{"id":179492,"date":"2020-09-17T10:36:21","date_gmt":"2020-09-17T10:36:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=179492"},"modified":"2020-09-17T11:07:06","modified_gmt":"2020-09-17T11:07:06","slug":"with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-of-the-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/17\/with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-of-the-tour\/","title":{"rendered":"Things We Learned With Four Days to Go Until the End of the Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe people of Slovenia enjoy sitting on a bike and cycling through the city streets as well in nature,\u201d the \u201cI Feel Slovenia\u201d website declares. \u201cThere are plenty of cycle paths leading over a soaring landscape which offers cycling terrains for families as well as terrains for those in search of more challenging cycling adventures.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I guess that explains why two natives of that country, Primo\u017e Rogli\u010d and Tadej Poga\u010dar, are dominating this year\u2019s race for the Tour de France yellow jersey. The mano a mano between the two friends has been one of the highlights of a Tour full of drama. They have taken turns trying to wear the other down, which left an opening for the Colombian Astana rider Miguel \u00c1ngel L\u00f3pez to win his first-ever Tour de France stage after the thrilling race up the murderous climb to the Col de la Loze on Wednesday\u2019s 17th stage.<\/p>\n

\"Miguel<\/a>
Miguel \u00c1ngel L\u00f3pez at the 2020 Tour. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Rogli\u010d now leads his countryman by 57 seconds in the race for the Tour win, with L\u00f3pez in third place, 1 minute 26 seconds behind. All eyes will now be on Saturday\u2019s penultimate stage, a 36.2-km individual time trial that ends with a category 1 climb to La Planche des Belles Filles.<\/p>\n

Both Rogli\u010d and Poga\u010dar are very good time-trial riders and, as we know, superb climbers. The last time they went head to head in a time trial at this year\u2019s Slovenian National Championships, Poga\u010dar came first, with Rogli\u010d in second. But the positions were reversed in the Road Race Championship.<\/p>\n

The big shock of the race, of course, was the abandonment of last year\u2019s Tour winner, Egan Bernal. allegedly because of the back injury he suffered in the Crit\u00e9rium du Dauphin\u00e9 in early August. When he dropped out after stage 16, Bernal had already lost more than 19 minutes to Rogli\u010d.<\/p>\n

\"Egan<\/a>
The big shock of the race was the abandonment of last year\u2019s Tour winner, Egan Bernal. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This has raised the question of why, if the young Colombian\u2019s condition was not 10 per cent, he was picked as Team Ineos\u2019 sole leader and why a former Tour winner from the team, such as Chris Froome or Geraint Thomas, wasn\u2019t chosen to ride in the Tour. \u201cI think you take your big players to races like that,\u201d said former team member and Tour winner Bradley Wiggins. \u201cJust their presence at the dinner table, their presence on the flat stages in the line-up\u2026 Particularly Geraint.\u201d<\/p>\n

He went on to say, \u201cChris Froome as a four-time winner, I think has earned the right just to be there in that team, in that line-up. If anything as preparation for the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a.\u201d However, Wiggins originally supported Ineos team manager Dave Brailsford\u2019s decision to leave Froome and Thomas out of the Tour, saying: \u201cI don\u2019t see it as a negative thing. They\u2019ve always had this plan, this goal, to win all three Grand Tours in a season and Geraint\u2019s got himself another month now to get himself into the shape he wants to be in, and the fact he\u2019s riding the Giro you\u2019d have to say he\u2019s going to be a contender for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hindsight is always right, as the saying goes. But Bernal may have succumbed to the pressure of having all his team\u2019s hopes resting on his shoulders. Last year, Thomas started as Ineos team leader and Bernal was able to ride without the stress of great expectations, and he won.<\/p>\n

\"Egan<\/a>
Bernal may have succumbed to the pressure of having all his team\u2019s hopes resting on his shoulders. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This Tour has been yet another disappointment for the host nation as Thibaut Pinot, also complaining of a bad back, fell back in the first week and has barely been visible since. Though he has won a stage, last year\u2019s home hero Julian Alaphilippe has also not lived up to expectations. His will to win is the same as it was in 2019 but his legs are not. With so many other nations (such as Slovenia) developing great young cyclists, it looks as if Bernard Hinault may well be the last ever French Tour de France winner.<\/p>\n

Finally, Peter Sagan looks to have lost the green jersey to Irish sprinter Sam Bennett, despite the best efforts of his Bora-Hansgrohe team. His only chance of winning the points classification for a record eighth time is to be part of the right breakaway on Thursday\u2019s rollercoaster stage 18 and then go all out to collect maximum points along the way. But 47 points is a lot to pick up on a single stage. And the final stage in Paris, with a final sprint, certainly favours the Irishman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe people of Slovenia enjoy sitting on a bike and cycling through the city streets as well in nature,\u201d the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":179493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[329],"tags":[3622,1253,425,4408,4411,4367,2228,1221,3415,1098,433],"global-categories":[3366],"class_list":["post-179492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-cycling","tag-2020-tour-de-france","tag-bora-hansgrohe","tag-chris-froome","tag-dave-brailsford","tag-i-feel-slovenia","tag-ineos-grenadiers","tag-miguel-angel-lopez","tag-primoz-roglic","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-thibaut-pinot","tag-tour-de-france","global-categories-cycling"],"yoast_head":"\nThings We Learned With Four Days to Go Until the End of the Tour - \u0160koda We Love Cycling<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"\u201cThe people of Slovenia enjoy sitting on a bike and cycling through the city streets as well in nature,\u201d the \u201cI Feel Slovenia\u201d website declares. \u201cThere\" \/>\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\/17\/with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-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 With Four Days to Go Until the End of the Tour\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cThe people of Slovenia enjoy sitting on a bike and cycling through the city streets as well in nature,\u201d the \u201cI Feel Slovenia\u201d website declares. \u201cThere\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/17\/with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-of-the-tour\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-09-17T10:36:21+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-09-17T11:07:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2020\/09\/roglic-profimedia-0558335761-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=\"4\" \/>\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\/17\/with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-of-the-tour\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2020\/09\/17\/with-four-days-to-go-until-the-end-of-the-tour\/\",\"name\":\"Things We Learned With Four Days to Go Until the End of the Tour - 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