{"id":174736,"date":"2019-07-23T16:19:31","date_gmt":"2019-07-23T16:19:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=174736"},"modified":"2019-07-23T16:19:53","modified_gmt":"2019-07-23T16:19:53","slug":"andy-schleck-on-the-tour-de-france-i-really-hope-alaphilippe-will-manage-to-wear-yellow-in-paris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2019\/07\/23\/andy-schleck-on-the-tour-de-france-i-really-hope-alaphilippe-will-manage-to-wear-yellow-in-paris\/","title":{"rendered":"Andy Schleck on the Tour de France: \u201cI Really Hope Alaphilippe Will Manage to Wear Yellow in Paris\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andy Raymond Schleck is a former pro-cyclist, a Luxembourg native, the 2010 Tour de France winner and has cycling running in his family. Currently, he functions as a chairman of the \u0160koda Tour de Luxembourg and as an ambassador at the Tour de France\u2019s \u0160koda Hospitality Programme so we reached out to him to get both his insider and expert overview of this year\u2019s Le Grande Boucle.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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This year, the Tour de France\u2019s organizers decided to treat the riders properly. And by \u201ctreat\u201d we meant \u201cmake them suffer\u201d. With no remaining time trial, the battle for the yellow jersey will take place over the course of three intense alpine stages. Each of them has an arsenal of features not suitable for the faint of heart, such as a 207-km-long slog snaking through three huge mountain passes, a summit finish at 2,770 meters of elevation (and that is just one of the five total climbs of stage 19) or the life-draining 33.4-km climb of the final stage, all of which will decide about the future owner of the GC yellow jersey.<\/p>\n

All eyes on Alaphilippe<\/strong><\/h2>\n

It seems that Alaphilippe is slowly becoming the favourite of the race. Could he possibly even make some gains on the descents in the Alps, even though he already expended a great deal of energy and his explosive performance power does not suit long climbs? \u201cHe\u2019s a really good descender but Pinot is one as well and I don\u2019t think he will gain points. I believe it\u2019s possible if, for example, Alaphilippe is behind Pinot on a descend, he can minimize the gap but I don\u2019t think he will drop anyone on the descent. But I also believe he can still win the Tour de France,\u201d Andy commented.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/B0MDvx5Ia27\/<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve all been taken aback by Alaphilippe\u2019s sensational performance so far and so is Andy, who deems his unexpected progress to be one of the greatest surprises of this year\u2019s Le Tour overall. \u201cI was really surprised to see Julian to be so strong in the climbs, no one really expected that. Normally, he\u2019s the guy always there, on the 3rd, 5th or 6th place, and now he actually managed to step up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watch your back, Julian!<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Even though Alaphilippe is certainly the talk of the town, he doesn\u2019t have the Champs-\u00c9lys\u00e9es in his pocket yet. As he himself has admitted, the yellow jersey is hanging on him \u201cby a thread\u201d. There\u2019s still a fat chance that either Thomas or possibly Pinot will be able to take it off his back, despite Pinot\u2019s run-in with the crosswinds on stage 10 and the subsequent loss of time.<\/p>\n

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The break is caught in the final kilometres and Ewan (LTS) wins the bunch sprint. @GeraintThomas86<\/a> & @Eganbernal<\/a> come home safely in the bunch. pic.twitter.com\/KOJlOnoTr2<\/a><\/p>\n

— INEOS Grenadiers (@INEOSGrenadiers) July 23, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n