Tag: stefan kung

Le Tour ’22 Stages 1-3 – A farmers son from Belgium

by James Warrener, posted in Blog, News, racing

As with the previous couple of years, I will write a post grouping key stages together (rather than doing each one on its own as I did the summer I was out of work!).

It feels right to cluster the whole of the Grand Depart together and to talk Denmark in totality with the massive pile of positives (experiences not doping tests) to take out of it.

Whilst on the subject of doping there was a lot of pre-race nosing into the business of Bahrain-Victorious but as of yet there is nothing concrete to report on the team or its riders. As Groupama-FDJ rider Stefan Kung said, the authorities either need to charge them or apologise for picking on them. Let’s leave that there…

The first stage time trial produced a major upset. Despite most of the other Specialized riders wearing a funny bank robber snood as part of their new helmets, it was standard lid wearer Yves Lampaert who put the other favourites in their place with a great win.

Lampaert was nervy watching the remaining riders finish before producing what on day 1 will be the quote of the race in relation to his ascent to the yellow jersey.

“I am just a farmer son from Belgium”

After trying to for years to land a big win in the Flemish classics, it was a tour time trial that thrust Lampaert into the spotlight. Irony.

The first road stage saw the “Grand Belt” bridge take star billing. Will it ever be as iconic as a strip of cobbles or mountain pass?

Probably not. It also didn’t have the impact that the Passage des Gois seems to have when that coastal route is used, mainly as the wind didn’t blow.

After a length break including home rider Magnus Cort Nielsen hoovering up all of the King of the Mountains points the race was together hitting the bridge.

There was a crash involving the yellow jersey and within the 3km limit which held up defending champion Tadej Pogacar but in the main it was fairly standard stuff.

Fabio Jakobsen kept up the 100% record of Quickstep winning the opening two stages ending his journey back to success following his Polish crash 18 months ago.

Cort took his chance again on stage 3, heading off alone to take some king of the mountains points but finding no other riders willing to join him.

He had a brilliant day out in his homeland taking a heroes welcome in each town and village. In fact there barely looked a spot on the side of the road all weekend with people lined up to see the race everywhere.

It was one of, if not, the best Grand Depart I can remember.

There was a crash outside the 3km limit which saw a few riders ship time but a sprint was pretty much guaranteed. This time it was Dylan Groenewegen who had his turn at redemption (also as a result of the Tour of Poland crash) winning from Wout Van Aert who has been in second place in each of the stages so far.

The race had an early break yesterday heading back to its homeland from Denmark ready for some tough looking northern French stages starting today.

Ineos show their classic mettle in Hell

by James Warrener, posted in beer, Blog, News, racing

After a midweek of Magnus Sheffield winning and team dominance, along with an Amstel Gold success, Ineos Grenadiers had showed they were truly on the road to being a classics squad by taking the big one.

RnkRiderTeamUCIPntTime
1 VAN BAARLE DylanINEOS Grenadiers5002755:37:00
2 VAN AERT WoutJumbo-Visma4002001:47
3 KÜNG StefanGroupama – FDJ325150,,
4 DEVRIENDT TomIntermarché – Wanty – Gobert Matériaux275120,,
5 MOHORIČ MatejBahrain – Victorious225100,,
6 PETIT AdrienIntermarché – Wanty – Gobert Matériaux175902:27
7 STUYVEN JasperTrek – Segafredo15080,,
8 PICHON LaurentTeam Arkéa Samsic12570,,
9 VAN DER POEL MathieuAlpecin-Fenix100602:34
10 LAMPAERT YvesQuick-Step Alpha Vinyl Team85502:59
From procyclingstats

Dylan Van Baarle proved that three attacks is too many but two just enough when he made his way across to the 2nd threatening break of the day and dropped them to head into Roubaix with a hefty winning margin.

The truth is that this was a win set up nearer the start than the finish of the race. In a slight crosswind his team put all 7 riders into a move that took until the 2nd sector of cobbles to pull back. Pre-race favourites Mathieu Van de Poel and Wout Van Aert had to use more riders than they would have hoped in getting it back.

This left the Grenadiers with plenty of riders on the front foot and at the head of the race. In their old more defensive style of riding, the travails of Fillipo Ganna would have been enough to derail their plan, but whilst it was bad news for the Italian, the mechanicals that had him dropped and having to chase alone didn’t affect the strategy. They had riders in abundance.

There were, however, riders clear at the key point in Arenberg forest and Milan San-Remo winner Matej Mohoric was proving to be no one trick pony in forcing the pace at the front. But with Ben Turner pushing on behind in the group of favourites and keeping things in check, Ineos didn’t panic.

Mohoric came back to them when hW Hs a puncture and Van Baarle made his first move driving the final selection away. This was despite the spirited Tom Devrient remaining clear from the initial breakaway.

The second Van Baarle attack was clinical and final with only Van Aert trying to respond, the rest were on their knees at this point.

But despite having Devrient, Stefan Kung and Mohoric back after his mechanical, they couldn’t get close to the Dutchman whose lead grew all the way through the final sectors and on into Roubaix.

Seeing Sir Dave Brailsford and Van Baarle embrace in the famous velodrome at the end of the race showed that despite having won Amstel and Liege-Bastogne-Liege (with Wout Poels) this was the one they wanted. And it was worth the 12 year wait to get it.

The fact that Quickstep continued their nightmare spring might have added a bit of gloss to the win and the feelings of joy perhaps? who knows?

But with the Ardennes coming up it will be interesting to see if that drought can end for the Belgian super team.

‘Chasing Rainbows’ – 2020 World Cycling Championships…

by James Warrener, posted in Blog, News, racing

The last minute, re-arranged World Cycling Championships were very good considering all of the stress and alterations to the venue in the run up.

Naturally it was a shame not to see U23 competitions and the team time trial (especially seeing as how controversial it was when it came in). But the events we did get to see where entertaining and with deserving winners.

RnkRiderTeamUCIPntAvgTime
1 VAN DER BREGGEN AnnaNetherlands35010047.15740:20
2 REUSSER MarlenSwitzerland2507046.8670:15
3 VAN DIJK EllenNetherlands2004046.5610:31
4 BRENNAUER LisaGermany1503046.2960:45
5 BROWN GraceAustralia1252545.9981:01
6 NEBEN AmberUnited States1002045.6481:20
7 NORSGAARD Emma CecilieDenmark851545.6121:22
8 KRÖGER MiekeGermany701045.4481:31
9 STEPHENS LaurenUnited States60945.2321:43
10 BUSSI VittoriaItaly50845.1781:46

Anna Van Der Breggen was a narrow winner of the Womens TT with Marlen Reusser at only 15 seconds and Ellen Van Dyke only a second away from a 30 second blanket being able to be thrown over the podium.

RnkRiderTeamUCIPntTime
1 VAN DER BREGGEN AnnaNetherlands6002004:09:57
2 VAN VLEUTEN AnnemiekNetherlands4751701:20
3 LONGO BORGHINI ElisaItaly400140,,
4 VOS MarianneNetherlands3251302:01
5 LIPPERT LianeGermany275120,,
6 DEIGNAN ElizabethGreat Britain225110,,
7 NIEWIADOMA KatarzynaPoland175100,,
8 LUDWIG Cecilie UttrupDenmark150902:41
9 BRENNAUER LisaGermany125803:08
10 REUSSER MarlenSwitzerland10070,

The road race was less close with Van Der Breggen doing the double. Special mention must go to her team mate and rival Annamiek Van Vleuten who came home for a silver medal despite recently suffering a fracture of her wrist.

As with the womens events, the mens were dominated by the big names of the sport with Fillipo Ganna winning the time trial ahead of Wout Van Aert (who bagged a pair of silver medals) and Stefan Kung who had left the Tour de France early to prepare for this event.

The weather was unpredictable with howling wind and cloud closing in and pulling out all through the event. At one point a cloud burst looked inevitable and this would have given an advantage to the early starters. But it didn’t materialise.

It was interesting to see that despite a pretty bland circuit and shortened distance the riders made the event and that was exactly what the championships needed to be successful.

RnkRiderTeamUCIPntAvgTime
1 GANNA FilippoItaly35025052.98135:54
2 VAN AERT WoutBelgium25019052.3490:26
3 KÜNG StefanSwitzerland20014052.2770:29
4 THOMAS GeraintGreat Britain15011052.0860:37
5 DENNIS RohanAustralia12510052.0380:39
6 ASGREEN KasperDenmark1009051.8490:47
7 CAVAGNA RémiFrance858051.8260:48
8 CAMPENAERTS VictorBelgium707051.7320:52
9 DOWSETT AlexGreat Britain606051.4051:06
10 DUMOULIN TomNetherlands505051.2211:14

The final event of the weekend was the mens road race which I settled down to watch with a beer after 80km of hard, windy riding of my own Sunday morning.

The breakaway were kept at a suitable arms length going into the latter stages of the race before Tadej Pogacar rocketed out of the front of the pack with a lap and a half to go.

He managed to get a good distance before fading, but it was a clear plan to soften the race up for his team mate Primoz Roglic.

Whether Roglic didn’t feel too great I don’t know. But he didn’t seem capable of getting out of the wheels when the likes of Tom Dumoulin and Greg Van Avermaet went off up the road.

The attack that did stick came from Julian Alaphillippe who went clear on the penultimate climb before following the Pogacar blueprint from previous laps and digging in on the plateau and rolling section of road.

He then made good on the decent into the Formula 1 circuit before stretching his narrow lead in the final kilometer as the chasers started to disfunction and settle for the lower places.

RnkRiderTeamUCIPntTime
1 ALAPHILIPPE JulianFrance6003506:38:34
2 VAN AERT WoutBelgium4752600:24
3 HIRSCHI MarcSwitzerland400190,,
4 KWIATKOWSKI MichałPoland325150,,
5 FUGLSANG JakobDenmark275130,,
6 ROGLIČ PrimožSlovenia225110,,
7 MATTHEWS MichaelAustralia1751000:53
8 VALVERDE AlejandroSpain15090,,
9 SCHACHMANN MaximilianGermany12580,,
10 CARUSO DamianoItaly10070,,

Van Aert came home second as previously mentioned with man of the month Marc Hirschi finishing off the podium places.

We now have a really short break before the Eneco Tour this week, Ardennes Classics on Wednesday and Sunday and the Giro starting Saturday.

Bring it on!