PREVIEW - Tour de Suisse stage 7 - Head-to-head between Joao Almeida and Adam Yates for the yellow jersey
Cycling
Tour de Suisse is one of the most important stage races of the year. It's the last big test before the Tour de France and some of the Tour's stars race in Switzerland, in an eight-day race that includes lots of mountains, time trials and a few days for the classics specialists. The race takes place from June 9 to 16. We preview the 7th stage
Stage 7 is only 118 kilometers long, which is certainly a short day, although not as short as the 42 kilometers of the previous stage. It has 3,000 meters of gradient. The stage starts in Villars-sur-Ollon, and yes, you'll hear that name a lot. The cyclists climb to the top of the Col de la Croix right at the start of the stage, 4 kilometers at 8.7% and finish with just 7.5 kilometers of racing.
The cyclists descend to Aigle, then climb Villars-sur-Ollon and the Col de la Croix for the second time. In total, there are 17 kilometers of climbing at 7.1%. The summit is 51.5 kilometers from the finish line. The cyclists then descend to Aigle for the second time; the first part of the descent is quite steep and relatively technical.
After crossing Aigle again, the cyclists head up to Villars-sur-Ollon, this time to finish the stage. The cyclists climb just before the start of the climb really begins to count, as the climb itself is 8.6 kilometers at 8%. It's a fairly steady climb, with a few bends, typical of the end of a difficult mountain stage.
Read also
Favorites
- João Almeida: Almeida already knows what it's like to beat Adam Yates in the Swiss race. The "Duro das Caldas" showed better legs than his teammate to take victory in stage 6 and in his declarations warned that, if it were up to him, he would go on to win every stage. He's less than 30 seconds behind Yates, and João can try to reduce the time and bet everything on the final time trial.
- Adam Yates: The yellow jersey will face the 7th stage of the Tour de Suisse as the big favorite to win once again. Leader of the general classification, the UAE Team Emirates rider showed very good legs on all the mountain days and will try to win the stage to face the final time trial with relative calm.
- Mattias Skjelmose: The winner of the 2023 edition of the race offered his best version on the sixth stage, climbing to 4th place overall and taking the white jersey in the youth classification. Skjelmose continues his upward trend and is aiming for the podium. Although he left doubts in the early days, he was better than Egan Bernal in the final head-to-head.
- Egan Bernal: The Colombian INEOS Grenadiers rider is showing good legs and a return to fitness in this Tour de Suisse. Bernal has shown this on every mountain day and, as a result, he remains in 3rd place in the general classification, where he hopes to remain at the end of stage 7. There's every reason to be confident that he'll make it, as he's been one of the few who's had the legs to keep up with the favorites' attacks on the final climbs.
Prediction of the 7th stage of the 2024 Tour de Suisse:
*** Adam Yates, João Almeida
** Egan Bernal, Mattias Skjelmose, Enric Mas
* Einer Rubio, Lenny Martinez, Tom Pidcock, Matthew Riccitello, Felix Gall.
Choice: João Almeida
Article written by Carlos Silva
Just in
Popular news
Latest comments
- yeah, that’s a more fair assessment. “reaching mathieu’s level” doesn’t mean you’re planning to replicate his whole career. the former IS doable, potentially. it’s just the latter that likely is not.OCexile25-12-2024
- That’s not entirely true. Every person follows their own development path and peaks differently. Remco and Primoz had hardly started cycling before elite level. Jonas was pretty much under the radzr until he unexpectedly had to take over responsibility at JV. Some guys only get real good in their thirties others have peaked mid-twenties. You can’t tell in advance how and upto what level they will progress, obviously his career might not have MVDPs length but nothing says he could not end up doing a few seasons at his level.Mistermaumau25-12-2024
- well, del grosso is 21 right now. when mathieu was a year younger than that, he was already winning elite level world championships, not U23. i think del grosso will be a very good pro for years, but if he was really going to be the next van der poel someday, he’d already have to be at that level right NOW. van der poel was showing signs of true greatness when he was 15-16. THAT’S what generational talent looks like.OCexile25-12-2024
- Yeah.... gear 😅.mikolajjj24-12-2024
- It shouldn’t be about expectations in the first place should it? Besides, if you look at everyone’s calculations as a whole they don’t add up in the first place. There’ll be 2-3 riders with a 50% chance, a dozen with 10 or 20% and dozens more with a 5% so we’re expecting at least 2 if not 3 winners. Remind me again who won before her? Says it all about using data to decide on participation.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- Ok, happy I’m not too interested in this team coz’ the account of what happened is really hard to follow.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- The UCI is worse than USA CyclingVeganpotter24-12-2024
- It's not like they wanted her to not win😅 She had an outstanding Olympics. But there's a reason why she wasn't expected to win the road race and that's ok. Things like this happen and it's great...better than seeing expected winners win.Veganpotter24-12-2024
- Bruyneel ? The man with a lifetime ban from cycling...why do you keep giving him and his doper mate, Armstrong, a platform?DJ24-12-2024
- yeah, agree. on the subject of being a “complete rider,” i do think that’s getting more interesting. mathieu seems to have decided he wants to get much better at climbing the the high mountain passes. he appears to be looking for new challenges, which should be interesting to watch. in most cases you’d dismiss a goal like that at age 30, but it’s mvdp. he’s never going to climb with the real climbers, but if he can improve enough it could open up stage wins when the parcours isnt just purely toothy and punchy.OCexile24-12-2024