The Col de la Madeleine and Col de la Loze were two biggest test of the Tour de France 2020 so far, with stage 17 offering up some remarkable performances from the riders.
As the peloton tackled the two huge beyond categorisation climbs during the 170km stage, the Strava leaderboards were completely destroyed as new climbing records were set on both ascents.
Miguel Angel Lopez rode to victory on the stage at the summit of the Loze, while Primož Roglič extended his race leader over Tadej Pogačar not far behind.
But what can the Strava stats behind the stage reveal?
The Madeleine was the first climb of the day, cresting 107km into the stage, and at 18km-long with an eight per cent average gradient, it was a monster challenge.
Richard Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) was the first rider over the top of the climb, followed by his breakaway companions Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck – Quick-Step), Dan Martin (Israel Start-Up Nation) and Gorka Izagirre (Astana), but unfortunately none of these riders uploaded their data to Strava.
Instead the new Strava King of the Mountain on the Madeleine is Valentin Madouas, who set a new fastest time of 58-34 with a huge performance.
The Groupama-FDJ rider set a huge power of 383 watts for the duration of the climb, with an average speed of 19.2km/h.
Next on the leaderboard is Tadej Pogačar, who led the peloton over the summit to pick up a handful of points in the Tour’s mountain classification.
Pogačar was five seconds slower than Madouas, but hasn’t uploaded his power data.
For comparison, the previous fastest time was set in June this year on stage three of the Critérium du Dauphiné, with Pierre Latour being the former KoM holder with a time of 1-00-59.
The top-100 fastest times on Strava for the Madeleine were all set during the 2020 season.
After making it over that major climb, the peloton still faced the new test of the Col de la Loze, which had never featured in the Tour before.
The 21km climb averages eight per cent and took the peloton to 2,300 metres altitude, making it a brutal challenge.
While the Col de la Loze hasn’t featured in the Tour before, we can look to the 2019 season for some previous performances.
The col featured as a summit finish in stage eight of last year’s Tour de l’Avenir – the under-23 Tour de France – as riders started from the bottom and fired directly the top on the 23.1km-long stage.
Michel Ries completed the 21.5km-long Col de la Loze par Meribel Strava segment (slightly shorter than the Avenir stage) in 1-02-58 to take the KoM, with an average speed of 20.5km/h and an average power of 346w.
The Tour peloton didn’t take on the exact same route as the Avenir peloton, but instead followed a slightly different 20.87km Strava segment to the summit.
Tadej Pogačar was the fastest Strava rider to reach the finish, with a time of 1-01-11 as he tried to chased down Roglič.
Jumbo-Visma’s Sepp Kuss also flew up the climb with a 1-01-36, with Richie Porte not far behind with a 1-01-39.
Unfortunately none of these riders shared their power data, but Valentin Madouas did.
Finishing 15th on the stage, four minutes behind the stage winner, Madouas set the sixth fastest Strava time with a 1-04-46, pushing 384w for that time.
Richard Carapaz was the seventh fastest rider on Strava with a time of 1-05-24, as his courageous breakaway effort failed on the final climb.
The Giro d’Italia champion set a power of 334w for the duration of the climb.
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After offering up a thrilling day of racing, the Tour organisers are likely to bring the Loze back to the race soon enough, so we’ll see if the riders can go even faster up this stunning climb.
