The Danish nutter could have waited for the final little climb, he could have waited for the last series of little climbs 10 km from the line, he could have waited for the first loop of the circuit 30 km from the line, he could have waited for the last categorised climb 40 km from the line; but no, he didn't even wait for the first passage on that categorised climb 60 km from the line, he attacked almost 10 km earlier than that, almost 70 km from the line! I wondered if he didn't consider that, should things go wrong, it would serve as training for a World/European championship, but as he is going on the Tour of Spain, that's not likely.

He was close to being caught a couple of times, but he could count with the usual idiocy of the chasing peloton: riding hard in climbs and, as a consequence, losing manpower and good will on the following flatter roads were a big group should have a great advantage over a small or solo breakaway, if only they could ride orderly.

I remember one moment when one Uno-X comes on the front of the peloton faster than anyone, and then... doesn't pull but just stops pedalling. It was like they had a man at the front of the race and he wanted to break the chase, except he had no one any more at the front. By the way, Uno-X completely vanished in the last miles. A disappearance worth a magic trick 😀

Visma wasn't much better. I always found the hype around Zingle overrated. Anyway, that's his comeback race after a long break caused by a crash, and perhaps Visma had nothing better in stock than Van Baarle and him. Laporte will come back for his first race in 2025 (!) on Sunday in Hamburg; I would rather have seen him in Denmark if he was ready, as Hamburg's startlist will be too hard for him, and I am not sure he can be much useful as a domestique there, but perhaps they preferred to see him on a one-day race.

The young Blaise and l'Hôte from Decathlon aren't bad. Same for the older Beton guy Larsen and, perhaps more discreetly, Kubish from Unibet.

[–] Deschanel2017 1 points 1 day ago

I always found the hype around Zingle overrated.

Naturally, he was that close to win today, just to annoy me! 😀

I am not sure Lidl-Trek played it very well, choosing to favour collaboration in the breakaway, especially after they saw that Zingle was easy. It is strange because their very first strategy seemed to have been harassment, when Pedersen left a split after his 2 teammates, and Zingle (I think it was him?) had to make an effort to close the gap. It was his only chasing effort, by the way, as someone else always did for him.

[–] EvilCartyen@feddit.dk 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah, that was a fun stage, you have to hand it to Pedersen - he's never boring! I can't wait to see him in the Vuelta, he will go for the points jersey and in this shape he is likely to win a couple of stages too.

I am pretty sure he'll go on to do the European Championships as well, actually, he's been talking about the TT in his podcast (Lang Distance) saying it's his best shot of an international TT title ever.

[–] Deschanel2017 1 points 1 day ago

I am pretty sure he’ll go on to do the European Championships as well, actually, he’s been talking about the TT in his podcast (Lang Distance) saying it’s his best shot of an international TT title ever.

Yeah. The main issue I see is that many riders don't wanna go to the World Championship this year, so more of them will wish to take part in the European Championship than in other years.

Otherwise, the European Championship this year will be pretty much like the Spring classics “Boucles Drôme-Ardèche”, the mass start being like the Ardèche race, and the TT like a small bit of the Drôme race.

The TT is short (again, this same problem of willing the women to ride the same length as the men, which ends up with everyone riding only a short distance).

It looks like they don't climb the whole Allex wall like thy do on the Drôme classic; if they did it should be as high as the final wall. They made it easier for TT bikes, I guess.

And here is the mass start race:

The 2 climbs are the same as on the Drôme classic, just repeated more often.

[–] EvilCartyen@feddit.dk 2 points 2 days ago

Niklas Larsen has been killing it, same with Julius Johansen. I expect to see Larsen in the pro field again next year, and I would be surprised if Johansen doesn't find a spot somewhere, even if it isn't with UAE.

[–] Deschanel2027@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

Compared to Poland where everyone rode for a sprint/punch finish no matter what course the organiser proposed, it makes a big difference when there is at least one audacious half-mutant on the race.

Thank you, Mads🇩🇰. And congratulations to all those (80% Danish!) which managed to follow, from the bunch or the breakaway. Almost all Conti teams riders...

Bad luck for the Decathlon (Conti development team) Norwegian guy Dahl🇳🇴 who lost the wheels a few miles from the goal and was caught up by the bunch. Haugsted🇩🇰 (Coloquick) always looked like he was going to be dropped any minute in the final part, but he managed to finish 3^rd^.

The drawback of the 40 seconds gap over the bunch created by this attack on the first stage, is that stages #4 and #5 will probably be ridden very defensively.

I don't understand how, on the classification published on PCS at the moment, many gaps of 1 single second are reported. That's not completely impossible, but almost impossible within a group (because the last guy before the split passes significantly later than the first one which is the subgroup reference time). So it's basically impossible to have 10 guys counted at time 0, 10 guys at time +1s, 10 guys at time +2s like it is shown now. Perhaps will it be modified.

[–] EvilCartyen@feddit.dk 2 points 5 days ago

Pretty entertaining for a mostly flat course with a couple of steep climbs, and good for the race that Lidl-Trek and Mads Pedersen likes to ride on the offense! I was very impressed that Haugsted managed to hang on for the sprint, even more that he managed to come third. I see he's won Frankfurt-Eschborn U23 this year so this type of terrain and course must be his force.

Not a strong field this year, but the Danish conti-riders are actually really strong. This type of hardman race is what they all do every weekend at local races, so I am not surprised so many managed to hang on. We will see them drop when the distance goes to 220 like on the Vejle-stage, most of them do 150-180 races max.

I agree about the timings, I expect them to be corrected unless it's a new sort of timekeeping system.

[–] EvilCartyen@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

True to form, Danish national broadcaster DR posted a list of favourites featuring Arnaud de Lie who's not on the list of starting riders :D

[–] Deschanel2027@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago

In their defence, it seems that De Lie was on the list until recently.

Også sidste års vinder Arnaud De Lie er på den foreløbige startliste til PostNord Danmark Rundt. Han vender tilbage med Lotto-mandskabet for at forsvare sin titel sammen med blandt andre danske Jonas Gregaard og et af cykelsportens store talenter 22-årige Alec Segaert.

I don't exactly know when this official article by the organiser was published, but the same bits of information made their way to several new outlets 4 days ago.