Is A Schleck gonna blow the race apart today ?

moray_gub

He will never get a better chance to do so and set up a TDF win he has had a good 10 days with no real drama to speak of and his team look really strong. Several of his podium rivals have abandoned his main rival pre race has a gammy knee and he looks like his best form is somewhere else. Probably his main rival is Evans and he is a better climber than him and Cadel always seems to have one howler of a day in the mountains so this could his best chance to stamp some authority on the race..............if he cant show up to the party now he never will.

verylonglegs

He'd be a fool not to test Contador today given the well publicised problems about his knee but I doubt he's going to go too deep into the red and bury himself on the very first mountain stage.

RowCycle

andyjr

Yep he'll blow it all apart, then stop and wait for Frank to catch up

Vino2007

I've hopefully timed it right. I shall have some trance playing in the background hopefully with a crescendo just as he launches an attack with frank as Voigt peels off in agony. Shall be magic.

Monty Zoncolan

Good question. in a sense he doesn't need to as he has a lead on Contador, although yes some of that may get eaten up in a time trial. He may well smell blood if Contador seems to be struggling today and go for it, but I can see somethign similar to last year's first mountain stage (can't recall name) where he went for it, but very close to the summit.

dougzz

If Contador's knee is healing, and his fitness is not affected by the Giro then today is the day to go, Bertie's knee may get better rather than worse.

Bronzie

Monty Zoncolan wrote:

Good question. in a sense he doesn't need to as he has a lead on Contador.

If I was Schleckette, I'd be more worried about Evans (and maybe to a lesser extent Klodi, Tony Martin and Peter Velits) for the time being. They'll all wipe the floor with him in the TT unless he has a decent buffer.

LeicesterLad

Schleck? Blow a race apart?

bet he chuggs up the mountains holding hands with frank clinging onto somebody else's wheel. YAWN.

calvjones

No.

Next question.

StageWinner

I know everyone thinks Andy is a giant wheelsucker - but didn't he at least try to attack over and over last year? It's not his fault that Contador was able to match him every time.

He's not an explosive rider. But I don't think he's JUST a wheelsucker either.

If he has the chance to ride Bertie off his wheel today, I'm sure he'll take it.

edhornby

I don't think anyone will 'blow it apart' per se but this will be the first big GC selection, so we will see Cadel, AS, FS, Bertie, menchov etc all storming up in a group and dropping as many people as possible - with Voeckler hanging on for grim death

paggnr

Cadel will blow it apart if anyone does

jonginge

Ah, menchov the silent (and absent) killer

Gingerflash

I agree with Edhornby.

The first mountain stage will separate the real GC contenders from the rest. I doubt any of them will make any significant gains on the others.

However, my feeling is that Frank is stronger this year than Andy and I wouldn't be surprised to see him win the whole thing.

I also agree that Contador probably should be attacked today IF he's having knee trouble, but I believe that's been exaggerated firstly by him and latterly by the media. He seemed to be downplaying it more recently.

galatzo

It'd be nice to see the race "blown apart" but no one seems to attack until the last couple of KMs anymore. I'd love to see someone go at the start of the final climb and try to rip the others legs off but neither of the Schlecks are gonna risk that.

OffTheBackAdam

Nothing will happen with the main protagonists, until the last climb.