2 days before Tirreno–Adriatico starts, one of the most sought-after 'dirty' classics takes place on Saturday the 7^th^ in Sienna. The race is 200 km long, with almost one third (63 km) on white dirt/gravel roads.

Zoom on the final:

As we can see, the longest gravel sections are located around mid-course, and in the end 2 sections are ridden twice.

Teams and riders

That's Pogatchar🇸🇮's first race of the season. He will meet the new terror of the yard: Paul 'Ze Elect' Seixas (🇫🇷 Décathlon). Pidcock (🇬🇧 Q36.5) and Van Aert (🇧🇪 Visma) will thus battle for third place. 😉

The teams:

Previous podiums:

Starting one hour before, the women race is 70 km shorter.

The final is the same.

The usual suspects will be present: Vollering (🇳🇱 FDJ), Kopecky (🇧🇪 SD-Worx), Niewiadoma (🇵🇱 Canyon) and so on. Ferrand-Prévot (🇫🇷 Visma) will pay a visit.

Should be a good race. Hopefully somebody can put up a fight against Pog and it's not just a 60 km solo win. Weather looks good if I'm looking at the right forecast.

Side note, I was super confused by that jersey graphic and why Visma, UAE, and others were listed as ProTour. Then I saw the slight shading. Still confusing. Thought I had missed some UCI drama or something and we didn't have 18 WorldTour teams anymore.

Hopefully somebody can put up a fight against Pog and it’s not just a 60 km solo win.

Let's hope that this someone doesn't get 3 punctures or caught in a crash.

Weather looks good if I’m looking at the right forecast.

I get the same: mild temperature, partially sunny, no wind: perfect.

Side note, I was super confused by that jersey graphic and why Visma, UAE, and others were listed as ProTour. Then I saw the slight shading. Still confusing. Thought I had missed some UCI drama or something and we didn’t have 18 WorldTour teams anymore.

😃 Yeah, the two pictures are meant to be side by side. It is so when my window is large enough, but otherwise of course the second one shifts below the first. I was too lazy to fuse them into a single image before uploading.

I took them from the official guide, and it puzzled me there too, like it did for you: they are not on the same page (hence my two screenshots). While it must be OK when printed on paper and you have the first part on the left page and the second facing it on the right page, on a PDF that you read one page at a time, it doesn't work well.

Hopefully somebody can put up a fight against Pog and it’s not just a 60 km solo win. Weather looks

It wasn't just a 60 km solo win, it was more like a 80 km solo win. 😆

A few notes of mine:

• After Pogatchar🇸🇮's attack, Seixas🇫🇷 should have given up the chase as soon as Del Toro🇲🇽 caught up with him, and go back with Grégoire🇫🇷, Jorgenson🇺🇸, etc. which were going well just a few seconds behind. Instead, he pulled for the whole sector (which was still almost 10 km long) and more. When they finally regrouped, they had burned their energy.
• As chasing groups were regrouping, they were getting slower and slower.
• Each attack from the regrouped chasing group was reducing the gap with Pogatchar🇸🇮 by 15 seconds as quickly as in a few hundreds metres.
• The TV direction is atrocious: there were 2 things to show in the final climb, the Seixas🇫🇷/Del Toro🇲🇽 duo and the Pidcock🇬🇧 group. We didn't see a bloody single inch of any of them! 🤬
• Seixas🇫🇷 would have been second best today, even if Del Toro🇲🇽 had beaten him in the end (or before the end), given the long efforts he did at least twice for miles and miles with Del Toro🇲🇽 staying on his rear wheel.
• Grégoire🇫🇷 was surprisingly good today. Even if he won in Drôme, he benefited on that day of the help of everyone's best comrade, Jorgenson🇺🇸, and of favourable circumstances behind, otherwise he wasn't great. Today, he was always at the front (or just behind it), he was consistently good, he didn't only show up in the end to snatch a good place.
• BTW, the 2 groups of strong riders formed after Pogatchar🇸🇮's attack, and later on after Seixas🇫🇷's attack, were in the same order the two times, and almost exactly had the same composition.
• UAE teammates Del Toro🇲🇽 and Christen🇨🇭 played and used their role perfectly.
• Q. Simmons🇺🇸 is still struggling. He tries obviously, but hasn't the legs for the racing he wishes to do. On the UAE/Pogatchar acceleration, when a micro-split starts to appear, it is hard for him but he is just ahead of the micro-split; but a moment later, when the actual split occurs, he is behind the split, he has cracked. Same as on previous races, and then again he doesn't seem to recover and drifts away.
• The Vermeersch🇧🇪 from today is definitely not the same Vermeersch🇧🇪 we saw the other day on the Het Nieuwsblad. While Florian👼 (UAE) did help everybody in his groups last week, Gianni👿 from Bora played the stowaway today. Quite a contrast compared to other riders in those groups.

Sex-ass had an incredible day. Excited to watch him develop as a racer in the coming years.

Too bad the win and winning method was predictable.

Roadside fan presence was pretty amazing too. Nice contrast to all those middle east races over the past few weeks.