Intermediate sprints and the green jersey

TheBigBean

What do intermediate sprints have to do with the green jersey? I'd always thought that the green jersey was for the most consistently placed finisher

Once upon a time there was a separate red jersey for the catch sprints which sort of made sense as it rewarded riders who consistently made breaks, but it was removed on the grounds there were too many jerseys. Why can't they just offer prizes for the intermediate sprints to encourage breakways, but without affecting any overall competition. They could even sponsor them and have a selection of random prizes.

Any thoughts?

Pokerface

Green jersey is a points jersey. Simple as that. And they give out POINTS at the intermediate sprints also.

So it's really for the most consistent RIDER on flatter stages - not just a FINISHER.

jibberjim

TheBigBean wrote:

Why can't they just offer prizes for the intermediate sprints to encourage breakways, but without affecting any overall competition. They could even sponsor them and have a selection of random prizes.

I would very much oppose this, it makes stages even more dull and predictable - break goes in the first 5km, 15km if it's enough teams deem it important to be in the break for sponsorship reasons but really nothing to do with actual racing.

The break and bunch ride tempo for a few hours in a game of bluff - how slow can the break ride and still be given a good gap by the bunch. Then the sprinters teams decide to pull back the break and we get a sprint.

With meaningful sprint bonuses in the middle of stages, more of the stage has to be raced, which may lead to more interesting racing. I'd like to see decent bonus seconds on early hills available to the GC guys too...

TheBigBean

jibberjim wrote:

Then the sprinters teams decide to pull back the break and we get a sprint.
/quote]

They almost always do this for the stage win and not for the points. I can't imagine that the sprinters' teams will try to pull back a break just to sprint for intermediate points. So all that will happen is that there will be a sprint in the peleton for whatever placing is available when they come to it (slight excitement), and the breakaway will treat it as something completely irrelevant to them - just as they currently do.

It might help Thor in the mountains though which could prove interesting for as long as he is riding. Still, I'm all for a non-sprinter winning the green jersey, but just think it should be based on finishing well on the mountain stage, not just riding up one mountain quickly and then joining the bus.