Vingegaard and frustrated that Pogacar just ****ing does it anyways.

atta boy Wout

who the hell was that Bora guy setting the pace on the climb and why??

It was Konrad, presumably they thought Vlasov had a chance today for some reason?

The overhead shot today was awesome, van Aert looked to be on a completely different level to everyone else.

Pog is just a straight up killer. Refuses not to fight for every place, every day.

He can honestly break every record for Tour wins and stage wins if he stays healthy.

WvA incredible but man that power Pogacar has is so impressive. He was a beat slow reacting to the attack but was back in front in a flash.

I expect to see the frequency of Pogacar stage podiums to go down a lot from now. Planche de Belles Filles was a target for him because he announced his cancer foundation that day and his parents and fiance were there so he put his team to work hard but it costs UAE too much energy to do that often. On future mountain stages UAE should be doing the more typical thing of letting the break have their fun as long as GC is not in danger. I wouldn't be surprised if Pogacar is targeting another stage later in the race though, L'Alpe d'Huez maybe? That would certainly be a statement win.

Yesterday and on stage 6 other teams brought back the break and he will of course fight for the win in that scenario since only employing a few guys in the finale costs a lot less energy. These were special circumstances of small break + sprinty uphill finish though and I think in the actual mountain stages that would probably have to happen as a side effect of the other teams riding hard to put pressure on UAE and Pogacar.

He can but we're so far away from that. He's won 3 stages in each of the last 2 years and 2 so far this year. On this pace he'll need another 9 years to break the stage record (Merckx and Cavendish are on 34 each), that's such a long way to go and a lot can happen in that time. 5 Tour wins is a lot closer though.

Why do riders, eg Ben O'Connor, carry on riding when they're clearly ****ed

They can't contribute to their teams and it can't be optimal training efforts or recovery either. I would've thought they should abandon, take a few days rest and get a couple of training blocks in and re-eval future race plans?

Chapeau Jungels

I think it's 2 reasons, first being that it's the Tour de France and riders really want to finish the Tour de France. The second is the hope that you can recover enough to contribute later in the race.

I'm a casual fan that pays attention to biking once a year. What percentage of them are doping? How many of the top 5/10/20? Is it generally accepted that everyone is?

Regardless of those answers, is there a consensus on why is Pogacar so much better than everyone else? Better doping protocols or some other factor? I primarily ask because it is wild to me that 2 of the best in the world both come from Slovenia, population ~2 million. Or is this like good runners coming out of Kenya?

I'm no expert but I think this is spot on. Pride, and the belief that you may be able to play some role before the Tour is over. Which is certainly possible, even if you're just another body blocking the wind on the flats.

But it's game over for O'Connor. Too bad.

Bring on the BIG MOUNTAINS

Pretty sad cant even watch the tour here in Canada no one broadcasts it

surely there's a streaming service you can find?