Cycling Paris - Nice

Paris-Nice
Eight stages with the first 3 flat sprint stages. Groenewegen, Demare and Jakobsen come off Volta Algarve where Groenewegen and Jakobsen each won one of the sprint stages with Demare second in both. Bennet, Ewan and Kristoff come off UAE Tour. Kristoff was lead out for Gaviria - Ewan lost his lead out on nearly every stage and Bennet won the last sprint stage ahead of Gaviria and Vivianni - pretty impressive.
The race profile is very similar to last year where Soler won by 4 seconds over S Yates but the ITT this year is 25km to last years 18km. It is, however lumpier.
Many GC riders will be using this as a training session so I will be sticking to beers except for my match bet.
Outrights
Gallopin over van Garderen @ evens ( Basically Teejay always has an off day )
Win
Yates S @ 13/2
Top 3
Teuns @ 13/2
Stage 1
Won the opening stage last year and has his lead out train here
Top 3
Demare @ 3/1
If my mind goes overnight I may take the 10/1 on Ewan as he is easy as fast as any of these guys - but will get in position?

Nothing on the stage yesterday but Teejay did get caught in the crosswind and shed 2min 51sec on Gallopin. Saw all the sprinters in action except for Kristoff who missed the front group. With all the echelon's yesterday I tried to keep an eye on the front group. Spotted most of the sprinters there but could not find Bennett on one occasion. Possibly he had to spend energy joining from a second or third group?
Stage 2
Win and Top 3
Bennett @ 10/1

With the wind playing havoc we did not get a sprint finish yesterday. Today I expect much the same except that the stage is 32km longer. Never know who is going to make the splits and who not so going with the higher odds on a few match bets - still keeping stakes at beer level
Stage 3
Teunissen over Drucker @ 12/10
Gilbert over Garcia @ 11/10
Jungels over Bernal @ 18/10

Grand Tour contenders and teams traditionally use either Paris-Nice or Tirreno-Adriatico to start their racing preparation. Tirreno starts on Wednesday.
Tirreno-Adriatico
The race of the two seas is run over 7 stages. Stage 1 is the 25km TTT and the final stage is a 10km ITT. The race does not carry a high climb as in Paris-Nice but, besides the 2 time trial stages the race is won or lost on stages 4 and 6.
Stage 4 has a 3km climb at 10.6% which is taken twice with the finish around 6km away. Stage 6 has a 4km climb at 13.9% which is taken 4 times and finishes at the top on the final time. Both climbs have ramps of around 20% in places.
Once again going with a match-up bet and beers for the rest
Outright Match-Up
de Plus over Oomen @ 14/10
Outright
Alaphilippe @ 19/4
The race is absolutely perfect for Roglic and Alaphilippe but Roglic gets the bookies nod @ 12/10 because of the two time trials.
I will be looking at that third podium place tomorrow because I first need to see how much time his useless team lose in the TTT.

Thanks for all the tips and info Vann!

The Vann wrote: Stage 3
Teunissen over Drucker @ 12/10
Gilbert over Garcia @ 11/10
Jungels over Bernal @ 18/10

In the bunch Bernal at 45 and Jungels a pube behind in 47th. Do make the other two - but friggen annoyed the boys coasted today and we had a proper sprint which Bennett won.
Lumpy/Bumpy tomorrow so will look for some long odds break away specialists

Paris-Nice Stage 4
De Gendt @ 25/1
Ulissi @ 33/1

Paris-Nice
25km ITT today. Nothing really appeals in the match bets and I can't see anyone beating Kwiatowski so taking
Top 3
Kelderman @ 11/10
Tirreno-Adraitico
Finish with 2km at 4.7% today - perfect Alaphilippe territory but odds too short. Think Roglic may hang tough with view to overall
Top 3
Roglic @ 3/1
My third slot on the podium pick was Lutsenko but his team shed a minute in the TTT to the likes of Yates and Dumoulin which I think is just too much.

Here we go! Two beautiful stages today in both Pairs-Nice and Tirreno-Ariatico - trying to watch both these finishes will be the tough part for me.I will get my kicks from watching only but will have small wager as well to get the cycling season going for me.

All the usual suspects are expecting to do well on this Nice climbing stage (15km's @ 7%:
Quintana, Simon Yates, Bernal, Bardet, Lopez, Bennett... The big boys will come out to play! Simon and Superman could be tough to beat as they will be given a touch of room by Sky but on a steady climb I will revert back to Nairo for the win @ 9/1 with ESBN


In Italy its more a short, sharp hell-climb (1.7km @ 11% - twice) and then the mostly downhill run to the line:
This is prime topography for the Ala P and Roglic to go mano e mano. Of course race leader, Adam Yates is also at home on this type of parcourse.
Not a lot of value here as the Top 2 should be dueling it out. I will have a nibble on Tiesj Benoot @ 14/1

Always wise to keep bets at beer level for these early season week long races as you never know who is training and who is riding for eg Yates beats the time trialists at Paris-Nice two days ago and in Italy Thomas is protecting Poels. In the interview after the ITT they asked Yates if he had got what he wanted from Paris-Nice. The answer was a cryptic " No - there is still the weekend". Yesterday Mitchellton-Scott closed down the break and hammered to the finish ostensibly to give Trentin a shot ( He did finish 3rd). Yates did not participate and finished 8min behind. So either he is not a team player or his team was keeping all the GC guys honest in preparation for today's mountain stage. Today's stage finishes with a climb of 15km at 7.3% and tops at 1600m - so no advantage to the Colombians ( normally kicks in over 2000m).
Probably not the wisest thing to do but I am packing my beers in the fridge for the day, dusting off the old wallet and taking a bet
Paris-Nice Stage 7
Win only S Yates @ 2/1

Won first prize in the National Stupid Betting Competition yesterday when I presumed my 2 units on Gallopin over Teejay was in the bag with a 7min lead and splashing it on Yates. Teejay took 9min off Gallopin on the climb and Yates is quite obviously 6 weeks away from top condition for the Giro. A poorer and wiser Vann is taking a few beers on
Paris-Nice Stage 8
LL Sanchez @ 12/1

Turns out Gallopin was ill and could not start the next day. Same day over in Italy de Plus crashed and shed 20min to Oomen to bury that match bet.
Tirreno-Adriatico
Nothing for me on the sprint today but I think Yates's 25sec may just be enough over a 10km ITT so a few beers on
Yates outright @ 14/10

Why am I not surprised that my last bet standing loses by exactly 1 second. Its been that kind of start to the cycling season.