THEMOVE - What is Juan Ayuso's Future at UAE? | Vuelta a España Stage 6 Analysis & Stage 7 Preview | THEMOVE+

Episode Date: August 28, 2025

Johan Bruyneel and Spencer Martin break down Jay Vine's ride to win the mountainous sixth stage of the Vuelta a España, which saw fellow breakaway rider Bahrain-Victorious' Torstein Træen take the race lead from Jonas Vingegaard and some notable attacks, some from Vingegaard himself, in the GC group behind. Afterward, the guys discuss the big story of the day, Juan Ayuso falling out of the GC after being dropped, and preview tomorrow's summit stage, which sets up yet another potential GC showdown, before discussing how they think the race will unfold and who presents the best betting value. Use our special link to see where you can bet in your area and claim the best sign-up offers https://nxtbets.com/betoutcomes/

What I do see of Juanayuso is that he always has the mind of a leader. It's about him. I rarely hear him talk about teammates or about the team. It's always about what he did, what he did or what he didn't do. And if he felt great or if he didn't feel great. Still, I don't see him change themes. Everybody, welcome back to the Move Plus. I'm Spencer Martin.

I'm here with Johan Bernille. We are breaking down stage six of the Volta. a spagna won by j vine from the breakaway with most of the gc contenders coming in led by joel almeda with yonis vinaigard behind the big story of the pretty formulaic old school mountain stage i would say johan breakaway gets away early the vizma shows as soon as they turn the tv images on i know we were wrong because vizma shows no interest in pulling this thing back the breaks at like four minutes with a 80k to go they just keep pulling out time vizma was not committed. They get into the final two climbs, Jay Vine. I heard someone in the

breakaway say, they're like, yeah, it was obvious Jay Vine was going to win the stage from like 10 minutes into the breakaway. He was just so much stronger. And he just pretty impressively formulaically just drops everybody, rides away in classic Jayvine style. Behind Little Trek takes up the pace when they get to the final climb. It's like a sprint leadout almost into these final two climbs. Little Trek takes it up. They're not pacing too hard, but Wanayuso gets dropped. Kind of an odd sight, like not suffering, but not staying with the group. Up front, Julia Chaconay attacks. He's followed by Jonas Findergaard. There is some scrambling behind. Zeralameda is in the third group, looks to be out of it, but in true Alameda fashion just paces

himself back up. Then attacks again. Not quite sure. I agree with that decision, but it worked out then he leads to group in in 10th place. But Johan, so really the only GC implications were Ben O'Connor loses a little bit of time. Santiago Petrago loses a little bit of time, couldn't hold pace, and Juan Yusa loses a lot of time. Is that of the GC? Also, Torsten Train finishes second on Bahrain victorious, 54 seconds back, goes into the red jersey. Technically, that's a GC development. Probably not long term, but what was your takeaway of the day?

yeah take away of the day spencer uh as you said we were wrong uh the break made it um it's true as soon as you see the the live images and you see 10 guys and you see the composition of the breakaway we knew that there was almost everybody of the breakaway stayed away by the way so but at least a few guys would stay away um so yeah great great win by j vine um there was obviously a reason why he lost already so much time in the first few stages, I would say probably on purpose because he was, was it 20 minutes down in G.C. He was very, yeah, 20 minutes down. Yeah, like aggressively far.

Yeah. So that was definitely the plan for him to go in breaks. It worked out well. I mean, the Vuelta is his race, man. I mean, this is where he wins stages. And this is a ground tour when he wins stages, right? Yeah. He won a few already.

Third career one. Was that? It's his third career, well, to win. Oh, it's a third one. Okay. Yeah. I think two back to back in 2022, if I remember in that, right? Yeah.

No, they were two and three stages in 2022. Yeah. And then he crashed out afterwards. Yes. But then, yeah, I mean, with the G.C. guys, Spencer, Visma, in my opinion, looked really strong, the strongest team by far. You know, they had Jonas and they had Sepp Kuz. they had Mateo Jorgensen, Ben Tullet was still there for a very long time.

So, yeah, that was definitely something. And then Jonas looked, I would say, amazing. Never, never under pressure. Looked comfortable. I just have one question, you know, did he really try hard? Or was he really being conservative knowing that the Volta's very long? Obviously, they knew the last climb. I mean, I think I read a stat somewhere, Spencer, that of this Vuelta Peloton, 25% of the

peloton actually lives in Andorra, one quarter of the Peloton. Wow. And that's just in this race. Yeah. So they, they know this climb. And yeah, I mean, I would say for the moment, we don't know much more. We know that Juan Ayuso won't win the Vuelta. He, he already hinted at the start or before the start that this was he needed to wait and see he didn't have any real reference points he knew he didn't prepare for this grand tour like he had prepared for other grant tours he decided late at the request of his team and today was clear that he doesn't have the form to be in the front of the Vuelta the question is now what's going to happen you know if is he going to go for stage wins, is he going to go, is he going to put himself at the service of the team? That would be great to see that of Juan Ayuso. And yeah, I mean, that's about it.

And then, of course, Thornton Train taking the lead, great, great reward for him. You know, I mean, we've read, I think last year I heard for the first time when he won a stage in the tour of Switzerland that he's actually a recovering testicular. cancer patient. And so, yeah, to see him now in the lead of a grand tour is just amazing. Yeah. Yeah, it is amazing. And he won, you know, he was like, I guess like a young star on UdoX win away for a little while, I guess because he was recovering from cancer.

And he wins a stage that I think the queen stage, the tour of Switzerland last year, kind of quietly racking up these results. And then today actually J-Vine probably attacked two or. early because Torsten, it was a weird stage where Bruno Emeril, Emeril, Emeril, and Torston train were just going for the lead. Like, they probably were not really going for the stage. J. Vaughn attacks him anyway, rides away. But it's like, you probably could have stayed with them and they would have pulled almost all the way up that funnel climb and then you could have dropped them later. But J. Vine probably doesn't need any notes on how to win VALTA stages.

The only thing about, I used to, I found kind of strange, Johan, is so, you said, I wasn't really prepared, but he leaves the Gero. What was the other option for the end of the year? Like, was he just not going to do another grand tour? Yeah. No, I think, I remember when he abandoned the Gero. You know, let's not forget, he was the co-leader of UAE in the Gero. He crashed on the gravel stage, damaged his knee pretty badly, could hang in there for a while,

and then finally he got dropped. and then after that he got stung by a bee. I seemed to remember and then he abandoned, right? Yeah. So things didn't go his way because of certain circumstances. I do remember UAE saying that he was not going to do another grand tour, that that's their policy, to not have these young riders do two grand tours. So I don't know.

And I think actually that's the truth because I did find out that the team, that was preparing for the Vuelta plus the young riders who were preparing for the Tour de laverineer which is going on right now they were all on a training camp

in Andorra on the top I think it's Puerto de Mvalira at 2,300 2,400 meters altitude they were there and there was one rider who was not there was Juan Ayuso he was training at home on the Costa Blanca so he didn't he hasn't joined

the training camp of the team. So I think it was kind of a wait and see how I feel. He was not part of the plan. And so it was a late decision. He did say at the beginning of the Vuelta, okay, I don't know, I don't know how I am. But then yesterday, after the team time trial, he looked pretty upbeat yesterday. I mean, I think in the team time trial, he felt great. You know, he was probably the strongest guy of the team in the final.

And so, yeah, I think it's really true that he didn't know what to expect, hasn't done any, you know, of course he's done, he's done training in the mountains, but not proper altitude training as everybody does right now. And then after the stage, he said, yeah, you know, I mean, you guys have been talking it up, but I've said from the beginning that I didn't know all he was. And he found out today that he's not in the shape that he has to be to be a contender. Yeah, he's kind of, I think Rimcoe Evanapult is like this, and I don't fully understand why, but he's a rider where time trailing comes first, comes before his climbing fitness. Like, remember two of Romandy, 2023, wins the TT. He's first overall GC. They got a tie-on 2000 the next day, and he's like, off the back.

You know, and you'd think like, well, how could you be that good in the TT? and not in climbing, but it feels like for him and Remko, like they have to be a top, top, top, top fitness to be climbing with the best. And someone like Pagacha, if Pagaccha had a really off summer, there's no way he's,

he still shows up to this Volta and he's climbing with the best, you know? Like, it just feels like for some riders, climbing comes easier and for some time trialing comes easier, even if they're roughly the same size. Yeah, that's possible. And what's, what's his future here? kind of worry about him at UAE because so going forward it seems like del Toro is going to need to

lead at least one grant tour a year but Gatcher is going to lead at least one grand tour year and Joamette is probably going to lead one grand tour year so where does that leave one of a use so at UAE? I think it leaves him at UAE you know there's there's a lot of speculation especially in Spain you know and now I've seen on social media some really really, you know, high speculation because for, I don't know, apparently he, Ayuso has changed his profile picture on the social media. So, you know, he's, he wasn't UAE kit and now he's in the Spanish selection kit. That's his profile picture. So certain people take away that, okay, he wants to leave

UAE and, you know, there's rumors that, you know, Movistar would be interested. There's, I've seen rumors that little track would want to make a bit for him. I think he's going to stay at UE. And he's going to be like a domestic there? Well, no, no. I mean, there's a lot of races. There's a lot of races. I think right now, Juan Ayuso should focus on one-week tours, which he's great at.

I think that right now that needs to be his focus. And then he can be co-leader at one, you know, I mean, he should not be at this moment the leader of UAE in any of the grand tours. I think that's just, you know, I don't. I do acknowledge that, you know, as a 19-year-old, he came into the Vuelta and finished third, you know. But that was like, okay, what's happening here? It has not been confirmed since. And he has shown that he has amazing qualities in one-week state races, two of Switzerland,

two of Romand, the Tireno, past country. I think that should be his focus. And it's a great team to be on UAE. to be going for those races. Yeah. Do you think a guy like that that gets third and a grand tour as a teenager is ever going to be able to say, like, I'm focusing on one week races?

He can do it. I mean, no, I'm just saying what I think he should do. I'm not saying that that's probably in his mind, you know, and even before he turned pro, Quana Yuso has the mind of a champion, of a winner. you can actually also see it in his interviews even today for example you know I was I was surprised to see that after the finish of course the Spanish press uh gets on him and he's there calm you know he puts his jacket on and he says yeah you know and I told you guys that I didn't know if I was ready or not but then he they were asking well you know it's a great day for the team and he says oh well I don't know what happened who won So it's clear that this guy, once he's out, he just, for sure, he took his earpiece out and, you know, didn't really care what was going on. I mean, before he got dropped, he knew that there was 10 riders away and that J. Vine was in there and that J. Vine was a serious candidate to win the stage.

So I would think any rider on a team would be, even if you dropped, you would be interested, you know, to know, to know, okay. let me at least okay this is over for me to gc but let me at least be up to date of what's happening and so let's see if my teammate wins the guy just did was not interested yeah you know so i mean okay that's just me thinking you could also think i mean and in his in his favor i would say maybe you know you're you're disappointed you're dropped you just want to make it to the top and you don't want to hear you know car number two yelling all the time because you know car number two is behind and if it's in mountain stages the distance is not that far so you keep you can hear right if it's if it's eight minutes 10 minutes in you know in in a short line the distance is not not that

big so um maybe he just wanted didn't want to hear all the noise you know that's also possible but uh but yeah i mean what i do see of Kuanayuso is that he always has the mind of a leader. It's about him. I rarely hear him talk about teammates or about the team. It's always about what he did, what he did or what he didn't do. And if he felt great or if he didn't feel great. Still, I don't see him change teams.

I think that first of all, he wouldn't let him go. And secondly, I mean, apparently there's a huge, huge buyout clause in the contracts of these of all these big talents. Ridiculous money. Now, I think if you if you look at it legally in Europe, I would have my doubts if those clauses are actually legal if you would test it in a court of law. But then, you know, we can also ask ourselves the questions right now about he is this super talent he came to the forefront when as a 19 year old was you know spectacular

he's won a few really nice races but he abandoned the tour last year he abandoned the giro this year and now in the tour of spain he's definitely not going to be on the podium so i would say his popularity his is you know his trendiness is is getting lower you know the momentum right now is not inside when he's a fourth year professional yeah and so i can only see one team i can only one seeing one team really going after him and that's movie star because they need love they need him they need a spanish star the other teams not so sure i'm not so sure so there's a guy on his team who's probably the of all time what do you think that guy would ask when he crossed the line i think he would ask

how did jay do right that's concerning to me yeah no listen the interviews are the interviews are not great they're not great uh for for him and his popularity but i actually don't think i think he doesn't care i think he doesn't care definitely doesn't realize he's just you focused on himself and his career yeah do you think he'll finish this race i think it's listen he has a great opportunity now to to well first of all what i know for sure is his first thought will be okay gc has gone what can i now do to win a stage that's his first goal in his mind the team will probably ask something different from him the team will all probably ask okay hey now you're you know a domestic you're great in the mountains so we need you right

he has the opportunity now to show that he can be a great teammate because he's not sick as far as I know he's not injured and he showed great form yesterday in the team time trial so you know And Iuso, who is at 80%, can still be very valuable for UE. Yes, I do think it's very important. I'd be very excited to see him working for the team. I'm not convinced it's going to happen. Do you know how long it's been since he's finished a grand tour? Since his second year pro.

He finished fourth, I think. Two years. Yeah. Fourth of the world. Yeah. So he hasn't finished a grand tour since 2020. in my opinion he cannot drop out of this thing because you can't have as a rider at that level you cannot have years between yeah tour finishes he doesn't care he's and he might not care but at

some point i mean at some point is uae like so he's not going to work for people he's not going to contest the win i mean they love him there so i guess they don't care but he's making a lot of money but but i guess i have question on the stage win so he gets dropped from a group that's tapping out of pace. So can he win a stage? Or was he sitting? Like what happened there? Did he sit up?

Because he's like, ooh, I don't feel great. He didn't look great. He didn't look comfortable. You know, he looked off. Still,

you know, he's a highly talented writer. Yes, he can win a stage. I would say yes. So even though he, from a breakaway. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't know if he can beat Jay Vine. is the problem his own team is in the break yeah you know riding from a breakaway is different you know i mean you don't have the the all of a sudden increase of pace the lead out of the team of the leader who then you know basically launches their leader that doesn't happen in breakaways yeah i mean we saw remco do this in 2023 at the volta right yeah gets dropped and then he he's ripping up the breakaways yeah i would prefer him to see him in a in a domestic role working for the actually that would be great for him and and for his own development yep yeah i agree i agree i

think it's like important i don't know if he thinks it's important we'll see though that's what's going to be interesting is you know you have to learn you have to like humble oneself to in front of the altar of teamwork before you can be a true champion and we'll see we'll see what happens um i kind of this takes me to j vine kind of an interesting case here like this guy is so and breakaways do you think if he was flying today man he is so strong yeah and he's really benefited from staying at uae because he just gets to focus on stage wins yeah do you think if he was on another team the pressure would be on him to be a leader yeah yeah yeah i mean he's a great climber he's a great climber he's a good time to all this they would definitely demand from him to

go for gc uh and i'm not saying he can't do it but you know Jay Vine seems to be one of those riders who really, you know, blossoms in a different kind of pressure. Yeah. It's not easy to, you know, to have the pressure to be the leader of the G.C. To be the leader of the team and having to be having to deliver every time they expect you to deliver. There's not many riders who could do that. No. And I, yeah, you're right.

He's a great time trust, great climber on a normal team on Movistar, they'd say, all right, you're the leader. I know, and maybe he would do great. Maybe he would win Grand Tours. I agree with you. I think, though, that this is like the perfect role for him. And he's benefited being on a stacked team where he doesn't get those opportunities. It's super interesting to see.

For sure, not great win for him. Great win. And then, yeah, I mean, the Norwegian guy, Thorstein, trying, he did a great climb at the end. You know, he kept, I mean, he took a bit of time back on Jay Vine. It's normal, but he kind of, you know, the paratron with the leaders, they didn't take that much time back, you know. Well, yeah, so he's two and a half minutes in front of Vindigard. I'm a bit of a worry ward, but it's basically all climbs left in this race. Are they sure they're going to get this back from them?

They must be. Oh, wow. Spencer, 1,000 percent. 1,000 percent, 10,000 percent. Actually, I would have, it obviously. makes no sense but if j i would love for j vine to have torston's lead and then get to see vendergarde try to take two and a half minutes on j vine that'd be kind of fun to watch but that would also that would also happen 1 000 by the way well i mean you start to see the love this is very

unscientific but you you would in that case like we like primos last year chasing down ben o'connor you just start to see a class difference between like the winners and the rest even though they're quite talented. Yeah, for sure. So Vizma's been super aggressive through the first part of the race. I would say overly aggressive to the point of reckless. They get to the first summit finish and they're really conservative. Why? What happened there? I mean, conservative. I mean, I think they just set a pace. They knew perfectly what was going to happen. They kind of, everybody could feel that little track was leading it out and a chic corner with attack. So why would you, you know, not take advantage of that?

I mean, basically little freck was doing the job for, for Visma. And then, you know, once, once Chikone attacked, uh, the, the, the groups blew up and then the strongest guys were there and Yonah still had two riders there. So I think, I think they, yeah, Visma wrote perfectly. They didn't have to do anything else. Well, they do, yeah, well, they do have to start taking time on Jemois made at a certain point. So, but they're in front right now.

Well, they're in front, but they're going in, would you feel comfortable with an eight second lead on Almeda going into a time trial at the end of the race? Yeah. So they, in theory, they do need to take time. Yeah, they do need to take time. But, but they're going to, I mean, today was not, not, it was a hard stage, but there's, there's finished, you know, mountain top finishes that are extremely hard. I mean, Anglidu. So is the narrative that Almeda's undercooked dead? Because if that was actually true,

when they've tried to press their advantage today. I still think that Almeida would improve. And also, today was a great climb for Almeida. It was tempo. It was hard, but not super steep. You know, it was an Almeida climb. But he looked good. He looked good, I have to say.

He looked, I think today was a test for. Almeida, you know, he could have been found out if he, if he wasn't really in great shape. But he wrote great. I mean, I made a little strong today. Yeah, I am maybe overly sensitive. I just think if you think you have an advantage on someone like Jo Alameda, you have to press it. Because if you wait and he gets better, like, remember 20-20 tour, it was like same thing. It's like really conservative, really conservative.

Oh, Pagatra is riding off the front. He's getting 40 seconds. That doesn't matter. And then it's like, well, actually it mattered quite a lot. Maybe we should have pressed it when we had the chance. Also, after the stage, final climb, people are saying, oh, easy climb, easy climb. 10K long. Not an easy climb.

I told you yesterday of, and, you know, I did some research on this climb. And, you know, I remember myself, it's 32 years ago, but I remember it as it was, it's not an easy climb. And, yeah, there was no big differences. let's ask the riders in the world if it was an easy climb you're not going to find many who say I was easy no I would invite people to go ride that that type of climb after listening to this I mean I did I did that right after the stage I try to keep the heart rate high like 160 and I can actually see what did you do what kind of climb did it was like 8k long at 7% about that's pretty hard you can start to see how bad decisions get made

And everything looks like it makes sense on camera. And then you're like, I'm hurting quite a bit here. And like, I'm just doing what I can. So we dissect everything that happens. Yeah. Well, these guys are kind of on the limit. We should just say Chaconay looked really good. The attack was interesting.

I mean, I guess I like to see it from him. He's being aggressive, right? That's what we didn't like at the tour. No, he looks good. You know, if you see him climb like today, the attack only Jonas could follow. then they get caught back, stays in there without any problem, finishes, I think, third of the group was Almeida and Jonas and then Chikonet. Yes.

So who looked like the three strongest G-C riders right now. Yeah. Yeah. And we should say, too, Vizma's conservativeness, I was going to defend them for a second. After watching that finish, it's not clear to me that if they pull that back, they win that stage. because that was a fast finish. Almeida's a fast guy.

Chaconna's a fast guy. Yeah. It's the work that they had to put in is too much compared to the risk. And they're not here to win stages. They're here to win the overall. Of course, if they can win a stage along the way, they will do it. But it was not worth the effort. Yeah.

It's a very good chance you just pull a rival into a stage in time bonuses, which isn't a good idea. Yeah, little track Chaconne. I'm interested to see where that goes. Chaconne has never finished Top 10 in a grand tour. Today, he looked, if you just watched today, you didn't know anything about the guy. He'd say he's one of the strongest people in the race. He's really good. Before we move on to the preview, one question I have for you.

So, UA is up the road with J Vine. They have Amade in the group. Iuso's dropped. Mark Salar gets kind of dropped. Ameda's by himself chasing Vindigard and Chikone. is that it just to me I mean they win the stage they they they first out of the gc group so all's fine in the end it just feels like well they're really spread all over the road here was a thought i had at the time and like is that a consideration when you're thinking about going for stage wins versus keeping people

back in the in the gc group no i think you know i mean more or less everybody was on their own except uh except jonas two teammates right next to yeah yeah you know uh Chikona was on his own. Eganbernau was on his own, I guess. I guess Chikone was only on his own because he had his team wind up the pace and then attacked them. Jay Hindley was on his own for a while, then had, what's his name, the Italian kid? Pelazari. Belizari come back.

Yeah, at that point, it's really a fight amongst the favorites. Of course, it would be. But even if, for example, even if, okay, normally if Ayuso is in great shape, he would have been there also, right? Then the question, the question would have been, if he's needed, will he do the job for, he do the job for Almeida? But a guy like Mark Soler, for example, who was on equal time before the start of, you know, he, if he would be there, he would be hanging on for dear life, wouldn't be able to do anything anyway. Yeah. So, nah, I didn't really read too much into that, to be honest. If you were directing, when you were directing Postal or Discovery, did you, would you have

sent a writer up to get a stage win on a stage like today? You can't compare, Spencer. You can't compare these times. We were very, we were very famous for, you know, not going in breakaways and the whole team around the leader uh that was our formula that worked the best um but that you know times have changed you can't compare well in the i don't know if i if today i would be directing i would probably try to get stagements too um because let's not forget you know like now j vine has his stage win uh you can ask him anything now in the rest for the rest of the rest of this welta

point i mean the thing about bismuth at the tour they go for that stage one early ended up being quite important i mean they get the one at the end i guess which is amazing but yeah it just gives you a little bit of insurance and you say yeah then you can ask anything of that person and j vine will be with almeda so yeah that's why you may you a has two stagements now already with the team time trial so you know the atmosphere must be amazing yeah yeah that is kind of the funny thing about this volta is ua has won back to backstages. What if their leaders is out of the G.C. And everyone is thinking that they're the underdogs. And they're waking and they have the king of the mountains. Yeah. Who's with the guy who's

won that before at this point. Yeah. Kind of interesting. But anything else on the stage before we move on? No, I think that's that's about it. I think we covered everything. You know, I mean, as you said, O'Connor dropped a bit. Um, I don't see him really as as, as, you know, it's hard to hard to imagine he's going to repeat his performance of last year and then bitrago lost a bit but i think we can't put bitrago in the same league as for example i vinguard almeida chikone gal bernal and those the interesting thing about that butrago is he was the one like doing a lot of the chasing of indigard and chikone and then pays for it which um i guess they still have tibery up there so if you're if you're really focused on the bob rain victorious gc situation there

They're in a great spot. They got train in the leaders jersey. They got Tibery, not losing time. But let's take a quick break and then predict tomorrow's stage. All right, Johan, stage seven, we leave Andorra. I don't think we've mentioned that yet. We finished in Andorra, your former home. No, we did say that earlier.

Now we start in Indora, Indora City. We leave, go further into the Pyrenees. There are one, two, three, four categorized climbs finishes on a first cat, 12K long, 6% average climb. There's bonus seconds on the second, at the top of the second to last climb. I'll list off the favorites and then we will discuss it. Also, we should say it was quite rainy early. It was bad weather and rainy early in the stage today.

I have not checked the forecast for tomorrow, but this part of the Pyrenees, it can be quite stormy. So I wouldn't be shocked if it's stormy again. But the favorite, heavy favorite, Jonas Finnegard plus 135, Giulio Chaconne plus 1,000, Jewelameta plus 1,000, J Vine plus 1,400, Egan Bernal plus 2,500, Mark Salaire plus 2,500, Chris Harper, plus 3,300, it goes on and on and on, we'll call them out when we need to. One quick note, I, so we didn't think it was going to be breakaway. I wake up this morning and say, ooh, this is going to be breakaway. I bet on J Vine live, on bedmgm. This is something you can explore, like if a stage like this, you think, oh, it's too risky, you can always wait and try to bet on it live.

And also, if you do want to bet, make sure you'd go to nxtibets.com slash bet outcomes because you'll get the best price and you'll see where you can do it where you live. But Johan, who do you think is going to win the stage? And do you think it's breakaway or Peloton? It's difficult. It's difficult to predict a rider from a breakaway, Spencer. I actually think there is a decent chance for a breakaway, especially because of this climb Porto Canto. I still remember that climb myself. I didn't like it at all.

It's 25 kilometers climb, four and a half percent only average, but it's ideal for big groups to go away. It's going to be mayhem on that climb. It always is. The thing tomorrow is that if Thrain wants to keep the leader's jersey, which I think he wants to, then Bahrain cannot let a group go too far away, at least with guys that are still in contention. So I'm just going to play it safe and go for Jonas Wingergart to win tomorrow. He's the heavy favorite, in my opinion. He is the best rider in this race.

He is the best climber in this race. So I'm going to go for him at 125. All right. We'll see if Visma is the appetite. I'm going to go discount, Jonas. I mean, I kind of, I just agree with your premise. I'm going to go someone at a better price. Joala made a plus 1,000.

It's funny to me that now ever, it's like the market is just like, well, Jonas is a, he's a summit finish monster. This guy out sprints everybody's on, on summit finishes. It's not really his profile as a writer. Like he tends to drop people and that's how he wins. I don't think tomorrow is a drop people climb. I think people are going to have to sprint out of a small group. So I'm going to go with, I think,

Almeida looks pretty quick to me at the moment. Yeah. Well, it's a finish on Serler. It's not a super difficult climb, but there is, I remember a part of about two kilometers. which with steeper gradients, I would say, between 8, 9, 10%, so he could get away there.

If he's going to be able to drop Almeida, that's, I mean, I'm talking about Jonas, right? Yeah. That's a question. My second choice is going to be the same kind of style writer that you just chose, Spencer, Julio Cicone, plus 1,000. I think he looked great today. He can definitely win in a sprint, and he's not going to be easy to be dropped.

So he's my second choice of plus 1,000. I don't hate that. I like that. I'm going to go, this is very, very unoriginal. I'm going to go Jay Vine because today, from the break, from the break, plus 1,400. God, even if Jay Vine's in the GC group, if you look at the profile of this climb, there is a point that it's like 10% than a descent, then a climb back up to the finish. Like, you can imagine, remember like Tyman Arnsman, something like that at the tour where you have these guys attacking out of the GC group and they're kind of let go.

But man, if Fine gets in the breakaway, it is actually hard to see anyone beating him at the moment because he's just so much better than any of the breakaway riders on these climbs. Now, today he was outstanding compared to everybody else in that breakaway. And he's still the beauty of Vine strategy. He's 18 minutes back, 19 minutes back essentially, which tells you he's probably pre-planned this. and that's why he lost an aggressive amount of time. And also, Spencer, I think, you know, if he wants personally to make it a serious goal, personal goal to win the KOM, he kind of has to go in the break tomorrow also.

Yeah. And so I think he's thought about this. It's why he's lost so much time more than other stage hunters. I'm going to go Vine at plus 1,400. Okay, good. All right. Well, well, we'll see how it is. It's heating up.

It's slowly heating up, Johan's not so, so. boring or slow boil would be the diplomatic way of saying that, but I'm excited to see how this plays out. Okay, Spencer, speak tomorrow. All right, we'll talk tomorrow. Bye.