It would be easy to look at the first ten stages of the Tour de France and come to the conclusion that it's going to be a subdued affair, a damp squib before the real action in the mountains gets underway, and an opportunity to do something else instead of sitting and watching the race all day. But after studying the route in detail, Bahrain Victorious' Fred Wright says the reality will be the complete opposite as he gets set to travel to Lille next week.
"The first week at the Tour is going to be so exciting," he said. "That's because some of those early stages will really open up the race, I can see Tadej [Pogačar] maybe trying to gain bonus seconds on Jonas [Vingegaard]. That might mean he ends up winning a few of the stages but none of them are hard enough that other guys won't also be in the mix too. That’s what we as a team will probably be hoping for in the first ten days or so too."
"From what I can see in the first ten days, I think it's going to make for some f*****g amazing racing," he added. "I think it's going to be more of a spectacle than everyone thinks with Tadej not just walking all over everyone. I had the exact same initial thought as everyone else; I looked at the roadbook and thought there were a lot of flat, sprint type stages in the first ten days, but it really isn't like that.
"It's going to be much harder than everyone thinks, there's a lot of Classics style, hilly stages in there, a bit like some of the Ardennes Classics."
Wright will head into the Tour fresh off the back of an impressive showing at the Critérium du Dauphiné in which he recorded two top ten stage finishes, most notably finishing second in a bunch sprint in Issiore to Lidl-Trek’s Jonathan Milan. Wright was also on the attack on the opening day and said he intends to approach the Tour in a similar fashion.
"We've got our goals as a team, but personally I've already looked at it and there are a few stages that I've got in mind which will definitely be good days for me to try something in the breakaway," he said. "How I was racing the Dauphiné is how I'll approach the Tour, it's the level I want to be at and how I want to go about searching for opportunities, it's really exciting for me.
"I was really in my element for those first few days at the Dauphiné, so I'm ready for this now and just want to keep building on what I’ve been doing, hopefully I can have a successful Tour."
In stark contrast to Wright, Geraint Thomas is one man who isn't looking forward to the opening week in what is set to be his final lap around France. "It's more the roads, you've got some narrow roads, it could be pretty windy at times," the Ineos Grenadiers rider said on his Watts Occurring podcast on Monday.
"Everyone knows the first week of the Tour is stressful, this is just prime stress levels at ten out of ten… to be honest, I'm not really looking forward to that bit. I would have preferred a couple of hard days like last year, it just settles everyone down then."
