DISCUSSION Criterium du Dauphiné Stage 3 | Mathieu van der Poel is a marked man; lack of full stage coverage and more...

Stage 3 of the Criterium du Dauphiné, as usual this edition, was a tricky and hilly one. A difficult and mountainous first part of the stage was the perfect terrain for many riders to fight for the break, knowing that it would be a tough task to control the race back in peloton.

14 riders went clear, one of them being Mathieu van der Poel. Florian Lipowitz, one of the main riders targeting the GC, was also there. Peloton wasn’t happy about that, with UAE and Visma setting the pace to avoid the gap to increase more than 2 minutes.

Many riders were dropped from the peloton at some point of the stage due to the high pace in the climbs, such as yellow jersey Jonathan Milan, who didn’t have any chance to fight for the victory.

The group in front remained strong throughout the whole stage, with Van der Poel as the marked man. After plenty of attempts to break the group, Iván Romeo surprised his companions and arrived solo to the finish line, stealing the yellow jersey in the process.

Once the stage finished, we asked some of our writers to share their thoughts and main takeaways about what happened today.

Very good stage, very fun, in which riders never let their foot off the accelerator at any time. The idea of the start of the route has been brilliant by the organizers and the riders have made it spectacular.

Mathieu van der Poel showed again that he is made of different stuff after having crashed hard in Nove Mesto, and the presence of Florian Lipowitz in the breakaway forced the teams of the important men for the final general classification to work consistently.

Despite making it into the breakaway, Lipowitz's tactics at the finish were rather strange. The one who didn't make a mistake was Iván Romeo, who attacked at the perfect moment and gave a tremendous joy to Movistar Team, which was having a hard time in the last races and was reunited with this 21-year-old super talent.

At first, it looked like the peloton would catch the breakaway, but in the end we didn't see any movement on the final climb. With what we've been seeing from Tadei Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard and Remco Evenepoel recently it may even seem surprising that they haven't moved, but they are saving their strength for a time trial that is expected to be decisive.

Why are we stuck with such limited coverage for Dauphiné? With the excellent participation of riders plus how tricky every stage is, we should be able to watch the it from the start to the finish. Today we missed all the breakaway formation, with riders like Remco Evenepoel attacking…

This is one of the most relevant races of the whole season with almost every star of the peloton, but they still don’t give us more than 90 minutes of action. I think this is something broadcasters have to reassess, it makes no sense and it is negative for everyone, both the business and spectators. The Giro d’Italia did it perfectly, offering the whole product from the start to the end, but ASO is reluctant to follow their steps for some reason…

Today was another proof that superstars like Mathieu van der Poel have it too difficult to win from a breakaway. They are always under intense vigilance, nobody is going to let them go clear and, they will force them to assume responsibility if someone else is in front. In the case of today, everyone knew that Van der Poel is just too strong, and arriving with him to the finish line is not an option because he will just prevail in the sprint.

After many attempts to break the group, Iván Romeo saw the opportunity and went for it. Once Lipowitz wasn’t able to close the gap in the first seconds, it was totally over. Group 2 syndrome kicked in as expected, nobody wanted to pull too much and Van der Poel was expected to do most of the work.

Romeo already got his first win as a pro at Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana earlier this year in a similar fashion – with a late attack from a reduced group. He is the best Movistar prospect and his potential is huge. More than decent climber, great rouleur, extraordinary time-trialist (current under-23 world champion) and with instinct to know when to launch the decisive attack. I wish we will see him riding the Tour of at least la Vuelta, he is probably their best option to get a stage win.

The presence of Florian Lipowitz in the break forced UAE and Visma to work behind in order not to allow him to gain too much time. I didn’t think the break would succeed due to the presence of the German rider, but they did it somehow. I didn’t feel peloton went all-in, maybe UAE, Visma or Soudal do not consider him to be a serious threat, but I wouldn’t be so confident. They might regret this at the end of the week.

I was surprised not to see any attacks from Pogacar honestly, knowing how much he likes to play and what happened the first day. He preferred to ride more conservatively, knowing all the tough mountain stages ahead plus tomorrow’s time-trial, which should create interesting gaps as well.