Vuelta 2018, Stage 21: Alcorcón > Madrid - 100,9 km *Spoilers*

mrfpb

This is my second time watching the (highlights of the) final stage, and yes it is boring. The "dead" corners killed the race and the points competition is a bit of a joke, as all the intermediate sprints seem to be between two mountains, so a GC contender tends to get the jersey. At least last year Froome was willing to attack on the last day to defend the green jersey. This year the red and green jerseys seemed lost in the crowd.

dabber

T de F 1989... Final stage, Fignon starts ITT with 50 second advantage over Lemon and ends up losing to Lemond by 8 seconds. A bit more interesting and tense than the usual snoozefest.

Pross

Dabber wrote:

T de F 1989... Final stage, Fignon starts ITT with 50 second advantage over Lemon and ends up losing to Lemond by 8 seconds. A bit more interesting and tense than the usual snoozefest.

But that would have still been the same had the TT been on the Saturday.

dabber

Pross wrote:

Dabber wrote:

T de F 1989... Final stage, Fignon starts ITT with 50 second advantage over Lemon and ends up losing to Lemond by 8 seconds. A bit more interesting and tense than the usual snoozefest.

But that would have still been the same had the TT been on the Saturday.

Sorry, I don't understand??? If there had been an ITT on Saturday what would have replaced the Sunday procession?

RichN95.

You have to see the final stage as not just part of the race. It is also an important business event. For the race sponsors, the team sponsors and government officials. The racers also want to have a party - as do the race staff. And when it's all over they want a short trip to a major airport to get home. And this can really only be done in a major city.

bobmcstuff

Pross wrote:

I don't think it needs changing. GTs are effectively 20 stages long and then the winner gets a nice procession to celebrate at the end before the rest of the field have one last chance of glory. I reckon that celebration at the end of 3 weeks of tough racing is a fitting tribute.

Additionally the Tour at least is now a sort of unofficial sprinter's World Championship, and stops them abandoning after the last sprint stage (as there's inevitably some back-loaded hard stages). Winning the final Vuelta or Giro sprint is still reasonably prestigious, even if not quite up there with winning on the Champs-Elysees.

If they continue to have stages 18 or 19-20 hard GC stages (which seems to be the way it's gone), and the final stage was another hard day or an ITT most of the sprinters would just abandon after whenever the final sprint stage is, possibly the second rest day.

Having some sort of elimination element (as mentioned above) or something similar wouldn't necessarily be the worst idea ever, IMO, so long as it was sensibly designed. It would allow the race to still finish in a city centre - having the final stage in a capital city or major city seems to be a reasonable thing for the organisers to want, and they tend to be flat.

Mad_Malx

Cav’s Giro red jersey in 2013 was won on last day, wasn’t it?

RichN95.

Remember last year's Vuelta when lots of people on social media were outraged that Froome would join in the sprint to save his points jersey

Pross

Dabber wrote:

Pross wrote:

Dabber wrote:

T de F 1989... Final stage, Fignon starts ITT with 50 second advantage over Lemon and ends up losing to Lemond by 8 seconds. A bit more interesting and tense than the usual snoozefest.

But that would have still been the same had the TT been on the Saturday.

Sorry, I don't understand??? If there had been an ITT on Saturday what would have replaced the Sunday procession?

But the thing that made it interesting was that the TT caused the turnaround on the final competitive stage. If the Sunday had been the normal Champs procession and the TT had been on the Saturday then the race would have been no less exciting.

In most other years you just have to accept the Tour finishes as a GC race on the Saturday and then Sunday is a celebration followed by a glorified crit. If you had a TT on the final stage every year then I doubt that you would get an exciting finish once every 20 years in any case and seeing all the riders arrive one at a time with the race already won would be anti-climatic I reckon. '89 was just a fluke at the end of one of the most unpredictable Tours ever, you'd be highly unlikely to replicate that ever again. That's not to say it wouldn't be good to mix it up every now and again.

bobmcstuff

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bn1kNAFBSFh/

Nice clip of Bennett handing off a bottle to a young fan

RichN95.

The last stage of the Giro was TT from 2008-2012. And the 2014 Vuelta. The leadership changed in the 2012 Giro, quite predictably.

blazing_saddles

RichN95 wrote:

The last stage of the Giro was TT from 2008-2012. And the 2014 Vuelta. The leadership changed in the 2012 Giro, quite predictably.

Blazing Saddles wrote:

The Giro still has final day ITTs fairly regularly.
2017 for instance and before that, 2009 - 2012 all had ITTs.

There was a leadership change last year, too, with Dumoulin moving from fourth to first.

kingstongraham

Spanish TV viewing figures for the final stage - 294,000.

Next lowest viewed stage was stage 1 - 527,000

Other three Sundays - 896,000 then 1,686,000 then 2,178,000

Noone watches - it wasn't even on the main channel like the important stages were.

larkim

You can argue to a point that TV audience size doesn't really matter, but it does make the point that many think of the final stages (when constructed in the way they were on Sunday) as a waste of time and a snoozefest. Personally I watched because I wanted to see Yates cross the line (and we didn't even see that!) but had it not been a Brit in red I wouldn't have bothered. Presumably plenty of spanish locals thought the same!