On a day when France enjoyed its best Tour performance since 1997, Vincenzo Nibali quietly went about making another statement to underline his total domination of the 2014 edition.
Nibali didn’t need to go too fast, but he couldn’t resist the temptation. A fourth place on a hot and humid individual time trial from Bergerac to Periguex, extended his lead to 7:52 over the new second-placed rider, AG2R’s 37 year-old Frenchman, Jean-Christophe Peraud.
Four stage wins and dominance over all of his general classification rivals in the only individual time trial is as emphatic as it gets. The winning margin is the greatest since Jan Ulrich in 1997 (9:09).
Nibali is the first Italian since Marco Pantani (1998) and seventh overall to win the Tour, and like his win in the Giro last year, Nibali showed he can triumph in all weather.
He first grabbed the yellow jersey on Stage 2 from York to Sheffield, subsequently holding it for all but one day. That makes an incredible 19 days in yellow, which speaks more about his mental strength than even his winning margin.
So far, Nibali hasn’t fallen foul of the drug testers that ultimately brought down Ulrich, Pantani, Richard Virenque and many others, but there are some credible cycling journalists who think he is not clear of suspicion just yet.
Of course, Nibali has been tested every day in yellow, so right now there is no story to write about another Tour drug scandal.
It is a shame though, that Nibali chose to play a game with the media, albeit a clever game.
He was asked several times about doping during the traditional winner’s media conference after the time trial had finished.
One question was unmistakably direct, “there are now lots of people that know your story, but there are lots that don’t… So are you clean?”
But rather than answer, he just talked about “what a great pleasure it was today to be here” and to tell us about the sacrifices he’s made to get from where he’s come from to where he is today.
Then when it came to the final question, as instructed by the Tour media officer, Nibali completed his move.
“I didn’t fall, everything went well, but if I hadn’t had all these targeted controls I may not have been sitting here today.”
Game, set, and match Vincenzo. The hundreds of journalists in the room had no comeback because it was the final question.
Given cycling’s history, scepticism about success is understandable but right now there is nothing else to go on.
There’s no doubt that the Tour would’ve been different with Alberto Contador and Chris Froome in the peloton, maybe Nibali wouldn’t be in yellow. When you look at the stages he has won though, it’s a hard case to argue.
He won four stages – 2, 10, 13 and 18 – but for me, the most decisive performance came in a stage Nibali didn’t win.
The dreaded cobbled stage, Stage 5, raced in mostly dreadful weather set the Tour up for him as Nibali pounded his way to a 2:34 advantage after leading by just two seconds going into the stage.
Coincidentally, defending champion Froome also crashed out that day too, but we’ll never know if the Astana aggression contributed to that is some small way.
The job wasn’t done of course, but it was such a show of strength by Nibali and his team, that even if Contador and Froome had survived beyond Stages 5 and 10 respectively, they may not have beaten him.
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