Tour de France: Who are the yellow jersey favorites?

By OlympicTalkSep 5, 2020, 10:08 AM EDT

A glance at Tour de France yellow jersey favorites with predictions from NBC Sports analysts going into the three-week stage race …

Egan Bernal
2019 Tour de France champion
Team: Ineos Grenadiers
Nationality: Colombia

Last year, Bernal ascended mid-Tour to become Ineos’ leader and, at 22, the youngest Tour de France champion in more than 100 years. Ineos’ hopes for an eighth Tour title in nine years largely rest with the Colombian after it left past Tour champions Chris Froome and Geraint Thomas off this year’s roster. Bernal’s most accomplished teammate is Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz, who won the 2019 Giro d’Italia.

Bernal is NBC Sports analyst Bob Roll‘s pick to win the Tour, though he withdrew after three stages of the Criterium du Dauphine with a sore back earlier this month.

“I just think that Ineos is so clever with their preparations for this one race,” Roll said. “He’s got a very capable team, no matter who they take to the Tour de France. I think we did not see the real Egan in the last couple of races.”

Primoz Roglic
2019 Vuelta a Espana champion
Team: Jumbo-Visma
Nationality: Slovenia

The 2007 World junior team ski jumping champion blossomed into a Grand Tour general classification contender the last two seasons. Roglic, who suffered this scary crash before leaving ski jumping, leads the Tour’s other top-tier team, Jumbo-Visma. Many believe that a combination of Ineos’ shuffling (notably the absences of the aging Froome and Thomas) and Jumbo-Visma’s depth could call for a changing of the guard in the peloton.

The 30-year-old is NBC Sports analyst Christian Vande Velde‘s pick to win the Tour. Roglic, a fourth-place finisher in his last Tour start in 2018, has accomplished help in Tom Dumoulin (2018 Tour runner-up) and a promising climber in American 25-year-old Sepp Kuss. Unfortunately, Roglic will not have 2019 Tour third-place finisher Steven Kruijswijk, who dislocated and fractured his shoulder in the Criterium du Dauphine.

“Even though [Roglic] crashed out of the Dauphine [withdrawing as a precaution while leading] … I still think he’s the strongest guy going right now, and that’s all we have to go off of,” Vande Velde said. “We don’t have much.”

MORE: Tour de France TV, live stream schedule

Nairo Quintana
2013, 2015 Tour de France runner-up
Team: Arkea-Samsic
Nationality: Colombia

Quintana hopes to be rejuvenated with a new team after being part of Movistar’s three-headed Tour leadership with Mikel Landa and Alejandro Valverde that produced a best finish of sixth between 2018 and 2019. Quintana, a 30-year-old who was once Froome’s chief rival, also did not finish the Criterium du Dauphine (knee pain). Already with Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a Espana titles, the Colombian can become the eighth cyclist to win all three Grand Tours.

Thibaut Pinot
2014 Tour de France third-place finisher
Team: Groupama-FDJ
Nationality: France

Considered the best chance for a Frenchman to win the Tour for the first time since Bernard Hinault‘s last of five titles in 1985. Before this 34-year drought, the longest span between French wins in Tour history dating to 1903 was seven races. Pinot, 30, failed to finish his last three Tour starts. In 2019, he tearfully abandoned during stage 19 with a leg injury while in fifth place in the overall standings. If Pinot struggles this year, the French will pin hopes on Julian Alaphilippe, who surprisingly wore the yellow jersey for 14 days last year before ultimately finishing fifth. And Romain Bardet, who was second in 2016 and third in 2017.

Tadej Pogacar
2019 Vuelta a Espana third-place finisher
Team: UAE Team Emirates
Nationality: Slovenia

Last year, at 20, he became the youngest Grand Tour podium finisher since 1974. This year, he can become the first rider to win his Tour de France debut since Frenchman Laurent Fignon in 1983. Pogacar, fourth in the Dauphine, was initially expected to support veteran Fabio Aru in the Tour but is now slated to be a team leader.

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Ryan Crouser breaks world record in shot put at Los Angeles Grand Prix

By OlympicTalkMay 27, 2023, 5:56 PM EDT

Two-time Olympic champion Ryan Crouser registered one of the greatest performances in track and field history, breaking his world record and throwing three of the six farthest shot puts of all time at the Los Angeles Grand Prix on Saturday.

Crouser unleashed throws of 23.56 meters, 23.31 and 23.23 at UCLA’s Drake Stadium. His previous world record from the Tokyo Olympic Trials was 23.37. He now owns the top four throws in history, and the 23.23 is tied for the fifth-best throw in history.

“The best thing is I’m still on high volume [training], heavy throws in the ring and heavy weights in the weight room, so we’re just starting to work in some speed,” the 6-foot-7 Crouser, who is perfecting a new technique coined the “Crouser slide,” told Lewis Johnson on NBC.

Sha’Carri Richardson won her 100m heat in 10.90 seconds into a slight headwind, then did not start the final about 90 minutes later due to cramping, Johnson said. Richardson is ranked No. 1 in the world in the 100m in 2023 (10.76) and No. 2 in the 200m (22.07).

Jamaican Ackeem Blake won the men’s 100m in a personal best 9.89 seconds. He now ranks third in the world this year behind Kenyan Ferdinand Omanyala and American Fred Kerley, who meet in the Diamond League in Rabat, Morocco on Sunday (2-4 p.m. ET, CNBC, NBCSports.com/live, the NBC Sports app and Peacock).

The next major meet is the USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships in early July, when the top three in most individual events qualify for August’s world championships.

Richardson will bid to make her first global championships team, two years after having her Olympic Trials win stripped for testing positive for marijuana and one year after being eliminated in the first round of the 100m at USATF Outdoors.

LA GRAND PRIX: Full Results

Also Saturday, Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico won the 100m hurdles in 12.31, the fastest time ever this early in a year. Nigerian Tobi Amusan, who at last July’s worlds lowered the world record to 12.12, was eighth in the eight-woman field in 12.69.

Maggie Ewen upset world champion Chase Ealey in the shot put by throwing 20.45 meters, upping her personal best by more than three feet. Ewen went from 12th-best in American history to third behind 2016 Olympic champion Michelle Carter and Ealey.

Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic ran the fastest women’s 400m since the Tokyo Olympics, clocking 48.98 seconds. Paulino is the Olympic and world silver medalist. Olympic and world champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo of the Bahamas is on a maternity break.

Rio Olympic bronze medalist Clayton Murphy won the 800m in 1:44.75, beating a field that included most of the top Americans in the event. Notably absent was 2019 World champion Donovan Brazier, who hasn’t raced since July 20 of last year amid foot problems.

CJ Allen won the 400m hurdles in a personal best 47.91, consolidating his argument as the second-best American in the event behind Olympic and world silver medalist Rai Benjamin, who withdrew from the meet earlier this week.

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Primoz Roglic set to win Giro d’Italia over Geraint Thomas

Associated PressMay 27, 2023, 4:13 PM EDT

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Primož Roglič all but secured the Giro d’Italia title on Saturday by overtaking leader Geraint Thomas on the penultimate stage despite having a mechanical problem on the mountain time trial.

Roglič started the stage 26 seconds behind Thomas — who was trying to become the oldest Giro champion in history — but finished the route 40 seconds quicker than the British cyclist after the demanding climb of the Monte Lussari.

That saw Roglič move into the leader’s pink jersey, 14 seconds ahead of Thomas going into the race’s mainly ceremonial final stage.

Roglič was cheered on all the way by thousands of fans from just across the border to his native Slovenia. They packed the slopes of the brutal ascent up Monte Lussari, which had an elevation of more than 3,000 feet and gradients of up to 22%.

The 33-year-old Roglič celebrated at the end with his wife and son, who was wearing a replica of the pink jersey.

“Just something amazing, eh? It’s not at the end about the win itself, but about the people, and the energy here, so incredible, really moments to live and to remember,” said Roglič, who had tears in his eyes during the post-stage television interview, which he did with his son in his arms.

It will be a fourth Grand Tour victory for Roglič, who won the Spanish Vuelta three years in a row from 2019-2021

Roglič also almost won the Tour de France in 2020, when he was leading going into another mountain time trial on the penultimate stage. But that time it was Roglič who lost time and the race to compatriot Tadej Pogačar in one of the most memorable upsets in a Grand Tour in recent years.

It appeared as if the Jumbo-Visma cyclist’s hopes were evaporating again when he rode over a pothole about halfway through the brutal climb up Monte Lussari and his chain came off, meaning he had to quickly change bicycles.

His teammates and staff had their hands over their heads in disbelief.

Despite that setback, Roglič — who had been 16 seconds ahead of Thomas at the previous intermediate time check — went on to increase his advantage.

“I dropped the chain, I mean it’s part of it,” he said. “But I got started again and I just went … I had the legs, the people gave me extra (energy).”

The 33-year-old Roglič won the stage ahead of Thomas. Joao Almeida was third, 42 seconds slower.

For Thomas, his bad luck at the Giro continued. In 2017, he was involved in a crash caused by a police motorbike, and three years later he fractured his hip after a drinks bottle became lodged under his wheel – being forced to abandon both times.

Thomas turned 37 on Thursday. The Ineos Grenadiers cyclist had seemed poised to become the oldest Giro winner in history — beating the record of Fiorenzo Magni, who was 34 when he won in 1955.

“I could feel my legs going about a kilometer and a half from the top. I just didn’t feel I had that real grunt,” Thomas said. “I guess it’s nice to lose by that much rather than a second or two, because that would be worse I think.

“At least he smashed me and to be honest Primoz deserves that. He had a mechanical as well, still put 40 seconds into me so chapeau to him. If you’d told me this back in (February), March, I would have bit your hand off but now I’m devastated.”

Thomas and Roglič exchanged fist bumps as they waited their turn to ride down the ramp at the start of the 11.6-mile time trial.

The Giro will finish in Rome on Sunday, with 10 laps of a seven-mile circuit through the streets of the capital, taking in many of its historic sites.

“One more day to go, one more focus, because I think the lap is quite hard, technical. So it’s not over til it’s finished,” Roglič said. “But looks good, voila.”

The route will pass by places such as the Altare della Patria, the Capitoline Hill, the Circus Maximus and finish at the Imperial Forums, in the shadow of the Colosseum.

The Tour de France starts July 1, airing on NBC Sports and Peacock.

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