this post was submitted on 06 Jun 2025
4 points (83.3% liked)
procycling
571 readers
5 users here now
for news and discussion of professional cycling
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Stage 5
The time trial is past, we go back to the scheme of the first stage, cranking the difficulty a bit up again, and also packing those climbs in the second half of the stage. Despite what I just said, there is just a tiny bump in the last 30 kilometres, so everything is actually packed in the 3^rd^ quarter of the race, which won't offer much rest.
J. Milan finally found his climbing legs! Unfortunately, he lost his sprinting legs in the process.
Despite the playing field which was proposed, many teams preferred to race for a sprint today.
It was quite a surprise to see Stewart come out of nothing for that win, but very deserved and well done!
(Caveat: I didn't see any replay of the final, so I only have my first impression – which often turns out faulty after checking – as a base...) With the curves, positioning played a big role, it didn't look like anyone could produce a really big kick in the last straight line. Then a legless Milan went backwards, and Van der Poel was cooked by his efforts in the previous mile to keep position because he worn his teammates out earlier (also possibly a bit by his staying at the very front of the peloton in the last climb); Penhoët was simply being Penhoët: this guy always finishes around the 5^th^ place, no matter who the guys ahead of him are, you'd put him in a local junior race, he would still finish 4^th^ 😄