Meanwhile the most of the major GC-contenders of the upcoming Tour de France are racing at the Critérium du Dauphine, the biggest battles at the Tour de Suisse might happen inside the Ineos team. The cardinal question is three weeks before the Grand Depart of the TDF (and after Chris Froome’s crash) who will be boss in the team of the defending champion? Geraint Thomas, the man with the no 1 startnumber himself, or maybe Egan Bernal?
The program contains two individual time trials a 9,5 km (stage 1) and a 19,5 km (stage 8) one, both of them are almost totally flat.
There are 2 or 3 stage for the sprinters, the 3rd and the 5th for sure, but probably stage 4 too.
The 2nd stage at the first Sunday seems to be quite exciting, the route is full with category 2 climbs (a total of 6 ascents), it quite possible, that someone from the GC-guys attacks.
Otherwise the second part of the week is ment for the battles in the mountains. Stage 6 and 7 end with hilltop finishes: Flumserberg (8,5 km à 9,0%) and San Gottardo (12,4 km à 7,1%), meanwhile the final stage provides 3 long HC category climbs: Furkapass (16,3 km à 6,4%), Sustenpass (17,5 km à 7,5%) and Grimselpass (25,0 km à 6,0%), but with a finish in the valley 21 km after the last hilltop.
Geraint Thomas and Egan Bernal are the biggest favourites of the race. Thomas rode an excellent Tour de Romandie, finished 3rd in overall, meanwhile Bernal had to skip the Giro d’Italia, the Tour de Suisse is his come back.
One of the fan favourites of the last year’s Vuelta a Espana, Enric Mas (Deceuninck-Quick Step) is in the peloton either, he participated 3 stage-races in the first half ofthe season, his 4th place at the Volta ao Algarve is his best result this year so far.
Simon Spilak (Katusha-Alpecin) knows how to win a Tour de Suisse, he did it twice already, in 2015 and 2017. Rui Costa (UAE Team Emirates) did it better, he has 3 overal victories in his backpack from 2012, 2013, 2014. There is an another former winner in this year’s line up: Roman Kreuziger (Dimension Data) the first rider from 2008.
One of the nicest surprises at the Giro d’Italia was Hugh Carthy‘s (Team EF) performance. He was in good shape already at the Tour de Romandie. The Tour de Suisse could be an another memorable race for him.
It looks like during this season it’s always worth to mention a BORA-hansgrohe rider Patrick Konrad can be the man for this race. Another notable mentions: Marc Soler (Movistar), Pierre Latour (AG2R), Domenico Pozzovivo (Bahrain-Merida) and Wilco Keldermann (Sunweb).
Every year since 2011 Peter Sagan (BORA-hansgrohe) is the winner of the point classification. He is going to fight for this kind of glory again, his biggest rivals will be Elia Viviani (Deceuninck- Quick Step), John Degenkolb (Trek-Segafredo) and Michael Mattews (Sunweb).
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