Pogačar and Vingegaard face each other in Paris-Nice
The 2022 Tour de France brought us one of the most beautiful duels in recent years, with Jonas Vingegaard (1200) and Tadej Pogačar (1200) fighting for the yellow jersey at each stage, with great tactical movements and endless attacks and counterattacks. In the 2023 edition of the Tour, another spectacular face-to-face is expected, but first, both riders will face each other on a new environment. We are talking about Paris-Nice, which from Sunday will take cyclists from the north of France and the metropolitan region of Paris to Nice, on the shores of the Mediterranean. Paris-Nice is a kind of miniature Tour de France, and one of the most prestigious one-week races of the year, making it one of the favorite tests for grand tour contenders.
The route
The race reaches its 81st edition this year, and includes some notable novelties, especially in the team time trial rules on the third day. Normally, in team time trials, the fourth rider to cross the finish line sets the team's time, and the three riders who pass in front of him get his the same time as the fourth. In this edition of Paris-Nice, the team time will be set by the first rider, and each cyclist will save their individual time for the general classification, so we may see the team leaders sprint to the finish line.
Of the rest of the stages, it seems that there will be two for sprinters (stages 2 and 5), three with undulating profiles suited for breakaways (stages 1, 6 and 8) and two stages with mountaintop finales (stages 4 and 7), which will be decisive for the final GC.
Favorites
Anything else but a victory for Jonas Vingegaard (1200) or Tadej Pogačar (1200) would be a huge surprise, although the starting list also includes other candidates such as Romain Bardet (800), Ben O'Connor (600), Simon Yates (800), David Gaudu (1000), Jack Haig (800), Daniel Felipe Martínez (800), Ethan Hayter (1200), Gino Mäder (600), Pavel Sivakov (600), Mattias Skjelmose (800) and Maximilian Schachmann (600), winner of the 2020 and 2021 editions of the race.
Amongst the sprinters, Tim Merlier (800), Mads Pedersen (1000), Arnaud Demare (1000), Olav Kooij (800), Sam Bennett (800), Alexander Kristoff (800), Bryan Coquard (600), Arnaud De Lie ( 200) and Kaden Groves (600) seem some of the fastest.
In addition, on the start list there are also several stage hunters ans classics specialists adding kilometers before spring, but who can dispute a partial victory in the undulating stages. Men like Christophe Laporte (600), Michael Matthews (1000), Magnus Cort Nielsen (800), Matteo Trentin (600), Florian Sénéchal (400) or Yves Lampaert (400) come to mind.