2025 Tour de France

[eth-dog]

I'll probably add a poll once we get an idea of who's racing it. Cliff's:

Start in Lille for three days
Going through all five mountainous regions of France
Stages 14 and 18 fighting for the title of Queen stage
Tourmalet, Mont Ventoux, Hautacam as iconic climbs
Entirely in France, first time since 2020

7 Flat stages
6 hilly stages
6 mountain stages
2x ITT (one flat, one mountain, 44 km worth of ITT).

Initial thoughts have this favouring the big 2 but a couple of Roglic stages and it's hard to see Remco doing this over the Giro with only 44 km worth of time trailing and the second of which he probably loses time, with barely any flat for him to power through. I'd have one less flat and one more mountain, and swap the first ITT for a TTT but minor quibbles.

Easily Prodhomme's best course for a while despite the above.

 

[Orange Agent]

I think Remco will do it. Also think BOC would have been a definite starter before the announcement but maybe not now, the long climbs are probably too much for him. The lesser gradients in France suit him more than Italy and Spain but this is not what he would have wanted. Vingegaard would be very happy today, it's now up to Visma to get the team right for him here, a lot falls to Wout because I don't think they've improved thier roster in terms of support. Simon Yates has never played this role.

 

[eth-dog]

I think Remco will do it. Also think BOC would have been a definite starter before the announcement but maybe not now, the long climbs are probably too much for him. The lesser gradients in France suit him more than Italy and Spain but this is not what he would have wanted. Vingegaard would be very happy today, it's now up to Visma to get the team right for him here, a lot falls to Wout because I don't think they've improved thier roster in terms of support. Simon Yates has never played this role.

Remco might do it but I think his main goal should be the Giro, this parcourse suits the other three far more than him.

He did for his brother once. I think Kuss will be the main guy, he won't have to do the Giro. Wout I think will want to be co leader at the Giro with Yates and then you'll get Jorgenson, Kuss and Yates as the main guys for support

I think this parcourse really suits Zana from a Jayco perspective. Ben said he wants the Tour but I think the steep ascents push him from a maybe top 5 to a probable 8-15 finish.