The riders have enjoyed a rest-day in Santander, Remco’s polka dot jersey has had a good wash and airing and his bike has had a good battery charge for the secret hidden E motor…
I do find the events of Friday’s Stage 13 rather suspicious; Remco has an off-day along with his loyal Soudal-Quick Step team and they enjoy a leisurely ride and to finish with a 27 minute deficit; and by doing so have fresher legs the following day, and Remco is allowed to breakaway (due to the 27 minute deficit) and proceeds to wipe the floor with everybody to a stage victory after winning every KOM sprint to earn 43 points in one day; the most one rider can possible win on Stage 14. For his outstanding effort they award him the Stage victory, the Polka Dot jersey, and the stage combatively price.
If the off-day was a strategy of skulduggery to bow out of the GC with the aim to go stage hunting then it is a very clever trick indeed, there is no rule or Pyrenean by-law against such a cunning plan, and it has added an interesting dynamic to the usual grand tour protocol. I remain very impressed with the Soudal Team tactical deviosity
A short flat stage ending with a 5km kicker summit finish that is just too long and steep for a proper sprinters finish.
Looks innocent enough but tomorrow’s stage 17 beckons with brutal ascents so they may simply choose to let a GC non-threat breakaway go on ahead …i wonder if Remco will be init?
Well that turned out to be very exciting. Even more so than the cycling was The Breakaway look back on the stage on Eurosport. First time I’ve seen Sean Kelly virtually shaking with anger at the massive disrespect shown by Roglic and Vingegaard to Sepp Kuss who has provided them with stalwart support over the years. If you didn’t manage to catch the closing moments of the stage, the last climb was a bit of a killer. The three of them were stuck together and Roglic decided to increase the tempo despite Kuss very quickly dropping off the rear. Instead of respecting the red jersey and their team mate, the pair of them made off in what appeared to be a blatant attempt to not just win the stage but (opinion of course, shared with the studio presenters) also to grab the red jersey.
I can’t imagine team Jumbo-Visma is a happy one tonight after that terrible show of individual power against one of their loyal servants and I wonder what their team manager had to say in the hotel. Certainly hope Sean Kelly doesn’t bump into the pair of them for what was clearly in his mind’s eye a red line crossed.
It doesn’t seem to sit well having two Grand Tour winners heading the same team, i think that is where the issue lies. Sepp has done well to hang on to the Red Jersey considering he has a past reputation for having an occasional off-day so maybe Jonas and Primož know something we don’t (?)
Hopefully Sepp will recover after today’s onslaught, it’s another extremely tough stage tomorrow.
The biggest victim today was Marc Soler, he made a fist of it, attacking in an effort to catch Remco, but this tactic didn’t go to plan for him on Altu de L’Angliru, he drops 7 places out of the GC top ten to 13th position.
Remco has built up such a large lead in the KOM he will probably be wearing the Polka Dot jersey in Madrid.
In the vid above there is a mention of Antonio Tiberi the animal abuser who deliberately and callously murdered a pet cat.
This happened earlier this year while he was a member of Trek-Segafredo.
All credit to Trek-Segafredo ( now Lidl Trek ) for quickly and decisively booting him out of their team.
However a disgraceful decision on the part of Bahrain-Victorious for their decision to sign-up this nasty criminal.
Another monumental stage victory for Remco Evenepoel, and again after winning the maximum ( 38 ) KOM points that one rider can achieve in this stage. Also his accumulation of sprint points is starting to challenge the leadership of Kaden Groves, however with the three remaining stages it looks probably Kaden will wear the Green Jersey in Madrid.
Sepp Kuss extended his lead slightly today, his two Grand Tour winning super-domestiques on their best behaviour as they approached the finish line.
Whilst Remco owns the KOM Polka Dot Jersey, the Green Points Classification Jersey is firmly on the shoulders of Kaden Groves, however his leadership is not secure with Remco’s day to day accumulation of sprint points.
Kaden will be out to stock up on points today and even if he doesn’t win the stage he should be okay winning enough points, and meanwhile Remco should have an easy ride today to recover from his epic performance of yesterday, and to save energy for tomorrow’s very long 208km hilly which he will want to win.
Points to be gained in the Points Classification today:
Sprint | Mojados (at 157.8 km) 20,17,15,13,10
Points at finish 50,30,20,18,16,14,12,10,8,7,6,5,4,2,2
<<>> <<>> <<>> <<>>
Sepp Kuss Jumbo-Visma Kaden Groves Alpecin-Deceuninck Remco Evenepoel Soudal - Quick Step Juan Ayuso UAE Team Emirates
Team Jayco AlUla
Astana Qazaqstan Team
Sepp Kuss 
Jumbo-Visma
Kaden Groves 
Alpecin-Deceuninck
Remco Evenepoel 
Soudal - Quick Step
Juan Ayuso 
Jumbo-Visma 2:38:23
TotalEnergies
Jumbo-Visma 3:15:56
Team Classification after Stage 18
Team dsm - firmenich