u/PelotonMod

Stage Info

Route	Profile	Finale Route	Stage starts: 12:20 CEST
Finale Profile	TimeTable		Stage finishes: 17:00 CEST

Weather

34°C, Sunny, slight South East wind at the start, 24°C, sunny at the finish

Stage Breakdown

Hello everyone and welcome to the 3rd stage of the Tour de France. We start in Granollers, near the Circuit de Barcelona Catalunya which hosts the Spanish F1 GP, for a mountain stage. I've talked a lot about the Volta a Catalunya in the last 2 previews and will continue to do so today, because this really looks like a basic La Molina stage that you see almost every March, and it is almost exactly that, as the stage is filles with long shallow climb pretty disctinctive of the Eastern Pyrénées. The first half of the stage is pretty insignificant apart from the uphill fals flats, the first KOM and the IS, but after the IS we get to our first real climb with is the Collada de Toses, which happens to be one of the sides of La Molina, which the riders who have done the Volta will know, then we go down to Alp (pretty funny) and then we go back up into France.

In France we will start by going around the Llivia enclave, a part of Spain still in France then we get to Font Romeu which is a well known city as it is where the training grounds to prep the 1968 Olympics in Mexico were established, for the Altitude and is still operating today, it's less popular for cyclist these days but notably Sylvain Chavanel did his Tour prep there. After that we go up towards Les Angle with 1.7km at 6.5%

With that in mind here are our predictions:

★★★ Breakaway ( Bernal, Vauquelin, Jorgenson, BOC, Plapp, Verstynge)

★★ Pogacar

★ Del Toro, Vingegaard, Remco, Seixas

Only 31 riders are at less than 4 mins of Vingegaard alreay, which seems like a nice limit to allow for riders in the breakaway. This leaves a ton of possible candidates for it and will likely lead to an intense breakaway battle. This leaves Visma with 3 options: Try to control but will likely lead to Pogi win and possible yellow, let the break go, or let the break go wit some of their rider, including Jorgenson who has a kick and is already 8:33 down on GC.

It's also dependant on what Pogi wants to do, he already gifted Del Tor a stage (ngl I expected it to be stage 3, not 2) so if he bothers it's more likely for him not for Del Toro so he might not bother, but it's hard to properly anticipate.

That's it for us, what is your prediction for the stage?

Date	Stage	Route	Length	Type	Altitude	Finish	Time
Sun. 05/07	2	Tarragona > Barcelona	182km	Medium	2391m	Uphill	13:45-17:35 CET

_	_
Information	Official Site / Startlist / Startlist FC / Wikipedia / TourView
Previews	INRNG / CyclingNews / CyclingWeekly / Cyclist.co.uk /
/r/Peloton Content	Pre-Race Thread / Cheat Notes / SWL
Social Media	Instagram / Facebook / X / Youtube / Dailymotion / Tiktok
Live Trackers	Official / Tissot / Cycling News / TourTracker Live
TV	CourseDeJour / Official live broadcasters list / Race Coverage starts at 12:00 CEST

Stage Info

Route	Profile		Stage starts: 13:45 CEST
Finale Profile	TimeTable		Stage finishes: 17:36 CEST

Weather

30°C, Sunny, 15km/h North Wind

Stage Breakdown

Hello everyone and welcome to the second stage of this 2026 Tour de France. We keep going in this Catalonian Grand Depart with a stage starting in Tarragona on the coast, for a stage very similar to the usual last stage of the Volta a Catalunya but a bit longer. A long nice stroll for the first 85km will probably make for a calm race, unless the sprinters teams decide to control for the intermediate sprint. After that, some riders will try to go for the first KOM of the race, which likely will give the first mountains jersey of the race. After that we go to Barcelona, where we will go, once again, around Montjuic, not on the usual circuit but on a longer but a bit harder circuit which the riders will have to go through three times, with most importantly the long version of the climb to to Montjuic Castle, with 1.6km at 9.3% ad a finish at the same place as the TTT today. Clearly every rider who has done the Volta a Catalunya will know this finale by heart and ti will make for a great battle

With that in mind here are our predictions:

★★★ Pogacar

★★ Vingegaard, Seixas, Evenepoel, Gregoire, Del Toro

★ Van Der Poel, Matthews, Ayuso, Vacek

With today in mind to give a nice preview of where everyone is at, Pogacar still looks like the best of the bunch but some other riders have given interesting indicators, such as Vingegaard or Evenepoel but mostly Gregoire, who did an incredible finish in the TTT, and they could possibily challenge Pogacar even if it seems fairly unlikely.

That's it for us, what is your prediction for the stage?

Stage Info

Route	Profile	Finale Route	Stage starts: 17:05 CEST
	Start Times		Stage finishes: 19:16 CEST

Weather

28°C, Sunny, 15km/h North Wind

Stage Breakdown

Hello everyone and welcome to the first stage of the 2026 Tour de France! Welcome back for another season of this (as long as Reddit isn't a bugged hellhole anymore) and we start in the sun!

Well that could mean anywhere in France considering the recent heatwave and the one that will be coming soon but anyway, we're in Barcelona, for another spanish grand depart after 2023. Barcelona is known for the Football, sometimes sailing, tourists but it's also a cycling city, it's been the host of many races in the past such as the Volta a Catalunya which sees a stage in Montjuic every year, the Setmana Catalana which occupied the currunt position of the Volta a Catalunya in the calendar or the atypical Escalada a Montjuïc with only two half stages. All of this to say, this isn't uncharted territory, evn more so this TTT. Some of you may Wonder why a TTT in Barcelona seems so familiar, well it's because it happened fairly recently, in the Vuelta a Espana, in the rain and at night, which made for a lot of falls and a lot of complaints, especially from Remco Evenepoel which resulted in this magnificent GIF. Well, one might hope he isn't too traumatized by the experience because this TTT has a fairly similar middle part. While the start here is different, arguably less technical, along the Mediterranean Sea, from more or less the 14km to go mark up till 5km to go, it is almost the same TTT, with fewer corners, but the Plaça d'Espanya where everyone slipped 3 years ago is included.

While the Vuelta stupped there, the Tour will continue, up to Montjuic by roads to which most pro riders are used to but it does have differencies to the way it's all done compared to the Volta.

So this TTT is known territory, nobody should be caught off guard and if they are it's on them. IMPORTANT THING TO ADD, this is TTT by ASO rules, the time is taken on the FIRST rider to cross the line, not the 4th or the 5th like in the past.

With that in mind here are our predictions:

★★★ Netcompany INEOS

★★ UAE Team Emirates - XRG, Team Visma / Lease a Bike

★ Red Bull - Bora - Hansgrohe, Lidl - Trek, Pinarello - Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team

TTT, unless you show up with a highly specialized team, often turns up to be a battle of those who have the biggest budgets int he sport, even more so than any other type of stages. This TTT falls into both categories, the richest teams are clearly the strongest but among those, one is showing up with a highly specialized team, Netcompany - INEOS, with 2 former World champion, one rider who is arguably the best TTer who hasn't won worlds currently in activity, some of the best TTers among GT riders and very solid flat riders. If they Don't win this it's a Failure and their Tour will be off to a very bad start in the first edition in which they aren't explicitely targetting GC since the team has been at the Tour. UAE and Visma obviously have a card to play and try to take some psychological advantage rather than a lot of time. For Visma it's really dependant on Affini's recovery since his crash in the italian national championships.

While we have seen the new TTT formula at Paris Nice and the Tour Auvergne - Rhône Alpes, we have yet to seen it with optimized teams in a really important setting so this will be the Curiosity of the day.

That's it for us, what is your prediction for the stage?

Team	GC	Sprinter	Puncheur/Classic	Climber	Rouleur/TT
APT		Philipsen	Marsman, Van der Poel, Rickaert, Verstrynge, Dillier	Debruyne
CJR		Gavira	Molenaar, Oldani, Otruba, Nicolau^RC	Parra, Berwick, Balderstone^SR
COF		Fretin	Allegaert, Biermans, Kirsch, Page	Aranburu, Izagirre	B.Thomas^RC
DCT	Seixas	Koij	Benoot, Bol	A.Paret-Peintre, Prodhomme, Riccitello	Hoole
EFE	Carapaz		Valgreen, Baudin, Healy	Steinhauser	Asgreen, Walker
GFC	G.Martin		Russo, Pacher, Gregoire, Costiou	Berthet, Braz_Afonso, Germani
JAY	O'Connor	Ackermann	Matthews, Schmid	Engelhardt	Durbridge^RC, O'Brien, Plapp
LOI		De Lie	Veistroffer, Slock, Berckmoes	Craps, Van Eetvelt, Zimmermann	Artz
LTK	Ayuso, Gee-West	Pedersen	Skujins, Vacek, Simmons	Skjelmose, Verona
MOV	Uijtdebroeks		Hessmann,	Carcia_Pierna, Castrillo, Rubio, Romo, Cepeda	Oliveira
NCI			Kwiatkowski, Godon	Bernal, Vauquelin, Arensman	Ganna, Tarling, Foss^SR
NSN		Girmay, Stewart	Louvel, Askey, Van Asbroeck, Neilands	Frigo, Bennett
PQT	Pidcock		Hermans, Wright, Howson, Maurisse, Van_Moer	Harper, Azparren
RBH	Lipowitz, Evenepoel		Denz, van Dijke	Van Gils, Hindley	Cattaneo^SR, Tratnik^SR
SOQ		Merlier	Van Lerberghe, Eenkhoorn, Stuyven	Paret-Peintre, Vervaeke	Van Wilder^SR
TBV	Tiberi	Bauhaus	Van_Mechelen, Stannard, Mohoric	Caruso, Martinez	Gradek
TEN	Jegat	Turgis	Le_Berre, Delettre	Vercher, Breuillard, Delbove	Guernalec
TPP		Bittner	Degenkolb, Märkl, Dhondt, Van_den_Berg, Biesterbos	van_den_Broek, Barguil
TUD		De_Klein	Alaphilippe, Trentin, Pluimers, Hirschi, Haller^RC	Storer, Voisard
TVL	Vingegaard, Jorgenson		Hagenes	Piganzoli, Kuss	Armirail^SR, Campenaerts^SR, Affini
UEX	Pogacar, Del Toro		Politt, Vermeersch	Grosschartner, McNulty, A.Yates, Wellens
UXM	THJ	Wærenskjold	Cort, Abrahamsen, Skaarseth^RC	AHJ, Charmig, Træen
XAT		Ballerini, Kanter	Teunissen, Gate	Higuita, Tejada, Velasco, Vinokurov

#2026 Tour de France 2.UWT

• Official website
• Parcours
• Startlist
• Rules/How To Play

---

#RFL

Submissions will have to be formatted like below, otherwise it won't be picked up.

Please arrange your comments like the list below (you can make bullets with the * key)

Also include the first name of the rider!

Grand Tour: pick 9 riders instead of 8!

* (x2.0) Firstname Lastname
* (x1.8) etc. 
* (x1.6) 
* (x1.4) 
* (x1.2) 
* (x1.0) 
* (x1.0) 
* (x1.0) 
* (x1.0) 

---

#SRFL

• Remember, you need to sign up (once) to join! Do so by messaging u/LynniePinnie67 In short:

• Pick one rider

• Your SRFL score is determined by that rider's FC points

• The more players pick that rider, the fewer points you can score

• You can change your pick as many times as you like by simply filling in the form again. Your latest pick counts.

#PICK YOUR RIDER VIA THE FORM

---

#Deadline

The deadline for these games will be when the race starts on July 4th at 17:05 local time (UTC +2), that's 15:05 UTC and 17:05 CEST, check your time here