"We've used this stage before, and it's the first guaranteed day for the GC riders to hit the front," Matt White, head sports director at Mitchelton-Scott, explains. "We've had that approach, the final🤪 climb and then the descent a number of times, and it's incredibly important in terms of the overall battle. The Corkscrew climb is longer and harder than Willunga Hill, and you can have a situation in which one rider goes clear, takes five seconds at the top of 👍the climb and is able to survive until the finish if they know the descent well enough or are willing to take risks.
"You could also see a larger group of around 10 contesting a reduced sprint, but the pure sprinters won't survive the 🌳climb. It might even be too hard for Peter Sagan. By the finish we'll see who is really in contention to win the overall. If you lose time on this stage, then your race is over because Corkscrew has the potential to be more selective than Willunga."
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Watch Tour de France stage 16 online: Live streams for Mont Ventoux showdown
The third week begins with an ascent of one of the Tour's legendary mountains -
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'Is that it?' - A Tour de France stage winner on the Mont Ventoux, Thomas De Gendt explains why it's the one victory of his career he sometimes forgets
In his latest column, De Gendt looks back on a stage when Chris Froome had to run up the Ventoux to stay in the yellow jersey, how he sprinted for victory even though he wasn't 100% sure he was at the finish, and the best tactics for racing it today
