14 DAY TRIAL // There was a time when a Tour de France features no less than three stages dedicated to solo riding against the clock, a prologue on the first day and two proper time trials that covered more kilometers in the second and the third weeks.
This year the ASO has decided to only feature one such contest on the penultimate stage and even here they have chosen to use an undulating course, which might pose some problems to traditional masters of the TT discipline.
The 54 kilometers could prove decisive in the real world in order to separate the favorites, depending on their performance during the previous weeks, but in my version of the winner seems to have been decided already, barring any major unfortunate events.
Because the time trial comes at the end of the grand tour it’s unclear who is going to win it but I will try to guide Cancellara to victory, using other riders on my team to test the best effort percentages for each section.
Time trials, because they are focused on a rider’s power in the long term, are some of the stages that tend to deliver accurate results even when simulated and many Pro Cycling Manager players tend not to actively play them.
The key to success is to take a look at the layout of the course and decide where each rider needs to push and try to gain time on his rivals and where he needs to conserve energy.
For the twentieth stage of Le Tour de France I used Ricardo Zoidl as a way to evaluate how fast to push my riders and the climbs and the descents and as a market for each time check.
When Cancellara came on the course I had a good idea of how fast he should go and I managed to perform well but I placed one second behind his big rival, Tony Martin, at the end of his ride.
Both time trial specialists were then defeated by two riders from Team Sky, who is well known for its training in the discipline and probably had better morale than my riders given their overall performance up to this point.
The biggest surprise was that Alberto Contador, the man who led for much of the race and performed best in the mountains, has finished 1’52 minutes down on Chris Froome, which means that he relinquished his Yellow jersey on the penultimate stage in truly dramatic fashion.
