2008 Tour de France : Stage 9 : Toulouse - Bagnères-de-Bigorre 224.0 km Sunday July13

limerickman

Stage 9

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morelike hypocrisy.

guncha

It could be a boring stage because the final climb is too far from finish. It was possible to add a smaller climb (2nd cat) in a way to Bigorre. I expect all favorites to finish together.
However, Tourmalet+Hautacam, Agnel+Pratonevoso, Lomabrde+Bonette, Galibier+Croix De Fer+Alpe D'Huez will surely compensate it...

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TheDarkLord

Profile of the stage:




It depends on who attacks on the climbs and who is able to set up a substantial lead over the rest over the chase group. But I agree that unless some favourite pops, they are likely to finish together. How technical is the descent? That may make a small difference.

Powerful Pete

TDl, for some reason your profiles do not appear for me with Firefox 3.0. Why?

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Powerful Pete

Forget it. I take it back. All is working now...

And for the record, it depends who attacks when. If they are able to get epic and make someone blow up on the Peyresourde then it could be a heck of a stage...

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TheDarkLord

I think someone is more likely to blow up on Col d'Aspin than on Col de Peyresourde.

Capt.Injury

I really like S. Sanchez on this, he won on a similar stage like this in the Vuelta, where the finish is mostly downhill, he was pulling away from everyone on the descent (Maybe it was into Granada if I remember right). I think he might turn himself inside and out to stay with the pure climbers for this opportunity

Runitout

From memory the descent from Col d'Aspin is fairly technical. [Edit - it's technical the other way, the descent to Bagneres is not too bad.]

Sanchez is a good choice for this stage. Scratching my head to remember who else descends well - not the Schlecks, nor Evans for some reason, nor Sastre. Pereiro is a good descender. Piepoli too. How's Valverde in the descent? Menchov? Ricco?

Edit - Col d'Aspin and the descent described:

http://books.google.com/books?id=lE3B_KlRreIC&pg=PA176&lpg=PA176&dq=col+d'aspin+descent&source=web&ots=CBU1sv7gsV&sig=T9VUy4d8gq2Z3cPtNYt5dOuE--E&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=4&ct=result#PPA176,M1

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Powerful Pete

It all comes down to how much of a lead the break has on the Col d'Aspin (stating the obvious)... a Piepoli. Menchov, one of the Schlecks or a Ricco' could then make it stick. I doubt Pereiro will be attacking... should ride with Valverde. Would be interesting to see Valverde or Evans try something though.

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Jan the man

Descent is pretty technical and difficult. Very difficult if wet. Ullrich, Kloeden etc tred to make a break in 2004.

EvilJediJ

Valverde is a great descender

rob of the og

The top bit through the trees is especially difficult, but the lower slopes aren't that tricky. You've got a reasonable flat stretch in the valley afterwards, so I doubt a GC rider would want to risk it.

Eldrack

It's going to be very hard to make an attack stick I think, given the nature of the downhill after the last climb. Maybe a GC contender who's a couple of minutes back at the moment will give it a go, and because they're down on time will be allowed a big enough time gap to take the win. However I think most of the favourites will hit the finish together. Reckon I'll guess at Cobo for the win.

Andrija

For me, the only question is: who will be in the breakaway?
I don't know if breakaway will succeed, but they'll get to the Peyresourde and Aspin alone.
KOM competition begins tomorrow (begins seriously... not like so far).

De la Fuente, Chavanel, Ricco(?)... I, really, don't have a clue.

P.S.

Few years ago, it was easy - Virenque and, after he retired, Rasmussen.

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