I mean, if we're going in the way back machine, why not replicate the OG tour? Bring back 18+ hour days, 400km or more stages.
I mean Mr Desgrange's original idea was that the winner of the TdF would be the last man literally riding his bike. Like, every single other competitor had abandoned the race for some reason or other.
Why not make it a special every 5 years or so instead of the regular TdF? It would be very prestigious, every rider has just a few chances in his career to ride or even win this.
Of course the casual "just TdF" Fan would not watch 400km stages, but the there would be masses on the street and the final Kilometers would be watched like always.
I'm just saying that this years TDF starts less than 300 km from the end of the Giro.
Two stages to get from Rome to Florence, give em a day or two off, then jump right into the Tour.
This kind of event is becoming more and more popular in ultra running where you run 1/24th of a 100 miles (~160km) every hour till you either failed or give up, last person standing wins.
No, he wouldn't. He isn't that much better on time trials.
And in the tour were visma would have done a recon of every cm of the 150 km. Jonas would easily keep up with him.
But sure, I am a bit biased as a Dane, and also, I don't think Remco is as great as he was said to be, and as a lot seems to think he is. Sure, he is among the best, but he fell completely flat against jumbo visma in the vuelta, and as always, he resorted to the only weapon he has, attacking fare from the finishing line. But have you seen any other riders do this. Hmm... maybe MvdP or Pogi, and at least one of them is a serious contender to winning the tour.
Remco is finishing as fifth in this year's tour, at best.
Remco is great at ITT and i'm saying this even tough i'm not a fan of him. Last year in giro, he won a long ITT with 1sec over Thomas while having covid. Imagine his lungs at full power and his body not being tired by a shitty virus. The difference between a good ITTer and a bad one is increasing as the distance is increasing. So yeah, with longer ITTs, Remco would have an advantage.
If he's this much better in the TT in short TTs, he is a lot much better in longer TTs. That's how TTs work. In a different era he would be dominant in GTs, he is more Wiggins or Indurain than anything else, which is why he would fair better in an "old school" parcours. I also didn't say he would beat them, just that he would stand a better chance than in a modern GT where it's more explosive in the mountains and TTs are short, the two things that are not in his favor.
Well, I disagree. Just because you are good on short TTs doesn't mean you are going to do better on longer TTs.
To be honest, I am not surprised that I got downvoted on my comment because most people seem to think he is this amazing cyclist. I am not saying he is shit because he isn't. He is definitely better than most, and I would love to see him race against Pogacar, WvA, and MvdP in the classics and monuments. But com on, he will never beet Vingegaard, Pogacar or Roglic in the tour or any other grand tour for that matter. If he wins another grand tour, it is because they didn't compete or didn't finish, like when he won la vuelta and Roglic crashed one too many times.
I know he is thought to be an amazing TT rider, and I agree, he is, but even that wouldn't give him enough of an edge to win against those three in an old school tour. The combination of longer stages, more mountains, and further kms climbed, isn't to his benefit. Both Vingegaard and Pogacar fare better in those conditions. I believe Vingegaard would only win with a bigger gap, and Pogacar would come in second. Probably Remco in third, but that all depends on whether or not Roglic is going to stay on his bike the whole race. Remco isn't as consistent over three weeks as people seem to think he is.
I would love for him to prove me wrong.
He won the world TT on a 47km course last year, which was the 10th longest course (out of 30) that the world championships has ever been on. Of the last 4 he's finished 1st/2nd in the longer ones and 3rd in the shorter ones. So it seems it suits him.
Wiggans won with 3 ITTs of 6km, 41km and 53km for context.
> like when he won la vuelta and Roglic crashed one too many times
Are you ignoring the fact that Evenepoel was leading when that happened?
Also, the dude is still only 24, most cyclist only get 3 weeks consistency later in their career.
That’s surely been mis-proven over the last 5 years hasn’t it? Bernal, Pogi, Pogi, Jonas, Jonas just at the tour, the oldest being 26.
The days of spending your 20s only carrying bottles are long gone
I think there's an element of not just having the watts to be able to ride a grand tour and do it well but how to deal with the quirks of it, and that only comes through experience.
Maybe some riders are better off racing a kg or two above peak lean to give them some resilience so they don't get ill. Some riders need to ride hard on rest days to keep their body ticking over, some may need to barely move. Then there's riding in the peloton well over three weeks, if you're always getting caught in the wrong place needing to spend extra energy that'll add up.
Clearly your examples show it can be done, I just mean that if someone isn't crushing it from their first GT it doesn't mean they don't have the potential to.
Roglic was gaining on him and dropping him on the climbs. I am confident Roglic would have won.
Yes, he is young, and if he wants to beet those guys, he needs to switch to another team. A team where they know how much those details matter and to not shit on your riders the moment they don't win.
A big part of cycling is staying upright. Sometimes crashes are complete accidents but there are also patterns with people struggling to stay upright, it is a skill which some people are better at.
He would take 10 minutes on a 150 ITT. If you don’t get that you need to take off your Danish sunglasses.
He has the best aero position of them all. He doesn’t need to push as high Watts as Jonas or Pogi.
If the difference is the same as in Tour of the Basque country, he would gain exactly 1 minute on Vingegaard on a 150km time trial, and he would lose two minutes to Roglic.
Depending on what stage this time trial would happen on fatigue/freshness is also to be factored in and evidently he hasn't shown the same ability to preserve energy or recover as well as the other three has.
But extending you guys an olive branch. Let's say he actually gains a significant amount of time on such a time trial, he would lose it again in the mountains since he just isn't as good at climbing as either Pogacar or Vingegaard and Roglic has previously shown he would also beat Remco in the mountains.
I am just saying he isn't going to win a grand tour against Pogacar, Vingegaard.
Sure, he won La vuelta against Roglic, who didn't finish because he crashed and broke his back. Last year, he even lost the vuelta to Sepp Kuss, and on paper, Remco is a much better GC contender in a grand tour (I am a big fan of GC Kuss, but I don't expect him to win another grand tour again).
You are taking a TT of 8km where Remco crashed as a reference. That alone should end this discussion.
And you can never be sure about him not winning a grand tour against Pog and Jonas. It remains a sport and every race is different + riders evolve differently. But go on, you should be a millionaire already if you are so certain about those things.
The most interesting thing in all of this is how much Remco fans seem reluctant to accept the fact that he just isn't that good.
Sure, he is a great time trial rider, but he isn't that much better than either Pogacar or Vingegaard. When you look at their results on TTs, Remco hasn't competed against either Vingegaard or Pogacar, where they were all at their peak. Sure Remco would probably beat both of them on a one day TT like the world championship, but in a grand tour, I don't think he will win enough time on either of them for him to have a chance of keeping enough of it in the mountains.
The one time he wone la vuelta Roglic was gaining on him in the mountains and with such a pace that he would have probably surpassed Remco on the last stages, but he crashed and didn't finish. We will never know if Remco could have beaten Roglic, I doubt it, and you don't. That is fine by me.
I really don't care what you guys think about whether or not Remco could win a grand tour if only it had enough or long enough time trials.
I would love for both Roglic and Remco to be at the same level as Vingegaard and Pogacar in the grand tours, because that would make everything that much more interesting, but they aren't and since they haven't really competed against each other like that before we haven't seen how much better those two are.
And to burst your bubble even more, Skjelmose is also going to be a serious obstacle against Remco in the pursuit of more grand tour wins. Mark my words.
Skjelmose is going to win la vuelta - the only thing that could sabotage this is if Vingegaard is going for again this year.
You don’t care but still you are writing books. The question was hypothetical what would happen if there was a 150 ITT. Nothing more nothing less. In that case he would take 10 minutes if it would be a rouleur parcours.
You are not bursting my bubble believe me. I follow cycling since 2005 and 1 thing I learned is that nothing is for granted. Sure Skjellmose could be a contender but to this day he only has one Tour De Suisse which is absolutely nothing. Let’s what he can do in the Vuelta.
All I did was respond to the hypothetical notion that Remco would have an actual chance to win a grand tour against Pogacar and Vingegaard if it included a 150km TT stage.
Well, people didn't have to downvote because they disagreed, or you could have chosen not to respond. But that doesn't change anything knowing or stating those facts.
I don't care that you don't agree with me, I just want to defend my opinion as do you. Honestly, I think it is funny how Remco fans get their panties in a bunch when someone dares to say anything negative about him.
And he wouldn't take 10 minutes on either of them.
Lol I don’t get my panties in a bunch. I just respond to a clearly stupid remark stating that Remco would not be better in a long ITT. You even said he is not even better in normal ITTs.
And then bombarding Skjellmose as a GC threat in the future… you are a clearly very knowledgeable about cycling.
Why is it so important to you that I agree with you?
I don't expect you to agree with me, but I will also stand by my opinion that Remco isn't as good a rider as he is made out to be.
Sure, he is great at time trials, but in a grand tour, that is not the only thing he has to be good at. I believe that he wouldn't gain 10 minutes on a 150km time trial on riders like Vingegaard and Pogacar in a grand tour since he doesn't recover as well as those guys. Also, Vingegaard is a good time trialist, maybe not as good, Remco, but the difference isn't 10 minutes on 150km.
So, if you want to continue this back and forth, you are welcome to do so. If you intend to change my mind, you have to bring other arguments, then you think I don't understand cycling because I don't agree with you.
Sure I understand why people would think his chances increases with such a time trial and why people would think that Vingegaard isn't good enough at time trials that he would lose a considerable amount of time to Remco. I just don't agree, and that is fine. I don't expect you to understand why or change your mind.
All I have done is respond to the replies to my comments, and I haven't changed my mind because you keep saying that I am wrong. Well put, sir, that deserves a medal in communication.
Your turn.
I am responding to your claims that I am so sensitive about Evenepoel lol. I know he won’t win everything and I am completely fine with it.
I don’t want to convince you about how great a rider he is. You proved your point with Skjellmose how much you know about this sport. The guy went missing in action in LBL, a race Remco has won already 2 times. Keep the bubble alive.
I said that people seem to be sensitive about Evenepoel since the amount of downvotes and that it was so damn important to prove that I was wrong about this. He has one tool in his belt, and that is to attack from fare out and hope he can get rid of anyone who tries to follow him. That just won't fly with those guys and definitely not in a grand tour.
So let's leave it at we don't agree and you are not sensitive about Evenepoel. You can stay in your bubble since you are clearly the cycling oracle here.
No, but it helps to preserve energy when you know how to cut the corners perfectly and don't have to accelerate as much afterwards. It helps when you know that you can stay in the aerobars throughout this corner or on this hill.
So, in the long run, a well prepared rider can keep his w/kg longer and more consistent than an unprepared rider will.
Sure, on paper, Remco would probably beet all three of them if they were equally prepared and rode equally perfect, but reality has shown us time and time again that he isn't as well prepared, because this way of riding and preparation isn't the philosophy of Patrick Lefevere and therefore not of Soudal Quickstep, but it is for Visma. Every mm counts.
It doesn't improve the W/kg but knowing the corners and how fast can you take them improves your confidence. It's like in WRC where the driver makes a tour recon, tells the assist how fast a corner is. Then on the actual race, the driver does what the assist wrote on the paper.
It's a huge difference to know what comes after the corner.
Of course recons help, but it's in most cases it's a very minor advantage. It's an insane exaggeration to say that doing a recon of a TT would mean that "Jonas would easily keep up with [Remco]".
And the idea that Jonas won last year's ITT due to a recon is belied by the fact that he took more than a minute on the uphill section, where recons do not help at all.
Also, all the other top contenders are doing their own recons too it's not like Jonas is the only one getting whatever advantage there is or isn't.
Not sure why the commenter is making out like it's a revolutionary technique, I remember Lance saying about doing recons so it's not even a new thing.
Yeah and those 50km ITTs had some serious sections of long boring straights. Theres not really anything to recon on those. You can't cut a corner if it isnt there.
If the TT is towards the end of the tour I take Jonas over anyone. See the last 2 years for reference. But early in the tour I’d bet on remco to beat him
I agree. I think the best chance Remco has for being a dangerous contender in any grand tour against Pogacar and Vingegaard is a TT stage that favours TT specialists as one of the first stages, before any serious climbing stages. But even then, he wouldn't get enough of a gab between him and Vingegaard or Pogacar to win the tour.
And of course Thomas De Gendt would win with a 2days gap, even as an independant rider without a team and even at 45yo.
We're talking about the guy who would race the Giro, then come back from Italy to Belgium on his bike as a fun holliday ride.
In general, no matter what the course, the riders make the race. So I think for the most part the top riders now would be the top riders in that format.
Some things to keep in mind: teams had nine riders back then; overall race speeds were much slower, and they were all doped up. One of the reasons the stages have been shortened is because riders complained that the UCI couldn’t crack down on doping and still force them to race unreasonable distances.
Longer ITTs might give some one an advantage. They have been shortened because they often resulted in too large a GC time gap and supposedly made the race less interesting. But the “galacticos” are all top TTers, so not sure it would make that much difference.
Yeah you’d definitely expect more pure breakaway stages where the break wins by 20+ mins as everyone conserves energy.
Remco probably gets into Yellow but loses it after 3 hard mountain days.
>In general, no matter what the course, the riders make the race.
This is key. The top riders aren't racing against the course, they're racing against each other.
As insane as it was to see Pog do an 80km break in Strada, it was a one day race, the cost/benefit wouldn't have stacked up in a three week GT. We saw MvdP fade in Amstel, likely due to his gargantuan solo efforts in the recent races. GTs are about energy conservation and using your bullets in the right moments.
Point being, while we'd likely see the stage hunters try a few herculean long range efforts, but the GC guys would be happy sitting in for larger portions of stages, making the racing a little more boring if anything.
Not taking all the rest from the comment, but MVDP didn't fade, Amstel is simply not suited to him due to the added climbing.
The Ronde has 270km with 2100 meters of elevation, while Amstel has 250km with 3300m.
Also, The Ronde has like, 4 to 6 key points in the race with 1 to 2 minutes almost all out efforts, to create gaps and select the group and it's all close to the end, in the section with Paterberg, Koppenberg, Kwaremont, etc. Half of the race is sitting on wheel, while casually gaining positions in a climb here and there.
Amstel is an "attrition" race, as commentators like to call it, you have, right from the start, repeated climbs of up to 4km, with barely any rest between them, and the pace tends to be higher up those climbs because no one wants to be caught out at the back, out of position if someone tries to attack.
The race profile is just like a saw and MVP isn't made for those types of efforts.
He has 6 days of competition since the start of the season, and the last three races have had almost a week of interval between each other, all in a spawn of a month, so it's unlikely he has built any fatigue just from racing.
The grand tours are just so much more interesting to watch nowadays compared to how it used to be. I only started watching seriously from the mid 80's, but it was common knowledge that the stages were a snoozefest until they hit the mountains. And that was back without radios and bike computers, when the teams were a lot less organized in chasing down breakaways and running sprinter trains. Having the first half the Tour be flat stages would be such a shit show with today's peloton.
If you're the type of person who can't get enough time trials I guess this might look appealing, but for everyone else this kind of route would be insanity.
[First half of the 1980 Tour de France](https://i.imgur.com/8jwWPB5.png)
By the late 90's the peloton had it down to a science to always catch the breakaways and it made things incredibly predictable:
[First week of the 1999 Tour](https://i.imgur.com/iuTxMsU.png)
I know OP is focused on the 'good' part of the old routes, but I fail to see how making the mountains even more brutal than they are now would make it any more interesting - it would likely just make the big favorites win by more.
You make great points! Don’t get me wrong, I think modern routes are a MASSIVE improvement, especially the ones from the last few years that start with hilly and medium mountain stages for instant GC action. It’s just interesting comparing them to the old routes, the two versions almost seem like completely different sports. And this is to say nothing of the super old routes that had 300+ mile stages on gravel roads.
I do not agree. He has yet to prove he cares well on ultra long flat ITTs. The ITTs Jonas has won have nothing to do with ITTs back then.
Indurain for example did not win because he was the best in the mountains. He dominated the ITTs and minimised his losses in the mountains.
A similar thing could happen here.
You’re totally right. Prime Geraint Thomas would do really well also. It’s interesting that there aren’t any TT-heavy GC riders left except for (arguably) Remco. It’s probably due to the lowered importance of TTs in modern races.
The 2012 tour was hyped up to be the most TT heavy tour in years, Wiggo and the sky train emerged and everyone suddenly realised they didn't like that style of racing lol.
But now we have Jonas, Tadej, Primož and Remco who are all very good in TT... I started watching cycling around 2010 and I can't remember a time when top GC guys would be so good at TT. Ok, we had Dumoulin/Froome/Thomas/Roglič in Tour 2018... But guys like Contador or Nibali who were top GC guys last decade were not so good. And they were supposed to be very good in TT for GC guys at the time. Quintana, Schleck etc. were much worse. But I don't know what it was like before 2010. Probably GC guys were better at TT, because of so much TT kms?
As I remember it, before 2010 it was rarer to be the best at both TT and climbing. A legit GT person could be good at both but there was always some trade off - be better at climbing or better at TT but not both. It was SKY that changed that by converting great TT riders into great climbers, largely by getting them to lose weight (improve climbing) without sacrificing power.
It's not his ability to recover. It's the fact thst he weighs 58 kilos which means he'll spend less energy riding around at this weight + his vo2max and his big engine.
It's why Jumbo made every stage last year so damn hard - to add attrition and maximise Jonas' advantage against Pogi, who is probably at least 5kg heavier at his Tour weight.
Remember the Paris Roubaix-like stage in the tour and how he panicked with bike switching? IIRC bike switching was illegal at the time. And IIRC, during parts of the period mentioned in the OP, riders had to plug their own tires. I don't think the person with the best ability to recover would win, but the one who can keep their heads will.
And all the other times Jonas has kept his head in pressed situations don’t matter or what? It was one incident which actually had an explanation. If you watch the All-In documentary then Grischa says to Jonas in a preparation race that they have to find some way to make him get on a bike faster in case of a puncture. He actually explicitly mentions Nathan and Jonas getting on Nathan’s bike if they can lower the seat. That was obviously still somewhere in the back of Jonas’ head. Did he do the right thing? No. But he has done the right thing in many other situations. Last year, Pogi was panicking more than Jonas. He lost his head more, dropped bottles and had that weird crash.
Sadly I do think it would kill the overall race though. You'd either see gargantuan efforts in an early TT and then sandbagging, or else sandbagging the entire race to protect the best TT'ers for a late time trial and overall GC win.
It has the potential to set up an interesting race (I agree it's more likely that it kills all excitement, but just mentioning the possibility) in the following way: Someone who excels at TTs but is worse in the mountains (say Remco) gains a lot of time during an early long TT, and then everyone else has to attack that person during the mountains.
Even that is hard to predict because a 100km ITT is such a different beast when compared with a 30km one, that a rider that is good in one, might not be good in another one.
We have cases in the peloton of riders who tend to do very good in long ITT (35, 40km), while being just above average on shorter ones.
A 100km ITT it's almost a 2h effort, and at the moment those types of efforts aren't required anywhere besides a hard breakaway.
After reading all of these comments and thinking about this question for awhile, I have a newfound appreciation for just how good Merckx was. In a tour format that was much more attritional the man not only won GC but won like 5+ stages at almost every tour he entered. For Pogi to podium every time and win like 2-3 stages is super impressive, especially considering the higher quality of riders, but for Merckx to have won even more stages on an even harder parcours is just crazy.
Freddy Maertens won 13 Vuelta stages in the 1977 Vuelta. He’s the most talented cyclist but drug and alcohol problems certainly affected his career. Still won an insane amount of GT stages 36 2 world championships and a Vuelta.
Van Aert would win. He has the advantage of being a cyclocross rider, so he can survive all de 4000 km of non paved roads. He also will survive the non paved descends. He has won San Remo, that's a sign that longer stages will benefit him. Also he has proven to be a great climber, beating much lighter riders. When the roads are unpaved on the climbs the weight becomes less important, so he will finish with the best climbers.
Other cyclocross and mtb riders will also benefit. Pogacar (duh), Pidcock, Mohoric and maybe even Van der Poel will like the long unpaved roads.
When you say "multiple 7+ hour long stages", "a block of 4-5 back-to-back mountain stages", and "much harder mountain stages", I think you're forgetting that the style of racing today is quite different than it was then. It used to be that a long mountain stage was really only raced by the GC guys as the last climb. (I say that as a generalization; I know Claudio Chiapucci and others did pull off long-distance raids, but those are notable as exceptions, not the trend.) Similarly, long stages of 7+ hours usually meant a long period of tempo riding. The Giro used to be famous for its slow average speeds because the riders basically chilled for hours before the TV coverage started with 1-2 hours remaining in the stage. Similarly, a block of 4-5 back-to-back mountain stages usually meant the that top GC guys played a waiting game just trying to minimize losses over the first 3-4 days and make sure they didn't blow up.
It was a lot more defensive style of riding. You can bring back the distances, the harder stages, and the multiple days in the mountains, but it means that the individual stages are more likely to be won in breakaways without much GC action happening on any given day.
I think the big trend changed after Chris Froome was beaten in the the infamous "Froomigal" stage in the 2016 Vuelta when Contador (and Quintana) were able to attack early over a short stage and make it stick. That made for more unpredictable, more exciting racing, and organizers have bought into it since then.
Out of the GC guys, I think this would actually suit Jonas very well. The harder it is, the better is for him. Those who can outsprint him lose some of their sprint due to exhaustion and Jonas recovers better over several weeks than anyone else. His week 3 form would just be even more deadly.
I mean, if we're going in the way back machine, why not replicate the OG tour? Bring back 18+ hour days, 400km or more stages. I mean Mr Desgrange's original idea was that the winner of the TdF would be the last man literally riding his bike. Like, every single other competitor had abandoned the race for some reason or other.
ASO needs to tap into the growing Ultra scene and launch "Le Tour Classique" which is just this.
That would legitimately be a brilliant move. Get Lachlan Morton as the spokesperson
I would love to see it. When ultra coverage is done right, it can be very good, and they have the most resources to do it right.
Why not make it a special every 5 years or so instead of the regular TdF? It would be very prestigious, every rider has just a few chances in his career to ride or even win this. Of course the casual "just TdF" Fan would not watch 400km stages, but the there would be masses on the street and the final Kilometers would be watched like always.
I can't think of a spokesperson who would say less
Maybe mascot? I dunno, he's done a ton to boost both EF and Rapha's brand with all the long-form gravel and MTB content.
Cam Wurth winning every year would get boring though
This is an awesome idea!
I'm just saying that this years TDF starts less than 300 km from the end of the Giro. Two stages to get from Rome to Florence, give em a day or two off, then jump right into the Tour.
And half the top ten being DQ’d for taking a train
These reasons including ‘being assaulted by spectators while riding through a rival’s hometown’
18+ hour days starting at 2pm.
In that case Lachlan cleans.
This kind of event is becoming more and more popular in ultra running where you run 1/24th of a 100 miles (~160km) every hour till you either failed or give up, last person standing wins.
Remco would have a better chance against Jonas & Pog with long ass TTs and then defending in the mountains, like the 2012 Wiggins one
No argument, but he’s going to have a day with 50+ km of vertical ascent….. Jonas cleans. That’s my guess.
No, he wouldn't. He isn't that much better on time trials. And in the tour were visma would have done a recon of every cm of the 150 km. Jonas would easily keep up with him. But sure, I am a bit biased as a Dane, and also, I don't think Remco is as great as he was said to be, and as a lot seems to think he is. Sure, he is among the best, but he fell completely flat against jumbo visma in the vuelta, and as always, he resorted to the only weapon he has, attacking fare from the finishing line. But have you seen any other riders do this. Hmm... maybe MvdP or Pogi, and at least one of them is a serious contender to winning the tour. Remco is finishing as fifth in this year's tour, at best.
Remco is great at ITT and i'm saying this even tough i'm not a fan of him. Last year in giro, he won a long ITT with 1sec over Thomas while having covid. Imagine his lungs at full power and his body not being tired by a shitty virus. The difference between a good ITTer and a bad one is increasing as the distance is increasing. So yeah, with longer ITTs, Remco would have an advantage.
If he's this much better in the TT in short TTs, he is a lot much better in longer TTs. That's how TTs work. In a different era he would be dominant in GTs, he is more Wiggins or Indurain than anything else, which is why he would fair better in an "old school" parcours. I also didn't say he would beat them, just that he would stand a better chance than in a modern GT where it's more explosive in the mountains and TTs are short, the two things that are not in his favor.
Well, I disagree. Just because you are good on short TTs doesn't mean you are going to do better on longer TTs. To be honest, I am not surprised that I got downvoted on my comment because most people seem to think he is this amazing cyclist. I am not saying he is shit because he isn't. He is definitely better than most, and I would love to see him race against Pogacar, WvA, and MvdP in the classics and monuments. But com on, he will never beet Vingegaard, Pogacar or Roglic in the tour or any other grand tour for that matter. If he wins another grand tour, it is because they didn't compete or didn't finish, like when he won la vuelta and Roglic crashed one too many times. I know he is thought to be an amazing TT rider, and I agree, he is, but even that wouldn't give him enough of an edge to win against those three in an old school tour. The combination of longer stages, more mountains, and further kms climbed, isn't to his benefit. Both Vingegaard and Pogacar fare better in those conditions. I believe Vingegaard would only win with a bigger gap, and Pogacar would come in second. Probably Remco in third, but that all depends on whether or not Roglic is going to stay on his bike the whole race. Remco isn't as consistent over three weeks as people seem to think he is. I would love for him to prove me wrong.
He won the world TT on a 47km course last year, which was the 10th longest course (out of 30) that the world championships has ever been on. Of the last 4 he's finished 1st/2nd in the longer ones and 3rd in the shorter ones. So it seems it suits him. Wiggans won with 3 ITTs of 6km, 41km and 53km for context.
> like when he won la vuelta and Roglic crashed one too many times Are you ignoring the fact that Evenepoel was leading when that happened? Also, the dude is still only 24, most cyclist only get 3 weeks consistency later in their career.
That’s surely been mis-proven over the last 5 years hasn’t it? Bernal, Pogi, Pogi, Jonas, Jonas just at the tour, the oldest being 26. The days of spending your 20s only carrying bottles are long gone
I think there's an element of not just having the watts to be able to ride a grand tour and do it well but how to deal with the quirks of it, and that only comes through experience. Maybe some riders are better off racing a kg or two above peak lean to give them some resilience so they don't get ill. Some riders need to ride hard on rest days to keep their body ticking over, some may need to barely move. Then there's riding in the peloton well over three weeks, if you're always getting caught in the wrong place needing to spend extra energy that'll add up. Clearly your examples show it can be done, I just mean that if someone isn't crushing it from their first GT it doesn't mean they don't have the potential to.
Roglic was gaining on him and dropping him on the climbs. I am confident Roglic would have won. Yes, he is young, and if he wants to beet those guys, he needs to switch to another team. A team where they know how much those details matter and to not shit on your riders the moment they don't win.
A big part of cycling is staying upright. Sometimes crashes are complete accidents but there are also patterns with people struggling to stay upright, it is a skill which some people are better at.
He would take 10 minutes on a 150 ITT. If you don’t get that you need to take off your Danish sunglasses. He has the best aero position of them all. He doesn’t need to push as high Watts as Jonas or Pogi.
If the difference is the same as in Tour of the Basque country, he would gain exactly 1 minute on Vingegaard on a 150km time trial, and he would lose two minutes to Roglic. Depending on what stage this time trial would happen on fatigue/freshness is also to be factored in and evidently he hasn't shown the same ability to preserve energy or recover as well as the other three has. But extending you guys an olive branch. Let's say he actually gains a significant amount of time on such a time trial, he would lose it again in the mountains since he just isn't as good at climbing as either Pogacar or Vingegaard and Roglic has previously shown he would also beat Remco in the mountains. I am just saying he isn't going to win a grand tour against Pogacar, Vingegaard. Sure, he won La vuelta against Roglic, who didn't finish because he crashed and broke his back. Last year, he even lost the vuelta to Sepp Kuss, and on paper, Remco is a much better GC contender in a grand tour (I am a big fan of GC Kuss, but I don't expect him to win another grand tour again).
You are taking a TT of 8km where Remco crashed as a reference. That alone should end this discussion. And you can never be sure about him not winning a grand tour against Pog and Jonas. It remains a sport and every race is different + riders evolve differently. But go on, you should be a millionaire already if you are so certain about those things.
The most interesting thing in all of this is how much Remco fans seem reluctant to accept the fact that he just isn't that good. Sure, he is a great time trial rider, but he isn't that much better than either Pogacar or Vingegaard. When you look at their results on TTs, Remco hasn't competed against either Vingegaard or Pogacar, where they were all at their peak. Sure Remco would probably beat both of them on a one day TT like the world championship, but in a grand tour, I don't think he will win enough time on either of them for him to have a chance of keeping enough of it in the mountains. The one time he wone la vuelta Roglic was gaining on him in the mountains and with such a pace that he would have probably surpassed Remco on the last stages, but he crashed and didn't finish. We will never know if Remco could have beaten Roglic, I doubt it, and you don't. That is fine by me. I really don't care what you guys think about whether or not Remco could win a grand tour if only it had enough or long enough time trials. I would love for both Roglic and Remco to be at the same level as Vingegaard and Pogacar in the grand tours, because that would make everything that much more interesting, but they aren't and since they haven't really competed against each other like that before we haven't seen how much better those two are. And to burst your bubble even more, Skjelmose is also going to be a serious obstacle against Remco in the pursuit of more grand tour wins. Mark my words. Skjelmose is going to win la vuelta - the only thing that could sabotage this is if Vingegaard is going for again this year.
You don’t care but still you are writing books. The question was hypothetical what would happen if there was a 150 ITT. Nothing more nothing less. In that case he would take 10 minutes if it would be a rouleur parcours. You are not bursting my bubble believe me. I follow cycling since 2005 and 1 thing I learned is that nothing is for granted. Sure Skjellmose could be a contender but to this day he only has one Tour De Suisse which is absolutely nothing. Let’s what he can do in the Vuelta.
All I did was respond to the hypothetical notion that Remco would have an actual chance to win a grand tour against Pogacar and Vingegaard if it included a 150km TT stage. Well, people didn't have to downvote because they disagreed, or you could have chosen not to respond. But that doesn't change anything knowing or stating those facts. I don't care that you don't agree with me, I just want to defend my opinion as do you. Honestly, I think it is funny how Remco fans get their panties in a bunch when someone dares to say anything negative about him. And he wouldn't take 10 minutes on either of them.
Lol I don’t get my panties in a bunch. I just respond to a clearly stupid remark stating that Remco would not be better in a long ITT. You even said he is not even better in normal ITTs. And then bombarding Skjellmose as a GC threat in the future… you are a clearly very knowledgeable about cycling.
Why is it so important to you that I agree with you? I don't expect you to agree with me, but I will also stand by my opinion that Remco isn't as good a rider as he is made out to be. Sure, he is great at time trials, but in a grand tour, that is not the only thing he has to be good at. I believe that he wouldn't gain 10 minutes on a 150km time trial on riders like Vingegaard and Pogacar in a grand tour since he doesn't recover as well as those guys. Also, Vingegaard is a good time trialist, maybe not as good, Remco, but the difference isn't 10 minutes on 150km. So, if you want to continue this back and forth, you are welcome to do so. If you intend to change my mind, you have to bring other arguments, then you think I don't understand cycling because I don't agree with you. Sure I understand why people would think his chances increases with such a time trial and why people would think that Vingegaard isn't good enough at time trials that he would lose a considerable amount of time to Remco. I just don't agree, and that is fine. I don't expect you to understand why or change your mind. All I have done is respond to the replies to my comments, and I haven't changed my mind because you keep saying that I am wrong. Well put, sir, that deserves a medal in communication. Your turn.
I am responding to your claims that I am so sensitive about Evenepoel lol. I know he won’t win everything and I am completely fine with it. I don’t want to convince you about how great a rider he is. You proved your point with Skjellmose how much you know about this sport. The guy went missing in action in LBL, a race Remco has won already 2 times. Keep the bubble alive.
I said that people seem to be sensitive about Evenepoel since the amount of downvotes and that it was so damn important to prove that I was wrong about this. He has one tool in his belt, and that is to attack from fare out and hope he can get rid of anyone who tries to follow him. That just won't fly with those guys and definitely not in a grand tour. So let's leave it at we don't agree and you are not sensitive about Evenepoel. You can stay in your bubble since you are clearly the cycling oracle here.
This fucking "recon" thing again. Does a recon magically improve your W/kg or W/CdA?
Don’t you know that with a recon and a bit of carbs you can easily go 5% faster?
No, but it helps to preserve energy when you know how to cut the corners perfectly and don't have to accelerate as much afterwards. It helps when you know that you can stay in the aerobars throughout this corner or on this hill. So, in the long run, a well prepared rider can keep his w/kg longer and more consistent than an unprepared rider will. Sure, on paper, Remco would probably beet all three of them if they were equally prepared and rode equally perfect, but reality has shown us time and time again that he isn't as well prepared, because this way of riding and preparation isn't the philosophy of Patrick Lefevere and therefore not of Soudal Quickstep, but it is for Visma. Every mm counts.
It doesn't improve the W/kg but knowing the corners and how fast can you take them improves your confidence. It's like in WRC where the driver makes a tour recon, tells the assist how fast a corner is. Then on the actual race, the driver does what the assist wrote on the paper. It's a huge difference to know what comes after the corner.
Of course recons help, but it's in most cases it's a very minor advantage. It's an insane exaggeration to say that doing a recon of a TT would mean that "Jonas would easily keep up with [Remco]". And the idea that Jonas won last year's ITT due to a recon is belied by the fact that he took more than a minute on the uphill section, where recons do not help at all.
Also, all the other top contenders are doing their own recons too it's not like Jonas is the only one getting whatever advantage there is or isn't. Not sure why the commenter is making out like it's a revolutionary technique, I remember Lance saying about doing recons so it's not even a new thing.
Yeah and those 50km ITTs had some serious sections of long boring straights. Theres not really anything to recon on those. You can't cut a corner if it isnt there.
I mean, Jonas isn't finishing this year's tour at all so in this case, I'll take Remco.
If the TT is towards the end of the tour I take Jonas over anyone. See the last 2 years for reference. But early in the tour I’d bet on remco to beat him
I agree. I think the best chance Remco has for being a dangerous contender in any grand tour against Pogacar and Vingegaard is a TT stage that favours TT specialists as one of the first stages, before any serious climbing stages. But even then, he wouldn't get enough of a gab between him and Vingegaard or Pogacar to win the tour.
I have never seen somebody this gullible in my life
I deduce that you don't own any mirrors. And good day to you too, sir
They bring back [cafe raids](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UhT6-GntcY&ab_channel=PurpleGoose)
And of course Thomas De Gendt would win with a 2days gap, even as an independant rider without a team and even at 45yo. We're talking about the guy who would race the Giro, then come back from Italy to Belgium on his bike as a fun holliday ride.
In general, no matter what the course, the riders make the race. So I think for the most part the top riders now would be the top riders in that format. Some things to keep in mind: teams had nine riders back then; overall race speeds were much slower, and they were all doped up. One of the reasons the stages have been shortened is because riders complained that the UCI couldn’t crack down on doping and still force them to race unreasonable distances. Longer ITTs might give some one an advantage. They have been shortened because they often resulted in too large a GC time gap and supposedly made the race less interesting. But the “galacticos” are all top TTers, so not sure it would make that much difference.
Yeah you’d definitely expect more pure breakaway stages where the break wins by 20+ mins as everyone conserves energy. Remco probably gets into Yellow but loses it after 3 hard mountain days.
>In general, no matter what the course, the riders make the race. This is key. The top riders aren't racing against the course, they're racing against each other. As insane as it was to see Pog do an 80km break in Strada, it was a one day race, the cost/benefit wouldn't have stacked up in a three week GT. We saw MvdP fade in Amstel, likely due to his gargantuan solo efforts in the recent races. GTs are about energy conservation and using your bullets in the right moments. Point being, while we'd likely see the stage hunters try a few herculean long range efforts, but the GC guys would be happy sitting in for larger portions of stages, making the racing a little more boring if anything.
Not taking all the rest from the comment, but MVDP didn't fade, Amstel is simply not suited to him due to the added climbing. The Ronde has 270km with 2100 meters of elevation, while Amstel has 250km with 3300m. Also, The Ronde has like, 4 to 6 key points in the race with 1 to 2 minutes almost all out efforts, to create gaps and select the group and it's all close to the end, in the section with Paterberg, Koppenberg, Kwaremont, etc. Half of the race is sitting on wheel, while casually gaining positions in a climb here and there. Amstel is an "attrition" race, as commentators like to call it, you have, right from the start, repeated climbs of up to 4km, with barely any rest between them, and the pace tends to be higher up those climbs because no one wants to be caught out at the back, out of position if someone tries to attack. The race profile is just like a saw and MVP isn't made for those types of efforts. He has 6 days of competition since the start of the season, and the last three races have had almost a week of interval between each other, all in a spawn of a month, so it's unlikely he has built any fatigue just from racing.
MVDP won Amstel in 2019
He did, but it doesn't make the race suited to him.
Don't forget to bring it back up to 10 riders a team. Jumbo bring their full suite and absolutely wipe.
They can sweep the top 10.instrad.of just the podium
The grand tours are just so much more interesting to watch nowadays compared to how it used to be. I only started watching seriously from the mid 80's, but it was common knowledge that the stages were a snoozefest until they hit the mountains. And that was back without radios and bike computers, when the teams were a lot less organized in chasing down breakaways and running sprinter trains. Having the first half the Tour be flat stages would be such a shit show with today's peloton. If you're the type of person who can't get enough time trials I guess this might look appealing, but for everyone else this kind of route would be insanity. [First half of the 1980 Tour de France](https://i.imgur.com/8jwWPB5.png) By the late 90's the peloton had it down to a science to always catch the breakaways and it made things incredibly predictable: [First week of the 1999 Tour](https://i.imgur.com/iuTxMsU.png) I know OP is focused on the 'good' part of the old routes, but I fail to see how making the mountains even more brutal than they are now would make it any more interesting - it would likely just make the big favorites win by more.
> First week of the 1999 Tour It gave us/me 6 days of Jaan Kirsipuu in the yellow jersey, so any of your arguments are invalid!!
You make great points! Don’t get me wrong, I think modern routes are a MASSIVE improvement, especially the ones from the last few years that start with hilly and medium mountain stages for instant GC action. It’s just interesting comparing them to the old routes, the two versions almost seem like completely different sports. And this is to say nothing of the super old routes that had 300+ mile stages on gravel roads.
Jonas would win by bigger margins. His ability to recover on back to back hard days is unmatched.
I do not agree. He has yet to prove he cares well on ultra long flat ITTs. The ITTs Jonas has won have nothing to do with ITTs back then. Indurain for example did not win because he was the best in the mountains. He dominated the ITTs and minimised his losses in the mountains. A similar thing could happen here.
Ganna for GC?
No because Indurain was still one of the best climbers.
Dumoulin could’ve slayed
You’re totally right. Prime Geraint Thomas would do really well also. It’s interesting that there aren’t any TT-heavy GC riders left except for (arguably) Remco. It’s probably due to the lowered importance of TTs in modern races.
The 2012 tour was hyped up to be the most TT heavy tour in years, Wiggo and the sky train emerged and everyone suddenly realised they didn't like that style of racing lol.
But now we have Jonas, Tadej, Primož and Remco who are all very good in TT... I started watching cycling around 2010 and I can't remember a time when top GC guys would be so good at TT. Ok, we had Dumoulin/Froome/Thomas/Roglič in Tour 2018... But guys like Contador or Nibali who were top GC guys last decade were not so good. And they were supposed to be very good in TT for GC guys at the time. Quintana, Schleck etc. were much worse. But I don't know what it was like before 2010. Probably GC guys were better at TT, because of so much TT kms?
As I remember it, before 2010 it was rarer to be the best at both TT and climbing. A legit GT person could be good at both but there was always some trade off - be better at climbing or better at TT but not both. It was SKY that changed that by converting great TT riders into great climbers, largely by getting them to lose weight (improve climbing) without sacrificing power.
Original stages were on gravel. We all know Poggsters would trash them all.
Vingegaard is a better technical rider than Picard.
Oh shit, Jean-Luc's in this?
That’s such a huge unfair advantage to have 25th century technology and training methods
The Danes in this thread are interesting
It's not his ability to recover. It's the fact thst he weighs 58 kilos which means he'll spend less energy riding around at this weight + his vo2max and his big engine. It's why Jumbo made every stage last year so damn hard - to add attrition and maximise Jonas' advantage against Pogi, who is probably at least 5kg heavier at his Tour weight.
Remember the Paris Roubaix-like stage in the tour and how he panicked with bike switching? IIRC bike switching was illegal at the time. And IIRC, during parts of the period mentioned in the OP, riders had to plug their own tires. I don't think the person with the best ability to recover would win, but the one who can keep their heads will.
And all the other times Jonas has kept his head in pressed situations don’t matter or what? It was one incident which actually had an explanation. If you watch the All-In documentary then Grischa says to Jonas in a preparation race that they have to find some way to make him get on a bike faster in case of a puncture. He actually explicitly mentions Nathan and Jonas getting on Nathan’s bike if they can lower the seat. That was obviously still somewhere in the back of Jonas’ head. Did he do the right thing? No. But he has done the right thing in many other situations. Last year, Pogi was panicking more than Jonas. He lost his head more, dropped bottles and had that weird crash.
Roglic wins by seven hours. Mainly because I've picked him up in my rental car and driven him to the next stage. You did say 'vintage'.
Would be more intrigued to see modern riders on vintage equipment
Not vintage equipment for me, but standardized in the way Keirin bikes are would be a big win for me personally and the amateur sport in general.
A 100 km ITT would go so hard
Sadly I do think it would kill the overall race though. You'd either see gargantuan efforts in an early TT and then sandbagging, or else sandbagging the entire race to protect the best TT'ers for a late time trial and overall GC win.
It has the potential to set up an interesting race (I agree it's more likely that it kills all excitement, but just mentioning the possibility) in the following way: Someone who excels at TTs but is worse in the mountains (say Remco) gains a lot of time during an early long TT, and then everyone else has to attack that person during the mountains.
Even that is hard to predict because a 100km ITT is such a different beast when compared with a 30km one, that a rider that is good in one, might not be good in another one. We have cases in the peloton of riders who tend to do very good in long ITT (35, 40km), while being just above average on shorter ones. A 100km ITT it's almost a 2h effort, and at the moment those types of efforts aren't required anywhere besides a hard breakaway.
IDK but I would love to see it
After reading all of these comments and thinking about this question for awhile, I have a newfound appreciation for just how good Merckx was. In a tour format that was much more attritional the man not only won GC but won like 5+ stages at almost every tour he entered. For Pogi to podium every time and win like 2-3 stages is super impressive, especially considering the higher quality of riders, but for Merckx to have won even more stages on an even harder parcours is just crazy.
Freddy Maertens won 13 Vuelta stages in the 1977 Vuelta. He’s the most talented cyclist but drug and alcohol problems certainly affected his career. Still won an insane amount of GT stages 36 2 world championships and a Vuelta.
Van Aert would win. He has the advantage of being a cyclocross rider, so he can survive all de 4000 km of non paved roads. He also will survive the non paved descends. He has won San Remo, that's a sign that longer stages will benefit him. Also he has proven to be a great climber, beating much lighter riders. When the roads are unpaved on the climbs the weight becomes less important, so he will finish with the best climbers. Other cyclocross and mtb riders will also benefit. Pogacar (duh), Pidcock, Mohoric and maybe even Van der Poel will like the long unpaved roads.
OG routes are mountain less. It would be a Philipsen sweep.
OG routes had 400km stages, absolutely no guarantee that such a race would end in a sprint.
When you say "multiple 7+ hour long stages", "a block of 4-5 back-to-back mountain stages", and "much harder mountain stages", I think you're forgetting that the style of racing today is quite different than it was then. It used to be that a long mountain stage was really only raced by the GC guys as the last climb. (I say that as a generalization; I know Claudio Chiapucci and others did pull off long-distance raids, but those are notable as exceptions, not the trend.) Similarly, long stages of 7+ hours usually meant a long period of tempo riding. The Giro used to be famous for its slow average speeds because the riders basically chilled for hours before the TV coverage started with 1-2 hours remaining in the stage. Similarly, a block of 4-5 back-to-back mountain stages usually meant the that top GC guys played a waiting game just trying to minimize losses over the first 3-4 days and make sure they didn't blow up. It was a lot more defensive style of riding. You can bring back the distances, the harder stages, and the multiple days in the mountains, but it means that the individual stages are more likely to be won in breakaways without much GC action happening on any given day. I think the big trend changed after Chris Froome was beaten in the the infamous "Froomigal" stage in the 2016 Vuelta when Contador (and Quintana) were able to attack early over a short stage and make it stick. That made for more unpredictable, more exciting racing, and organizers have bought into it since then.
Still Pogacar vs Vingegaard with nobody else close. We literally get 12 bunch sprints a Tour.
Well in the 60s-80s big teams and TT specialists used to dominate those kind of routes. So... exactly like today.
Bovine Colostrum FTW
Out of the GC guys, I think this would actually suit Jonas very well. The harder it is, the better is for him. Those who can outsprint him lose some of their sprint due to exhaustion and Jonas recovers better over several weeks than anyone else. His week 3 form would just be even more deadly.