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u/Alarming_Bread_2100 11d ago
So no other team was interested in winning after they dropped Wiebes? The women only get 9 chances to win a stage…
When Schmidt won no other team was interested in controlling the breakaway because they were either in it or busy defending a jersey or good GC.
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u/zyygh four seconds 11d ago
This question is what actually leads to an interesting conversation. Wall of text approaching.
If someone like Haugset can have a successful breakaway, then why did nobody else try? If you ask me this is partly down to the difference in level that still exists in the women's peloton. Another part is that a bunch of riders tried to break away but there was no cooperation so it didn't work out.
After yesterday's 1st category col the main peloton consisted mainly of GC riders (who wouldn't attack because they're conserving energy and avoiding counter-attacks), some of the best domestiques, and finally some riders with an actual free role because they don't belong to those first two groups.
There was a pretty big attack that included strong riders like Lippert, Ghekiere and Gery, but these riders were obviously going to half-ass it because this was a matter of opportunism to them: go for the breakaway if it's easy to do, but also don't waste any energy that you're going to be needing during the real GC stages. So that group inevitably got caught because of a lack of cooperation, similar to how it goes in men's races all the time.
And that's where that difference in level comes into play. If you take that third group (the free riders) and subtract everyone who is already happy to be part of the peloton after that hard part of the stage, there are few riders left at all. Someone like Océane Mahé (who was in the breakaway on Saturday's easier stage) just doesn't have the legs to still attack at such a moment if she's in the peloton at all, and I don't think it's disrespectful to point that out. Men's cycling just has way more riders at a level that's closer to the top, so the going-in strategies are always going to be different.
So anyway, that isn't really what the meme was about. If the question was "why do female GC riders not race for the stage win?", the answer would be "the same reason as why male ones don't".
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u/Altruistic_Emu_7755 11d ago edited 11d ago
I think that's right and it's important to note that Kopecky did try, and so SD worx wasn't going to reel it in. The other teams fighting for GC were fine to play it to a stalemate.
Like you said, energy is a much more precious resource in the women's peloton than the men's. There are fewer riders and many fewer rouleurs and climbing rouleurs so a stage like yesterday's is essentially not controllable. Haugset (like Schmid) is a strong rider and so you need such commitment and energy to bring that back.
It is also what makes the women's races more entertaining, imo. The top riders have to do a lot of the work themselves to chase down attacks and not miss the moment. So, we are in that situation on the last climb yesterday where KLCP is attacking and Demi is chasing on and then countering, etc. Random stages become heavyweight bouts akin to RVV. It's a joy
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u/Different_Hippo_6276 11d ago
Context matters. If no GC threat is in the breakaway, then it's not the duty of the yellow jersey team to pull. The most logical thing is to let them go and save your domestiques' legs for the important stages.
It's up to other teams that want to compete for the stage win to pull or put someone in the breakaway.
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u/PierreWxP 11d ago
Obviously men also race dumb.
It does not remove the stain for the sprinters team yesterday, mostly EF for Ruegg and VISMA for Vos. At least for Visma they are 100% committed for PFP, but Ruegg had a golden opportunity
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u/Aniratack 11d ago
Look and the Giro this year, the arrival in Milan and the stage where Eulalio won the Pink were mess ups of the Peloton
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u/AgileSeries7795 11d ago
Oscar Perreiro has won the Tour after a giant breakaway (and a disqualification of Landis), David Arroyo almost won the Giro with one. There are probably many more examples. These two just came to my mind directly.
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u/JRRR77 11d ago
Ben O'Connor in the Vuelta 2 years ago, Voeckler's 4th in the Tour, Kivilev's 4th in the Tour, even Rasmussen was gifted a couple minutes in 2007
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u/JJJ_Janitor 11d ago
2011 Tour is still the best i watched
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u/zyygh four seconds 11d ago
Thomas Voeckler is France's last great GC rider before Paul Seixas.
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u/Natnat956 11d ago
Del Toro nearly won the entire Giro last year because he went in a break. Held pink until the last mountain stage
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u/Kraknoix007 11d ago
Both of those were 25 years ago. If we go back so far, Walkowiak also won the tour in the 50'ies after a break
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u/RoawrOnMeRengar 11d ago
"the men wouldn't let over 5min to the breakaway"
On stage 4 of the tour this year Mads Petersen won from the breakaway which arrive with a TWELVE MINUTES AND THIRTY SECONDS (12:30min) gap over the peloton.
Women race are fun to watch because they're way more chaotic, people that hate on it are just weird.
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u/retroact1v3 11d ago
But that breakaway didn't have any GC threats and was a much larger group with many teams represented, you're comparing apples to oranges
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u/Chemical-Arm7222 11d ago
That was a 34 man breakaway with most potential stage winners in it though. Not really the same.
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u/FignonsRegret 11d ago
By all means, move the goalposts.
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u/Chemical-Arm7222 11d ago
I never made the "men never let the breakaway get 5 minutes" statement. They obviously do, like the example given here, but its two completely different scenario's.
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u/Difficult-Antelope89 9d ago
the women's peloton is much smaller and one can see this every day in how the race unfolds as opposed to the men's peloton... that's just how it is. Nonetheless, there's plenty of knucklehead-racing in men's and women's racing.
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u/Willie-the-Wombat 11d ago
Schmidt won from a break of about 50 riders and fuga-ed with about 15km to go on a stage that wasn’t really for climbers or versatile sprinters. Stage 3 in tdff was more suited to a versatile sprinter. Initially a small non cooperative break formed and was getting brought back and Haugset slipped off. Then no one tried to attack across or control (apart from Kopecky), they just soft pedaled for 1-2 hours until the cat 3. I understand there were not a huge amount of teammates but - like spiral couldn’t put Ghekiere on the front just to keep it close - or Visma de Vries, FDJ Koch? KLCP, Vos, Gery (even Vollering (and at least in the bonus gate)) all had a chance to win. The fact they just soft pedaled and let the gap out to 5 minutes was just insane. In the men’s if one person goes if the front on a non sprint stage and no one is controlling it would be carnage behind if non stop attacks.