Category: tour de france (Page 4 of 23)

Stage 9 was filled with excitement and great racing. Jonathon Vaughters said that Garmin-Sharp’s riders would cause chaos in the peloton and they delivered on that promise today. Their reward for their attacking style was the stage win for Dan Martin.

There were fireworks from the beginning of Stage 9. Saxo-Tinkoff and Movistar worked together at the front; setting a high tempo they isolated GC leader Chris Froome on the first Category 1 climb as his lieutenants (including the second placed Richie Porte) dropped by the way side.

Between the attacking tactics of the Garmin-Sharp riders and the Spanish armada formed by Saxo and Movistar Sky didn’t know what hit them.

All the strength and control Sky exhibited yesterday was non-existent today. Needless to say I was happy about that as were most Tour fans I would guess.

The yellow jersey was already isolated and it was early in the stage. Movistar and Saxo had Froome right where they wanted him – all alone – while Movistar leader Alejandro Valverde still had 3 of his lieutenants and Saxo-Tinkoff leader Alberto Contador had 2 of his.

As you would imagine there were a number of attacks off the front before things settled down somewhat into a 4 man break including Pierre Rolland and Ryder Hesjedal. Rolland picked up enough points to take back the polka-dot jersey from Froome. Other chase groups formed then faded, getting swallowed up or dropped by the main group with the yellow jersey and most of the favorites. Froome’s teammates were never able to catch back up.

Valverde and two teammates attacked the yellow jersey group, only Froome gave chase, easily catching them. Valverde and company and Froome came together before the start of the 2nd Category 1 climb, Col de Peyresourde. Next up was the Col de Azat, the 2nd to last climb of Stage 9.

In my mind it was do or die for Valverde/Movistar and Contador/Saxo. They had Froome just where they wanted him – solo – and Movistar particularly had the manpower to hurt him. Regardless, they didn’t attack, instead they rode tempo, and not surprisingly Froome was more than happy to sit back while Saxo and Movistar took turns at the front.

They had a shot and they didn’t take it. By the time Movistar did attack (with Quintana) it was late, on the last climb and easier for Froome to fight off than it would have been on the Azet.

It was a missed opportunity and one they may not get again. Instead of riding tempo, Movistar should have attacked Froome repeatedly, forcing Froome to give chase and thus wearing him down until he couldn’t follow any longer.

Apparently Valverde/Movistar was happy to drop Porte and move Valverde into the #2 spot rather than to go for the top spot and yellow jersey. With an individual time-trial on Wednesday Froome will surely increased his hold on yellow over Valverde. Don’t say you didn’t have a chance to take time Movistar.

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Garmin-Sharp on the other hand played every card they had. They saved their last best card, Dan Martin, for a final move. After the attacks by Quintana had played themselves out and Froome had apparently saved the yellow Martin attacked, with only Fuglsang following. They quickly opened up a gap on the main group as they worked together heading for the finish.

Martin played it perfectly, sitting on Fulgsang’s wheel until just the right moment when he attacked and took the stage win. A thrilling finish to an exciting stage.

There’s a rest day tomorrow (yeah!) and then the Tour heads north for a sprint stage.

More fireworks next Sunday when the Tour goes to Mont Ventoux. Team Sky will have one less rider protecting their hold on yellow; Vasili Kiryienka was the only rider to not make the time cut. Sky had a bad day, could have been a really bad day, but it no doubt was a wakeup call.

Makes me smile.

When I bemoaned the opening week of sprint stages yesterday I didn’t expect someone would do something to make this last one exciting. Someone did. Actually a team of somebodies: the team of Peter Sagan, Cannondale.

There was no bluff to Cannondale’s plan for Stage 7 – get Sagan the win. How? By dropping all of his competitors before the finish.

They executed their plan to perfection.

Cannondale, with some help from Orica-GreenEdge the team of the yellow jersey holder Daryl Impey, set a blistering pace at the front. If the peloton thought they were going to be able to take it kind of easy before tomorrow’s tough stage in the Pyrenees, they were sorely mistaken!

The first break of the day was old man Jens Voigt (Radio Shack) and Blel Kadri (AG2R) getting out in front, with Kadri picking up KOM points on the first two climbs and Kadri’s teammate outsprinting Pierre Rolland who had held the KOM jersey ensuring Kadri would capture the polka-dot jersey which he did.

Meanwhile OGE could sit behind Cannondale and let them do the work, good for them. No need to work when another team has an agenda. They managed to split the peloton dropping all the other main sprinters on the category 2 climb and continued to drill the pace until the intermediate sprint. I have to believe that was Cannondale’s plan is to get Sagan points to increase his hold on the green jersey, but when they saw they had dropped the likes of Mark Cavendish, Andre Greipel and Marcel Kittel, they decided why not go for the stage win.

So basically Cannondale gave Sagan a 190k lead-out. Their work at the front was nothing short of phenomenal.

Later in the stage Cannondale/OGE had to chase down a more threatening break with previous yellow jersey wearer Jan Bakelandts. Since Bakelandts was within striking distance of taking back the yellow jersey OGE shared in the work of chasing them down, although Cannondale still did the majority of the work. They caught them 3k from the finish and the race for the stage win was on.

Somehow Sagan and his teammates had enough left to take care of business. Sagan had to start his sprint from a long way out and in a less than optimum position. It didn’t matter. Argos-Shimano’s sprinter Degenkolb nearly caused him to go into the wall getting ahead of Sagan, but Sagan rocketed past him to take his much deserved first stage win of the 2013 Tour de France.

No choreographed victory salute for Sagan this time, just an acknowledgement to team sponsor Cannondale. He looked exhausted, I’m sure he was, along with his team no doubt. They gave us a great display of teamwork and perfect execution,it was a joy to watch.

I was equally happy that Impey kept the yellow jersey. For a new team, OGE have had a phenomenal week at the Tour, and just think, it was their bus that got things going.

In other news Christian Van de Velde had to abandon the Tour today after suffering another crash early in the stage. Hopefully he will be all healed up and ready to defend his US Pro Cycling Challenge championship in August.

Since I have Peter Sagan on my Fantasy Cycling Challenge team I picked up 125 points today, bringing the total thus far to a not-so-great 463.

Stage 8 is a doozy,the first day in the Pyrenees and it is a tough one. We should see a major shakeup in the GC  and jersey competitions. Just please don’t let Sky get yellow.

I have grown tired of the first week of the Tour. For me the first week of the Tour is often something to get through so we can get to the good part:  enduring the sprint stages to get to the stages of the Pyrenees and Alps, where the Tour will be won or lost.

Sort of like getting through a dinner of meatloaf when all you really want is to get to the dessert of chocolate cake.

Initially I am just happy for the Tour to begin so those first few sprint stages are exciting, but after a while (stage 6) they become boring. As horrible as it sounds (is), sometimes the only thing that livens up the stages of the first week are the crashes or if the breaks succeed which they rarely do. Otherwise you watch a few hours of tempo riding for the last few seconds of excitement.

Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen don’t help. I have heard every liggettism and sherwenism there is and most if not all of their anecdotes – twice. I find them boring or irritating most of the time. I watched Stage 1 online with Eurosport and enjoyed their coverage and commentating, but Steephill.tv cut many of their feeds afterwards. I just checked again and see they have added more, so I will give them a try tomorrow for Stage 7.

There was something newsworthy about Stage 6, no breakaway. One rider jumped away at the start, but with no help the peloton easily brought him back to the fold.

Besides crashes there is one other thing that can liven up a flat stage: crosswinds. Stage 6 had them, but the peloton was so tightly packed the crosswinds had no impact. The peloton were also motoring at a high rate of speed. Orica-GreenEdge did the majority of the work at the front, while the favorites fought to stay in front because of potential splits from crosswinds and/or crashes.

The stage did come down to a sprint among the strongest sprinters. Andre Greipel (Lotto) got the best leadout and consequently took the win finishing ahead of Peter Sagan (Cannondale), who is still winless, and yesterday’s winner Mark Cavendish. Cavendish crashes going around a roundabout about 30k from the finish and didn’t have enough punch left to beat Greipel. When that became evident, in typical Cavendish fashion, he sat up finishing 4th behind Sagan and Marcel Kittel.

Geipel’s win was especially sweet for his team as they lost their GC contender Jurgen van den Broeck due to injuries sustained in a crash yesterday. In other good news, the first yellow jersey ever for a South African rider was captured by Oricaa’s Daryl Impey. Nice OricaGreenEdge was able to share the yellow jersey among teammates.

Maxine Bouet, also abandoned the Tour today due to injuries suffered yesterday. Bouet was on my Fantasy Cycling Challenge team so that leaves me with one less rider. Hopefully my team will not be decimated by injuries like it was last year. Serious business this fantasy team stuff.

Stage 7 is another lumpy stage with a fairly big lump, a category 2 climb as well as a couple of category 3s and a category 4. It still looks like a stage that will end in a bunch sprint since the last 12k are downhill to the finish. Sagan has to be eyeing this stage for his first stage win of this Tour. This time last year he had already won 3.

Stage 7 Profile:

The real fun begins Saturday when the Tour goes into the Pyrenees with an HC category and a category 1 summit finish:

Stage 8 Profile:

Just like days of old, the relatively flat Stage 5 came down to a classic sprint and with a perfect leadout from his team, Mark Cavendish finished first, capturing his 24th Tour stage win.

The usual suspects contested the sprint: Cavendish, sprinter/Mr. Everything Peter Sagan (Cannondale), plus the hulk of a sprinter Andre Greipel (Lotto) as well as Edvald Boasson Hagen (Sky) and a Ferrari (Lampre). When things line up the way they did today, Cavendish is simply unbeatable.

There was some doubt whether the sprinters would get to go for the win with the break holding their own. The 6 man break built a lead of over 12 minutes at one point before Orica-GreenEdge with a little help from their friends (sprinters teams) managed to reel them back in several kilometers from the finish.

Being the first week of the Tour, there were a couple of silly crashes, the last one just yards (meters) from the finish. No one appeared to be seriously injured.

There was no change in any of the jersey competitions: Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEdge) yellow (overall), Peter Sagan (Cannondale) green (sprint), Pierre Rolland (Europcar) polka-dot (climber) and Michal Kwiatkowski (OPQS) white (young rider).

The most memorable thing about Stage 5 was the unfortunate fact that Ted King was not allowed to start the stage and continue in the Tour after he finished just 7 seconds outside the time cut (winning time set by Orica-GreenEdge) in yesterday’s team time-trial.

Tour officials could have reinstated him as they have many times in the past when riders don’t finish a stage within the time limit. Why they chose to do this to King is beyond understanding. They had the discretion to reinstate him prior to the start, yet chose not to stating rules are rules. I mean 7 seconds, come on!

Given King’s circumstances, a shoulder separation suffered in Stage 1 which didn’t allow him to ride a standard (faster) time-trial bike nor ride as aggressively causing him to quickly fall behind his team, it was unfair to penalize him so severely in his first ever Tour.

To make it even worse King is a class guy, and an apparently clean guy who is a workhorse for his team, particularly Sagan. It isn’t like he finished minutes behind either, just 7 seconds and now he’s out.

I imagine if it happened to a French rider or one of the GC favorites or favorite sprinters they would have shown them leniency and allowed them to race on.

Such leniency and understanding is exactly what Ted King deserved.