Ineos and Bora in rehearsal for the Tour de France: the two teams compete in the Tour de Suisse, which begins on Sunday on the shores of Lake Zurich, where the Belgian Remco Evenepoel of the Quick-Step formation will also be a favourite. The competition will be followed live with commentary on RTBF.be/sport.
And if Evenepoel intends to run only the Vuelta as a grand tour this year, the Ineos team will align in Switzerland the predictable backbone of the group which will try to put an end to the domination of the Slovenian Tadej Pogacar (absent in Switzerland) in the Grande Boucle. with the British Adam Yates who would be the leading role if we are to believe the Colombian Daniel Martinezhimself a perfect spoilsport.
In addition to Adam Yates and Daniel Martinez, winner of the difficult Tour of the Basque Country in April, the British team presents the Welshman Geraint Thomas and English Tom Pidcockas well as the winner of the last Paris-Roubaix, the Dutchman Dylan van Baarletransformed into a simple team member.
Faced with this armada, Bora puts forward a trump card in the person of the Russian Alexander Vlasovneophyte of the Tour de Suisse but already winner at the beginning of May of the Tour de Romandie and winner of the queen stage of the Tour de Valence in February, where Remco Evenepoel had cracked. Vlasov, who will also discover the Tour de France in July, will be supported by the German Maximilian Schachmann and the Colombian Sergio Higuita in a race that features two summit finishes, Friday and next Saturday, before the final 25.6 kilometer time trial in Liechtenstein.
Pinot wants to test itself
Less than three weeks before the start of Copenhagen, the deadline for the Tour de France occupies the minds, of the Dane Jakob Fuglsang (3rd in 2021) in already advanced form, from Kazakh Alexey Lutsenko and also French Thibaut Pinot.
“The Tour de Suisse will be my last preparation block“, advance Pinot, near the podium in the final classification in 2013 and 2015 (4th). “I did a good preparatory course in the Alps. I want to test myself on this Tour of Switzerland“.
For its part, Gino Mader will have additional motivation on the roads of his national tour. Fifth in the Vuelta 2021, the Swiss finished second in the Tour de Romandie. “I showed that I might handle pressure as a team leader“, he notes regarding a responsibility that Evenepoel (22) takes on for his part very regularly.
The winner of Liège-Bastogne-Liège, who hit hard for his return to the Tour of Norway at the end of May (three stages and the general classification), looks like the man to beat, with the advantage of the counter- shows the last day in Vaduz.
Interest will also focus before the mountain stages on sprinters and punchers (Kristoff, Stewart, Groves, Impey, Aranburu and Coquard for the former, Cosnefroy, Turgis, Garcia Cortina, Matthews and Ulissi for the latter). And also on Peter Sagan, the Slovak sick at the start of the season and author of an anonymous return, Friday, at the GP of the Canton of Aargau won by another ghost, the Swiss Marc Hirschi.