Primoz Roglic does not consider himself the clear favorite for this Tour. A trick to put the weight of the race on Tadej Pogacar and his teammates?
José De Cauwer: “He won, but Roglic was the man of the Tour last year. Is there a difference now? They are equally far.”
“One is not more favorite than the other. It is not that Pogacar now has an advantage due to his overall victory last year.”
“There are 3 teams able to control the peloton and that is enough to not see much in the battle for yellow”, suggests Michel Wuyts.
“Unless one of those teams takes a different approach and opts for guerrilla warfare. Then I think of Ineos Grenadiers: they can put Geraint Thomas with the Slovenians and have Richard Carapaz attack. That would be interesting.”
“Carapaz can and dares to do that. He did it in the Vuelta last year,” recalls José De Cauwer. “We are talking about 2 big names, but Ineos can play an important role.”
With Geraint Thomas, the British have an ex-winner in their ranks. “With two time trials on this course you would think he would have an edge, but his time trials in Romandie (3rd) and the Dauphiné (10th) were not enough for me,” says our commentator.
Michel Wuyts gives Roglic an edge in the chronos, José De Cauwer warns: “If Pogacar is the better in the first time trial, you will get a stressful situation.”
“Making it happen again on the last time trial on the penultimate day: they will all be afraid of that. If it has to happen there again, it will be dangerous.”
Our commentary duo also paid attention to Movistar, which has a lot of irons in the fire with Miguel Angel Lopez, Enric Mas, Alejandro Valverde and Marc Soler.
“It seems to match,” says Michel Wuyts about the multitude of leaders. “They know their place, provided the old one (Valverde) can do his thing for once.”
“He has it for Mas, but I saw him do nice things for Lopez in the Dauphiné. It clicks better than with Nairo Quintana.”
José De Cauwer does not rule out “a weird Tour”. “We expect a big battle between Jumbo-Visma and UAE, but make sure they don’t look at each other along the way.”
Michel Wuyts contradicts that: “I don’t think it will be a big battle between Jumbo-Visma and UAE.”
“They will become natural allies in the knowledge that Movistar and Astana will pick days where they are allies and want to drive someone into loss. Then I see the Slovenians play friends along the way and make things right for each other.”
