So we just use this thread?
(It would be my preference)
Why not? The thread title is “Tour de France 2023”, no gender specified.
I agee,
I’m really torn between rooting for van Vleuten and Vollering.
One would set an almost unassailable record worthy of her remarkable career, the other would finally get the win this season she richly deserves.
The 2020 Tour thread ended up discussing the World’s and several of the re-scheduled-from-spring-because-covid classics. I tried to start a general purpose World Tour racing thread in '21, but it garnered very little interest. This thread will work better for generating discussion than a new thread would.
OP here and I don’t think I should get any more voice than anyone else, but if it matters, I’m 100% in favor of continuing to use this thread.
Great victory today for the young (23) Ricarda Bauernfeind in a solo flight that began about 40 km before the finish. It was supposed to be a sprint stage, but the riders were so exhausted from yesterday’s stage and the heat that the peloton exploded early in the stage and in the end consisted of only about 25 riders, most of them GC aspirants and no sprinters. The commentators on Eurosport pointed out that after five stages, with two wins the German riders are as successful as the Dutch, which is sensational.
Showdown time. Van Vleuten, Vollering, and Niewiadoma alone in a lead group on Col d’Aspin, with Col du Tourmalet to come.Last year’s podium, and quite likely this year’s as well.
Dangerous game here. Kasia Niewiadoma clips off the front on the descent of the Col d’Aspin. Van Vleuten is trying to make Vollering help her close the gap, but Vollering has Reusser and Kopecky in a group 30" back and won’t do any work, so the pair of them are losing buckets of time to Niewiadoma. Probably Kasia will lose a bunch of time to Annemiek and Demi in the ITT tomorrow, and there’s a decent chance they catch her on the Tourmalet today, but as I type this she’s gained a minute on the pair of favourites who are just about caught by the group behind.
Yes, that was dangerous and crazy. Allegedly there’s lot of bad blood between Van Vleuten and Vollering, so neither wanted to lead for the other. But now that the group has caught up to them, they have a good chance to catch Niewiadoma before the finish (only a 30 second gap at the moment I type this, which is virtually nothing at the foot of the Tourmalet).
I think van Vleuten and the Dutch riders on SDWorks don’t get along great because she feels like they ride for each other more than her on the Dutch team in Worlds/European Championship/Olympics.
Niewiadoma still 43" ahead of the group behind with 6km to go, and somehow Kopecky is still in the main favourites group. Okay, maybe not, Vollering just pushing on and dropping everyone but Annemiek. It’s on now. Gaps to van Vleuten already? Into the fog. Oh, this is very good stuff.
Okay, how is there no camera on van Vleuten at this point? Can’t see anything in the fog. Vollering in the lead with Niewiadoma 15" back, Kopecky 1’ back now, van Vleuten somehwere in between the latter two.
Yeah, the fog makes it doubly exciting.
Vollering has this race in the bag assuming she doesn’t crash out on the ITT tomorrow, I think. It’s starting to look like Annemiek isn’t going to overtake Niewiadoma for second on the stage which I think guarantees Kasia the polka dots, though we’re getting Italian time gaps here.
(For those who don’t follow cycling as much, the Giro d’Italia is famous for unreliable time gaps.)
It’s obviously due to the weather today. We’ll probably see the next real time gaps only at the finish.
Well it’s generally due to weather at the Giro, too. 
True. 
Actual gaps to Vollering are a lot bigger than they were showing, looks like.
Can’t believe how little we’ve seen van Vleuten on this climb.
LOL @ Niewiadoma dropping F-bombs being interviewed. She doesn’t seem to have any more of a filter than Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig.
Damn, I missed that, was only listening with half an ear. The first sentence from her I caught was “I’m sorry, English is not my first language.”, and I wondered why she said that because her English was flawless. Did she refer to her F-bombs there?
Matt: Kasia, what a brave brave ride. One of the performances of your career. You were out in front so long, battled to second place. Describe the feelings.
Kasia: It’s amazing, cuz to be honest, I mean, I’m so happy that all the hard work paid off. Like all the races so far I was thinking out what were my weaknesses, why was I dropping from Demi’s wheel. And finally when I had time to go for a training camp together with my coach we just focused only on my weaknesses. So I knew the moment normally when I dropped, but I promised myself that I wouldn’t stop riding out of the saddle unless Annemiek would do so cuz that’s normally how I would get dropped, from her out of the saddle hard pace. I’m just fucking proud of my team and myself and everyone who helped me to be there because there team worked so long and so hard. So fuck yeah. Sorry for my language, English is not my first language.
Matt: It’s an emotional day. You went clear on the bottom of the descent. We know how well you can descend, but did you expect to be given such a big lead, because behind we actually saw Annemiek putting on the brakes and you just road away and you just seized the moment.
(Demi interrupts to congratulate Kasia, says “Superstar” Kasia says “Thank you. You too, girl. Wow.”)
Kasia: I knew it, because I did it on purpose. I saw how they were competing with each other. In Polish we have this saying that if the two are fighting then the third one is winning. I was just hoping to get them involved with themselves and look for my own opportunity. The thing was the group behind got back and Marion was chasing me down and the first part is quite steady and very powerful and I just didn’t want to go back to the group and I knew that I prefer to ride my own pace and then I totally feel stronger on my own.
Matt: Thank you so much.
As you say, her English is perfect. She was just using it as an excuse for the fucks, which is where I lolled.
For those who didn’t see it, this was just moments after they crossed the line. Niewiadoma was still sitting on the road next to her bike.