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This has been a 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Tour de France shaped by the differing tactics of two super teams fighting for overall victory: 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Team Sky and 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Movistar. 

They are arguably the two strongest GC squads in the race, with Team Sky led by the defending champion and current race leader 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Chris Froome and Movistar rallying around their pint-sized Colombian climber Nairo Quintana. With no disrespect to Adam Yates (Orica-Bike Exchange) and Dan Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), who both s💃it high in the overall, Froome and Team Sky and Quintana and Movistar are the favourites who will decide this year’s race.

So far both teams have played contrasting roles with Team Sky taking up the responsibility – even when other teams held yellow – while Movistar have been the cannier of the two. They have encouraged Tam Sky to work by doing just enough to show their strength in the race without actually launching a full assault. Froome leads Quintana by 23 seconds but both Movisꦦtar and Team Sky would argue that they have the upper hand at this point. Only time will tell the truth, with the two squads looking to outfox and eventually defeat each other before Paris.

“It’s hard to say if they’re doing enough work,” Team Sky’s Servais Knaven told Cyclingnews about their Spanish rivals.

“Everyone can see that we’re doing all the work. We’re controlling the race and that’s best for us. If other teams want to go for the stage wins then it’s up them ♏but if we do everything then we could run out of energy in the third week. Right now I think that we’re doing just the right amount.”

Running out of gas is clearly what Movist🐟ar, and other teams are hoping will happen ಌat Team Sky. There’s no doubt that the team has an embarrassment of riches with potentially six of their nine-man team capable of competing for a top-five place. But even the best riders in the world have a finite number of matches to burn and Paris is still almost two weeks away.

Neither team are leaving anything to chance and the often used but rarely explained term of ‘marginal gains’ is something not trademarked by just one team. An example? On the rest-day press conference in Andorra it was no coincidence that Team Sky’s three men for the flat, Rowe, Stannard and Kiryienka were all missing. The trio had put Froome and the climbing contingent of the team in an excellent position on stage 9 to Arcalis and as a result needed the extra recovery time. The rest of the team attended the media event, whဣile by contrast, only Quintana made it out for bed for Movistar. Not even Alejandro Valverde put in an appearance.

“Luke and Ian have done a lot of work for our climbers group. That was perfect at Arcalis and that why we had so many gꦍuys for the final but of course we would be more than happy if the work was shared with other tea꧒ms,” added Knaven.

The issue of work-rate has been raised several times by Team Sky. They will have known coming into the race that the likely scenario would have seen them pushed into controlling the race. Dave Brailsford has made comments about other ‘big teams’ not taking responsibility but the answer many teams came back with was, ‘w🥂hy should we?’

“We also worked when we didn’t have the yellow. Now i⛦t’s different and we have yellow but we were also working when BMC had yellow,” Knaven pointed ou💞t.

Who is in the best position?

A lot will of course depend on how Quintana is feeling. Was his ability on the clim�🅠�b to Arcalis really his limit? Or he is indeed playing the waiting game?

“I th💎ink it’s always best to be in the lead because they have to try and take the 23 seconds back,” Knav꧑en argued.

“Of course they have a plan and there are more mou✤ntaintop finishe🐓s. We also expect Mont Ventoux to be really hard. One day Quintana has to try something. He hasn’t so far but we’ll be ready.”

“But maybe their team isn’t as strong and they just want to save their legs. For sure, they have a reason to ride like that but we can do it. That’s why we selected such a strong team.”
It begs the question, if th♚e shoe was on the other foot and Team Sky were in the wings, waiting and waiting, what would they do?

♎“Maybe I would try a little bit earlier but I don’t now how they feel. I thought Quintana would attack on Arcalis, maybe he was on the limit, I don’t know. We can’t tell. We don’t know but they also don’t know what we do. If you do the same every year then it becomes predictable but we saw we attacked with Henao and we’ve adapted our tactics.”

Quintana has been waiting quietly in the wings but on the legendary slopes of Mont Ventജoux, we may just see him and Froome take centre stage together as they fight for the yellow jersey and victory at the Tour de France.