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Tour de France: Stage 5 preview

Mark Cavendish is, as always, one to watch. (Image: Omega-Pharma Quick-Step).
Roar Guru
7th July, 2015
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The Tour de France takes in 190 kilometres of slightly lumpy roads as the peloton travels from Arras Communate Urbaine to Amiens Metropole.

There are no categorised climbs on today’s stage, and the race does not go above 164 metres above sea level, but it is not pancake-flat.

Still, today’s route should provide the first real bunch-sprint of the Tour.

On the race’s official website, director Christian Prudhomme explained how the stage would likely pan out:

“The roads will probably be the scene of a confrontation between the sprinters’ teams. On the list of winners in Amiens are the likes of specialists like André Darrigade or Mario Cipollini. A fast finish is expected.”

Today’s stage also offers up the first chance for the general classification riders to have a rest from the highly nervous racing we saw across Belgium and the Netherlands.

The favourites
Etixx Quickstep by their own admission absolutely cocked up the finale of Stage 2. Funnily enough, over the past six months, when they have had the clear dominance in numbers in small groups, they have made poor decisions (remember Omloop Het Nieuwsblad).

In the case of Stage 2, Etixx had the most amount of riders in the front move, the best lead-out man (Mark Renshaw) and sprinter in the group (Mark Cavendish). But as things played out Renshaw pulled off to early in the sprint, which Cavendish has been extremely vocal about, and the Manx Missile faded in the final 50 metres.

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Let’s not dwell upon that result though; the stage was extremely difficult, and Etixx was the team that split the race to bits. You can therefore understand why they may have lacked the horsepower at the end to finish it off.

A possible obstacle for Cav’s victory could be the fact that Tony Martin is in yellow. They will be hoping that the other sprinters’ teams help chase the morning breakaway.

Lotto-Soudal were rewarded with the Stage 2 win, after Cavendish seemingly led Andre Griepel out. Today though we should see the Lotto sprint train in full force, with young classics sprinter Jens Debusschere and the experienced Greg Henderson to pilot the ‘Gorilla’ into the finish.

Griepel rode extremely well in Ster ZLM Tour, picking up two stage wins and a second place with the two above lead-out men. As such, the German’s confidence should be high, and with Lotto coming through the first week relatively unscathed, minus Adam Hansen, they should be at full strength.

Another team that is worth mentioning is Katusha. The rider of the year so far has to be Norwegian Alexander Kristoff. In 50 race days this season, Kristoff has one stages on 17 of them. Unfortunately for Kristoff, this Tour has been a disaster – missing the split on Stage 2, and puncturing at key points on Stage 4.

Today’s stage is one where he has the potential to prosper. Even though Kristoff’s lead-out train is of lesser quality than both Etixx and Lotto-Soudal, most of his wins this season have been when the lead-out men (Marco Haller and Jacopo Guarnieri) were present.

Runs on the board and the confidence that comes with it means Kristoff has a very good chance at the overall stage, and taking the green jersey.

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Other riders to watch out for include John Degenkolb, Peter Sagan, Arnaud Demare, Bryan Coquard, Nacer Bouhanni and Sam Bennett.

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