(Photo: Michael Woods on the way to winning Stage 7 – Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
A bit rushed today so please excuse my typos.
Tomorrow is big. Tomorrow we find out you can’t win the Vuelta. The GC picture will take a more chiseled shape, and someone in the Top 10 will lose minutes.
I like Primoz Roglic for tomorrow. He’s been riding strong, and my belief is that Sunday was a fluke. A near disaster caused by a rain jacket. Hmm.
The final climb tomorrow is very difficult – the Alto de Moncalvillo is 8 and bit kilometers long with a sustained gradient of 9-10%. Those who don’t have the legs will go backwards quickly.
It will be interesting to see which team(s), if any, try to take control at the front, both for the majority of the stage and on the final climb. Movistar has been more active than usual – today’s move of bridging Valverde to the break was yet another masterclass in stealing the Teams Classification when the Spaniard moved into the Top 10 Overall.
Tomorrow we see if Mas is strong enough. He is riding well and incredibly consistent, but tomorrow is a true test, and I fear he might not have the goods. I think Marc Soler will become Movistar’s man tomorrow. With the flattening off in the last kilometers, I see Soler attacking early, with say, 4-5km to go, and getting enough of a gap to take the stage win ahead of the GC favorites.
Two more riders to watch: Hugh Carthy and Esteban Chaves. The former looks incredibly strong and has been thrust into the role of team leader not unlike his countryman, Tao Geoghegan Hart, at the Giro. The latter is experiencing a rennaisaance of form, but still he is missing that top end. The Top 10 seems to be the place for Chaves now, but if his legs come good, he could all of a sudden be challenging for the podium.
Our predictions went well again yesterday, with Storer, Martin, and Wellens all making the original break before it swelled to over 30. Martin needs a summit finish in order to get a stage win, but man he is certainly trying. Few picked Woods today because of the downhill and flat run-in to the finish, but the GC/breakaway battle to work in the break played into the Canadian’s favour. He looks like one of the strongest riders in the race at the moment, and it makes you wonder where he would’ve been in GC had he not crashed and lost heaps of times early in the Vuelta.
I’ll stick with the GC group to take the stage tomorrow, with Soler coming out on top ahead of Roglic who leads in the chase 30 seconds later. I think we could see Valverde crack after his big effort today. Stay tuned for tomorrow – if you have the time, watch it. It’ll be a good one.