Dauphiné begins the lead-up to the Tour
The Critérium du Dauphiné is one of the most prestigious stage races of the year, as evidenced by a palmares that includes the 4 quintuple winners of the Tour de France, Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain. Due to its demanding route and its situation in the calendar, with July and the Tour de France on the horizon, the Critérium du Dauphiné always attracts some of the favorites for the Tour, who take the opportunity to test themselves in some of the mountains they will have to climb in a month.
Route
For the 2022 edition, the race presents an 8-stage route. Decisive for the race outcome will be the Individual Time Trial on the fourth day and the last two stages, purely mountain stages which include famous climbs such as Col del Galibier (23.1 km at 5.1%) and the Col de la Croix de Fer (29 km at 5.2%) for Saturday's stage and Col de la Colombière (11.9 km at 5.7%) and the finish at the Plateau de Solaison (11.7 km at 8.8%) in the final stage on Sunday. The rest of the stages present medium-mountain profiles with quite a lot of climbing, without opportunities for pure sprinters.
Favorites
Tadej Pogačar (1200) will repeat the preparation for the Tour de France that he did last year, competing in the Tour of Slovenia, so the big favorites to win the Critérium du Dauphiné are the Jumbo - Visma riders Primož Roglič (1200) and Jonas Vingegaard (800), second-placed of the last two editions of the Tour de France. The team also includes all-rounder Wout Van Aert (1200).
Other contenders for the GC should be Enric Mas (1000), Ben O'Connor (600), Tao Geoghegan Hart (600), Brandon McNulty (800), David Gaudu (1000), Damiano Caruso (600), Pierre Latour ( 400), Alexey Lutsenko (600) or Jack Haig (600), although there are still several teams to present their line-ups, so we will have to keep an eye on the starting list.
On the Individual Time Trial, Wout Van Aert (1200) and Filippo Ganna (1000) start as big favorites, along with Ethan Hayter (1000), Rémi Cavagna (400), Rohan Dennis (400), Primož Roglič (1200) and Jonas Vingegaard (800). In the mid-mountain stages, Wout Van Aert (1200), Ethan Hayter (1000), Cristophe Laporte (600) and Jasper Stuyven (600) should be amongst the fastest men after a hard day.