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Of course, there is only one true winner of the Tour de France, and that is Chris Froome, but there were many other teams and riders who had successful races.
I will go through some of them below.
BMC
If you had read my story about the underachievers of the race, you would have seen a comment about TJ Van Gardaren. The American who was third in the race heading into the Alpine stages suffered from illness and was forced to retire. A podium finish for TJ was the main objective of the team.
However, before Van Gardaren retired, the team managed to have an extremely successful tour, clinching three stage wins, including the all important team time trial, the area of discipline where BMC certainly do have an edge over their rivals. They may not having the plethora of climbers like Movistar and Sky, but they are a very solid unit.
The tour started off superbly for the team, with young Australian talent Rohan Dennis surprising the favourites Dumoulin, Cancellera and Martin to win the opening day time trial. Dennis has shown promise in time trials for a few years now, having come from very successful track background.
Much like Greg Van Avermaet, second places and close finishes have been a constant for Dennis in time trials over the past year, so to win on the biggest stage of the year is a massive coup for both him and the team.
Speaking of Greg Van Avermaet, he also conquered his podium finishing hoodoo in big races, beating Peter Sagan in a hilly finale on Stage 13. In a blistering attack in the final 400 metres, he initially gaped Sagan, who managed to regain his way back to the wheel, but in the final sprint, could not come round the Belgian, who pulled off a remarkable win.
Looking back, even though there was a huge amount of success for the team, it is still a race where the team are thinking what might have been their success if Van Gardaren had stayed healthy.
Sky
Sky came here with one objective, to win the Tour de France, which they did. They have an amazing success rate at the tour in recent times, winning three out of the past four races on general classification.
Their success this year can be put down to three things; team selection, teamwork and tactics.
In this year’s tour squad, Sky was able to call upon the services of two former top 10 finishes in Grand Tours in Nicolas Roche and Leopold Konig, plus Richie Porte and Geriant Thomas, who have been high on general classification in week long world tour stage races this season, plus a very strong Wout Poels.
Let’s not also forget Peter Kennaugh, who showed his strength to Sky with a strong stage win at the Dauphine, and classics specialists in Luke Rowe and Ian Stannard, and you have a team that can support Froome in the hills, on the flat, or in the high mountains.
Some say money cannot buy you success. For Sky though, it can.
For a team of stars to work, ultimately, they need to work together for a common goal, which Sky did superbly. Stage 20 is the perfect example of this, with both Wout Poels and Richie Porte sacrificing themselves to help a struggling and sick Froome up the final climb of the tour, the Alpe d’Huez.
To save the tour on Stage 20, to ripping the race to shreds on Stage 10, Sky worked perfectly at both isolating their opponents, then containing them in the final few stages.
Tactics were heavily apart of this. It was interesting to watch over the tour to see how the roles reversed within Porte, Thomas and Poels.
For example, on Stage 10, Porte was the last man left with Froome, and he was the one who blew the race apart, but only two days later on Stage 12, it was Thomas who pulled the front group in the headwind finish of Plateau De Beille.
Poels then took centre stage on the final two days, but especially on Stage 19, with a miraculous ride to keep things together on the fearsome climb of La Toussuire.
The combination of the three factors explained above allowed Sky to dominate the race once again. People say they way they ride is boring, but they do exactly what it takes grind down their opponents, which is the way you would think a Grand Tour should be raced.
Tony Martin
Three times Tony Martin has raced a prologue or time trial on the first day of the tour, only once had he finished on the podium. However over the 14-kilometre course in Utrecht, many people would have tipped Tony Martin to win.
Once again though, luck was not on the side of the German, with him finishing second, potentially due to a change in wind direction for the late starters, which Australian Rohan Dennis was not one of them.
Though all was not lost, as Stage 2 would be characterised by large crosswinds, which ripped the field to shreds. Included in the front group was Martin, but also a certain Fabian Cancellera, who was only once second down after the opening day time trial, and who has been shown in the past to pack quite a sprint in difficult finishes.
As was the case Martin helped lead out Cavendish, who ended up finishing fourth, Cancellera third, meaning Cancellera would take yellow due to the newly introduced bonus seconds. Two times a chance for yellow, two times a failure.
When Cancellera crashed in the later stages of Stage 3, another chance arose itself for Martin to take yellow up the Mur de Huy, but alas, he would lose 40 seconds to Chris Froome, who was in the lead group, and once again, was behind on general classification to the British rider by a solitary second.
A tour of what might have been was averted when Martin won stage four over cobbles in miraculous fashion. The German punctured with 15 kilometres to go, took his teammate Matteo Trentin’s bike and managed to get back to the leading group, only to attack with three kilometres to go to take the stage win and the overall lead.
An amazing turn of events had given Martin the jersey, and an amazing turn of events swiftly took yellow of his back, when on Stage 6 he crashed on the hilly finish to Le Havre, forcing him to abandon.
For his effort, and bounce back mentality, Martin is included in this list.
Andre Griepel
Another German to show himself as a true great of the current generation is Andre Griepel, who with the help of a determined Lotto-Soudal outfit, completely demolished the other sprinters teams to achieve four stage victories.
His win streak started on Stage 2, making the split in the crosswinds, being well supported in the final to be placed right on the wheel of Cavendish, who was made to hit the front far too early. Griepel waited, and came round to take a very simple win.
Again on Stage 5, Griepel came from a long way back in a strong headwind finish to claim another win, with a fast finishing Sagan coming in second. This was the first bunch sprint of the tour, and he continued to look impressive.
After finishing second to Cavendish on Stage 7, he regained the ascendency of his sprinting rivals on Stage 15 into the town of Valence, getting over the category two climb of the Col de I’Escrinnet to be positioned in the front group vying for the stage victory.
After the loss of his lead out man Greg Henderson on Stage 7, Griepel had to use his tactical nous in the final, jumping onto the Katusha train, then launching early when Kristoff was left to far out from the line.
Amazingly, having gone early, he was able to hold off the field, for what would be his most impressive win of the tour.
With the form well and truly known to his competitors, not many people would have bet against Griepel on the final lap around Paris. Anybody who did would have been very happy.
Once again, Lotto-Soudal did the work up until the last kilometre, where they positioned Griepel in the front of the group, a few riders behind a Katusha train, which was the only real leadout on the day.
Kristoff again was left on the front early in the final sprint, with Griepel sitting fifth or sixth wheel rounding the final kink. Once again his speed, and his willingness to take risks in not being right at the front in the final sprint paid off, as he was able to time his sprint to perfection to round off a superb tour.
In Part II, I discuss a French team (with two riders excelling), a Spaniard, an African team and a Dutchman.
Can you guess who they are?
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