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2023 La Vuelta ciclista a España - Stage 17
(www.lavuelta.es)
Stage 17 | Ribadesella/Ribeseya - Altu de L'Angliru (124.4 km) | Tracking & Results
I don't get this take.
"Putting yourself ahead of the team" might be a bad thing. But in this case Primoz and Jonas aren't putting the team's win in jeopardy.
Maybe Jumbo Visma decide that three different winners is fun, maybe they decide that Jonas needs a better palmares, maybe having Kuss win will motivate him in future, maybe they decide to simply see who is strongest on the road, maybe they play rock paper scissors. Ultimately, between the three riders and the team management they'll make a decision. And frankly any are fine. Internal team politics doesn't seem like something to get worked up about.
You attacked your own red jersey teammate when NO positions were in jeopardy, and took 20 sec from him.... On his birthday. Like, just take the 1, 2, 3 finish.....you can still win the stage without disrespecting kuss like that
This isnt about the final podium. I dont care iff kuss loses eventually
But what roglic did in the last 2k today was disraceful
"Bice racer disgracefully races his bike". Nah dude, team orders stopping a grand tour winning leader from racing would have been the disrespectful (not to mention boring for fans of racing) thing.
The only slightly shady thing for me is lying in interview about intentions. You're all clearly riding as if you want to win, fess up.
Another way to look at it is that Jonas could have stayed with Sepp today, just like Rog did yesterday and on the other stage Jonas won. He didn’t even sprint for the win today, so his only purpose was to take time on Sepp. Rog didn’t threaten the red today or yesterday, Jonas did
I think his purpose was not to lose time to Roglic, he simply followed.
"disraceful" - I think your typo is strangely appropriate. In the end, this is a race, and riding as fast as you can is exactly the normal way to race.
The teammate aspect and birthday aspect are pretty overblown. If the team have told them to race and not to wait for each other, then they should do exactly that. And the scheduling fluke of having a big stage on your birthday - is that really relevant?!
If Kuss manages to win it will be because he was strong enough, not because riders who could have beaten him decided not to try. Surely that is more worthy of respect than the strongest riders deciding to give him a gift.