With stages 18-20 of the Tour de France featuring the high mountains and the finale in Paris now tougher for the sprinters with the addition of the Montmartre climb from the Olympic Games, stage 17 represents a final chance for green jersey contenders to unseat Mads Pedersen.
Pedersen leads Alpecin-Premier Tech's Jasper Philipsen by 31 points in the green jersey competition, with Biniam Girmay (NSN) 25 points further behind.
The Lidl-Trek rider seemed upbeat and a little cagey in his interview after the time trial, saying he thought the stage had been a nice way to open up the legs before Wednesday's challenge.
"It's one of the days we marked out before we came to the Tour. We'll be racing to win the stage tomorrow," Pedersen said of stage 17.
After making a mistake on stage 13 and missing a massive early breakaway, Lidl-Trek had to scramble to make up for the rare gaffe, and Pedersen managed to bridge across with another large group. He limited his losses, taking second to Jasper Philipsen in the intermediate sprint and losing five points before sitting up and going back to the bunch.
Stage 17 will be a much, much tougher effort to make the early breakaway since the first 50 kilometres will consist mostly of climbing, but Lidl-Trek will be keen not to make the same mistake twice.
The team could either stack a breakaway large enough to sweep up all the intermediate and finishing sprint points. Or, they could keep an early breakaway close and detonate the race as the terrain flattens out. With the intermediate sprint coming 147.5 kilometres into the 175-kilometre stage, there will be time to shift tactics along the way, too.
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The key point of the finale is an uncategorised ascent of 2.5 kilometres inside the final 10km - it's a place where Pedersen could get rid of Philipsen and give himself a chance against the remaining pure sprinters in the bunch, too.
It's not just about Pedersen and Lidl-Trek, though. More than half the peloton are yet to win a stage or stand on a podium for any reason, and time is running out.
Transition stages in the third week of a Grand Tour are notoriously tricky. After crashes took top contenders Jonas Vingegaard and Florian Lipowitz out of the race, there could be even more mayhem as fatigue sets in.
The GC contenders are likely to continue their unofficial agreement to play the stage safe and let the green jersey battle play out.
Look for Visma-Lease a Bike to feature prominently in any moves as they seek to make up for the loss of their leader.
Continuing north towards the Alpine crescendo, stage 17 covers 174.7km from Chambéry to Voiron. Billed by the organisers as a sprinters' stage, it may deliver a battle between breakaway artists and sprinters’ teams.
Points at finish: 50-30-20-18-16-14-12-10-8-7-6-5- 4-3-2
The first 60 kilometres wind through the Bauges regional natural park on roads tailor-made for a breakaway, with four categorised climbs including the Col des Prés at 1,142 metres before the route loops back to Chambéry. Rolling terrain then carries the race through the Chartreuse regional natural park for the next 77 kilometres to the intermediate sprint in Colombe, after which the final 30 flat kilometres offer the peloton a chance to regroup before Voiron.
Mountains
Côte de Bassa (cat. 4, 1.5km at 5.5%), km. 19.2
1 pt
Côte de Rossillon (cat. 4, 1.7 km at 5.3%), km. 35.5
1 pt
Col des Prés (cat. 3, 3.5km at 6.8%), km. 49.6
2-1 pts
Côte de Saint-Jean d'Arvey (cat. 4, 1.1km at 5.7%), km. 59.5
Lyne has been involved in professional cycling for more than 15 years in both news reporting and sports marketing. She founded Podium Insight in 2008, quickly becoming a trusted source for news of the North American professional cycling world. She was the first to successfully use social media to consistently provide timely and live race updates for all fans. She is proud to have covered men's and women's news equally during her tenure at the helm of the site. Her writing has appeared on Cyclingnews and other news sites.
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