{"id":179373,"date":"2020-09-10T11:06:30","date_gmt":"2020-09-10T11:06:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=179373"},"modified":"2020-09-10T11:06:30","modified_gmt":"2020-09-10T11:06:30","slug":"things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/","title":{"rendered":"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris on September 20. Here are some of the main takeaways following Wednesday\u2019s 11th stage.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

1. The favourites for the General Classification remain Jumbo-Visma\u2019s Primoz Rogli\u010d and Egan Bernal of Team Ineos with outside chances \u2013 based on their form to this point in the race \u2013 for UAE-Emirates\u2019s Tadej Poga\u010dar, Guillaume Martin of Cofidis and Nairo Quintana of Team Arkea-Samsic.<\/p>\n

Rogli\u010d currently wears the yellow jersey, 21 seconds ahead of Bernal, with Martin in third place, 28 seconds adrift. However, Poga\u010dar has been very impressive, winning Sunday\u2019s gruelling stage 9 in grand style and displaying speed, aggressiveness and power on the climbs. But does he have the team to support him in next week\u2019s decisive Alpine climbs?<\/p>\n

The same might be asked of Rogli\u010d. Jumbo-Visma has been very visible so far, controlling many of the stages. But Tom Dumoulin who had been touted as its other GC candidate was dropped on the Category 1 ascent to the Col de Marie Blanque in stage 9, as were Jumbo-Visma\u2019s other support climbers, Sepp Kuss and George Bennet.<\/p>\n

\"Jumbo-Visma\"<\/a>
Jumbo-Visma at the 11th stage of the 2020 Tour. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meanwhile, Team Ineos must have been grateful that Jumbo-Visma did so much of the early work controlling the peloton so its riders could be passengers on the train and save their energy for the last week, and Bernal looks to be in fine form again. Is Jumbo-Visma saving its support climbers for the Alps or are they just not strong enough? We\u2019ll find out next week.<\/p>\n

In any case, the winner of this edition of the Tour will be the rider who has conquered the Alps and managed to survive injury from crashes and infection from the novel coronavirus.<\/p>\n

2. Peter Sagan is no longer the best rider in the world. That honour must now be bestowed on Jumbo-Visma\u2019s Flying Dutchman Wout van Aert. The 25-year-old former Cyclo-Cross world champion has won two stages via the sprint and has also been remarkable on the climbs, leading his team up the first part of the ascents. There\u2019s little doubt that if he were not vital to Jumbo-Visma\u2019s plans to win the yellow jersey, he would be a favourite to keep Sagan from winning his record eighth green jersey.<\/p>\n

It is hard to say if the 30-year-old Slovak Bora-Hansgrohe rider is in form or if he has simply chosen not to go all out on the early sprints and collect points in the later stages. His stage 12 sprint, where he finished second behind Cadel Ewen of Lotto-Soudal suggested that he has a long-range strategy. But that strategy has been thrown into disarray by Sagan\u2019s relegation to last place in the stage for leaning into van Aert in the sprint to the finish. The points he lost as a result may very well put an end to his dream of an eighth green jersey, which is currently worn by Sam Bennett of Deceuninck-Quickstep.<\/p>\n

\"Wout<\/a>
Peter Sagan and Wout Van Aert in action during the 11th stage of the Tour. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

3. Thibaut Pinot will not win the Tour de France \u2013 again. A back injury from a fall in the second stage caused the perennial Great French Hope to lose loads of time in stage 8. If he recovered over Monday\u2019s rest day, perhaps he will try to regain some pride in the Alps with a stage win or two.<\/p>\n

To add to France\u2019s disappointment, Julian Alaphilippe committed an amateurish blunder \u2013 taking water from a team helper too close to the end of stage 4 \u2013 and lost the yellow jersey, which he\u2019d held since stage 2.<\/p>\n

But the host nation still has a few irons in the fire. Guillaume Martin sits third in the standings, 28 seconds behind Rogli\u010d, with AG2R La Mondiale\u2019s Romain Bardet in fourth, 2 seconds further back. Of the two, Martin looks the stronger but will one or the other be able to challenge the race leader or Bernal? My money is on no.<\/p>\n

There was mostly good news on the COVID front. Testing on Monday\u2019s rest day revealed that not a single rider had been infected with the virus. But, ironically, race director Christian Prudhomme tested positive and was forced to isolate for a week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":179377,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[329],"tags":[3622,578,4401,1887,381,1221,1468,433,831],"global-categories":[3366],"class_list":["post-179373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-cycling","tag-2020-tour-de-france","tag-christian-prudhomme","tag-guillaume-martin","tag-julian-alaphilippe","tag-peter-sagan","tag-primoz-roglic","tag-sam-bennett","tag-tour-de-france","tag-wout-van-aert","global-categories-cycling"],"yoast_head":"\nThings We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour - \u0160koda We Love Cycling<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-09-10T11:06:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"tereza\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Siegfried Mortkowitz\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/\",\"name\":\"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour - \u0160koda We Love Cycling\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-09-10T11:06:30+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/50f01ecd18718d2333cf72e823c4f926\"},\"description\":\"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp\",\"width\":900,\"height\":600},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/\",\"name\":\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\",\"description\":\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling magazine\",\"alternateName\":\"\u0160koda WLC\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/50f01ecd18718d2333cf72e823c4f926\",\"name\":\"tereza\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f9eb71be33845f0afabce3791bc1c58ecdb0a25c62964987e5dbcf7a20d2ec7?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f9eb71be33845f0afabce3791bc1c58ecdb0a25c62964987e5dbcf7a20d2ec7?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"tereza\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/author\/tereza\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour - \u0160koda We Love Cycling","description":"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour","og_description":"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris","og_url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/","og_site_name":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling","article_published_time":"2020-09-10T11:06:30+00:00","og_image":[{"width":900,"height":600,"url":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp","type":"image\/webp"}],"author":"tereza","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Siegfried Mortkowitz","Est. reading time":"5"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/","url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/","name":"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour - \u0160koda We Love Cycling","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp","datePublished":"2020-09-10T11:06:30+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/50f01ecd18718d2333cf72e823c4f926"},"description":"Half of this dramatic, surprising and crash-filled Tour de France is behind us and we are a little wiser about who may be standing on the podium in Paris","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp","contentUrl":"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/tour-2020-profimedia-0557196312-CVR.webp","width":900,"height":600},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/10\/things-we-learned-from-the-first-half-of-the-tour\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Things We Learned From The First Half Of The Tour"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/","name":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling","description":"\u0160koda We Love Cycling magazine","alternateName":"\u0160koda WLC","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/50f01ecd18718d2333cf72e823c4f926","name":"tereza","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f9eb71be33845f0afabce3791bc1c58ecdb0a25c62964987e5dbcf7a20d2ec7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f9eb71be33845f0afabce3791bc1c58ecdb0a25c62964987e5dbcf7a20d2ec7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"tereza"},"url":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/author\/tereza\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179373","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179373"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179373\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":179381,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179373\/revisions\/179381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179373"},{"taxonomy":"global-categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/global-categories?post=179373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}