That's it now Sky, BACK YOUR MAN! Geraint has to be proven to be the strongest rider now.
Part of me thinks that this was Sky's plan all along, for a Thomas win. I don't know why many journo's aren't even mooting that as a strategy, but if it actually was (and we may never know!) it was a genius move by Team Sky. Perhaps they knew Froome was still tired from the Giro and that really their best bet was the man who just won the Dauphine....? All part of a big plan? I think so...
Have to agree, yet Sky where very clever if that was their plan all along - equally they knew that both Froome and Thomas are great TT'ers so quite happy for them to decide things on the road rather than having a specific hierarchy from Day 1. I guess that's the benefit of having an early TT to decide things on a GC viewpoint for the viewers, but also why it almost dictates the tactics of teams like Sky which might otherwise have been more tested to make hard decisions themselves on the road (like Landa/Thomas in the Giro). I do like time gaps nice and early in a GT as keeps things interesting even through the early sprint stages, but it can lead to riders 'defending' their time gaps quite early in a Tour when it should be more about attacking!
It's been a good tour this year. As was said when the tour route was announced it has been designed to not play to Froome's strengths. It's funny but the most decisive point in the tour was day 1 when Froome, Porte, Yates and Quintana lost time. It may have been a different tour had we gone into the Alps with those lot in the race on the same time as Thomas.
Thomas has really improved his climbing since dropping track racing and really looks good and plainly the stages of this years tour suit him.
Yup he really grew into the yellow jersey as the race drew on. He really did seem to be in fantastic form from the outset, brilliant to see, but equally quite shocked to see Froome missing peak form. I'm not convinced he even found it in that 3rd week. Either over trained or over raced?!
Quintana should be docked time for that spell behind their car yesterday. Dumoulin got done for exactly same thing when it was a lot more impact to the GC involved in the penalty. I know the car drafting happens but if they are going to lead by example on a race favourite in one situation but not in the other, what is the point?
Yup. No consistency between the application of rules across various cyclists. Such is the UCI constantly though!
Well I have to eat my words. Never ever expected GT to win, not even in the top 10 of the starting riders I’d have picked.
Avoided all bad luck for three weeks which nobody else managed to do and looked strong all the time.
Got to agree, surprised win but absolutely justified. Really genuine performance and his post-race interviews have been good. Maybe a little too 'Sky media PC'. Admittedly he's not been asked many difficult questions like Froome would generally get asked (and then his responses picked to pieces afterwards).
We/I knew G could perform like that but wasn't sure if he could mark out a Quintana/Porte/Landa/Valverde late GC single stage breakaway style massive attack (not to mention having 'good luck' he's usually lacked!). Thankfully he didn't need to! Roglic was supreme to watch, almost feel sorry for him missing out on the podium. I'm a Froome fan, but think of all the top 3 he was the lest deserving to be there based on performance.
Amazing ride by Dumoulin, so consistent and he's turned into an incredible climber now - but he wasn't overly attacked like we've seen before to test him.