Here is the summary of everything good, bad and ugly about the 2016 Tour de France.
Adam Yates
Can Adam Yates do an ‘Esteban Chaves’ and grab Orica-BikeExchange its second Grand Tour podium of the year?
I don’t see why not.
The young Englishman has not fumbled a pedal stroke so far this Tour and his ascending throughout the Pyrenees has looked controlled and comfortable. On Stage 9’s mountain-top finish at Andorre Arcalis, he was the only one of the General Classification contenders to finish alongside pre-race favourites Chris Froome (Sky) and Nairo Quintana (Movistar), gaining time on Richie Porte (BMC), Dan Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), Romain Bardet (AG2R La Modiale), Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo), Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha), Tejay Van Garderen (BMC) and Fabio Aru (Astana).
His second place on GC, just 16 seconds behind race leader Froome, is reflective of his strong form. There is a long way to go of course, with the daunting Mont Ventoux and a week of racing through the Alps still to come, but if Yates keeps on doing what he is doing, then a place on the final podium is a realistic possibility.
With Froome and Quintana most likely to battle it out for the top two positions, third place is up for grabs. Provided he can stay out of trouble, Yates can make it his own.
Mark Cavendish
It seems that rumours of Mark Cavendish’s demise have been greatly exaggerated.
Love him or hate him, you can’t help but admire him. The tenacious little Manxman has lost none of his explosive power despite slimming down noticeably this year. Three stage wins in the first week of the Tour moves him to second on the all time list of stage victories behind the indomitable Eddie Merckx.
Merckx has 34 wins, 16 of which were gained in time trials. Cavendish has 29 wins, all of which were won in sprints, giving him the record for mass-start wins. If he is not the Tour’s greatest ever sprinter, then I don’t know who is.
The sprints
While the Giro d’Italia’s sprints were an exhibition of power by German tyros Marcel Kittel (Etixx-QuickStep) and Andre Greipel (Lotto Soudal), the Tour’s sprints have been as hotly and closely contested as any in recent memory.
Cavendish may have won three of them, but none have been by clear cut margins. Photo finishes between Cavendish and Greipel on Stage 3 and Kittel and Bryan Coquard (Direct Energie) on Stage 4 kept fans guessing until the official announcements were made.
The buffeting sprint between Kittel and the fast finishing Coquard was especially thrilling, a real David and Goliath battle between the German giant and the petite Frenchman.
Peter Sagan, an under performer in the stage victory stakes despite dominating the green jersey competition in recent years, also returned to the winner’s list with a stirring victory on day two. It was just reward for a rider who has provided us with so much entertainment throughout his career.
It was also pleasing to see both Cavendish and Sagan spend time in the yellow leaders jersey. Despite their history of Tour success it was a first for both of them.
Froome’s follies
Team Sky are often accused of being boring and strangling races to death with clinical precision. If panache is a quality that cycling fans crave the world over, then Sky are anti-panache. It stands to reason then that the Team Sky leader should be the embodiment of anti-panache, except in this instance, he isn’t.
Chris Froome is flighty and unpredictable. Half the time he doesn’t know what he is going to do let alone his team. This was exemplified towards the end of Stage 8 when, after cresting the final climb of the day, the peloton rightly expected that the group would more-or-less coast the final 15 kilometres to the finish line and rest up for the following day’s challenge.
So sure were the main contenders of this scenario playing out that Quintana decided it was an opportune moment to take on some refreshment. Imagine his surprise when, peering over his upraised water bottle, he saw Froomey stamp on the pedals and disappear down the descent at break-neck speed!
The Team Sky skipper was around the first bend and out of sight before Quintana could even discard his bottle.
Not content with just making a statement and then dropping back to the chasing pack, Froome embarked on a hair-raising adventure of bombing corners, pedalling furiously while sitting on his top tube, and pushing his bike and himself beyond the boundaries of what would generally be considered safe descending.
When asked about his death defying ride later on he simply smiled and said that it was ‘fun’!
Oh, and he got a yellow jersey for his trouble. Chapeau Froomey!
No abandonments
For the first time in years the Tour de France has not been marred by serious crashes during its opening week. As a result the first abandonment didn’t come until Stage 8, when Katusha’s Michael Morkov unclipped after deciding the mountains didn’t agree with him.
That’s not to say that crashes haven’t played a part. Alberto Contador (Tinkoff) crashed on the two opening days and his performances suffered as a result. He has now left the Tour because of a fever, no doubt exasperated by his body trying to repair itself and climb mountains at the same time.
The French connection
At the start of this Tour I was hoping that the French GC riders would stand up and really challenge Froome and Quintana for the overall. Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) remains in contention, in sixth place and just 44 seconds down, but Warren Barguil (Giant-Alpecin) and Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) have already slipped out of the conversation.
Pinot in particular has been disappointing. One bad day can end a rider’s dreams and Pinot suffered that on Stage 7’s ascent of the Col d’Aspin, losing almost three minutes to Froome.
He has since readjusted his sights and now aims at the King of the Mountain competition and is locked in an intriguing battle with Rafal Majka (Tinkoff), but it is little consolation to a rider who offers so much.
As a future GC contender at Grand Tours, he must be considered as fragile at best.
Team unity
Orica-BikeExchange will deny that it has a problem, but watching Simon Gerrans and Michael Matthews attack a stage finish from opposite sides of the road would suggest otherwise.
We all know they are similar types of riders and as a result will target the same stages, but surely the team’s leadership must dictate a common goal. One must work for the other. This situation has to be fixed.
Also Astana leader Fabio Aru shouldn’t expect too much help from multiple grand tour winner and team mate Vincenzo Nibali. Despite making overtures pre-race that his one and only goal was to play super-domestique to Aru, Nibali has been dropped, mounted ill-fated attacks and has done everything but settle into a sustainable rhythm that Aru can follow up the mountain passes.
Nice work Vincenzo! Not.
Outside influences
In a race that spends three weeks traversing open roads, outside influences are bound to play their part at some point. We saw this illustrated graphically just one kilometre from the finish of Stage 7 when the Flamme Rouge inflatable archway rapidly deflated, spectacularly snaring Adam Yates and the chasing peloton in its rubbery clutches.
Thankfully the incident was proven to be just an accident and not something with malicious intent. That is no consolation to Yates of course, who now sports half a dozen or so stitches holding his chin together.
Should it have happened? No. But how can race organisers plan for every contingency? As long as they put processes in place for the remainder of the Tour to prevent something like this happening again everyone should be satisfied.
Completely unsatisfactory though is the UCI’s reaction to Chris Froome dealing with an unruly spectator on Stage 8. The spectator, draped in a flapping flag, was running dangerously close to the peloton as it climbed up the Peyresourde. Froome lashed out, ejecting the fan from the picture with a sharp elbow to the side of the head.
With the recent spate of spectator related accidents you can’t blame Froome for taking the action he did, but according to the UCI he was out of line and as a result they fined him 200 Swiss francs.
I reckon they should have given him a time bonus!
What do you think?
Vernal
Guest
Do you mean to say that Morkov's abandonment was due to a dislike of mountain stages? Or that his injuries in the Day 1 crash made it too difficult to continue into the mountains? That crash looked horrible. Given that he had trouble walking after the crash, I'm surprised he could even ride a bike the next day.
Sean Lee
Expert
Hi Glyn. Yeah, the article was written before I saw stage nine. Glad to hear that His Nibs was pulling his weight.
Sean Lee
Expert
I reckon he's a monty for the Vuelta now.
delbeato
Roar Guru
I think he will on the Ventoux. Will be great viewing!
delbeato
Roar Guru
Hasn't he already declared that he'll ride in 2017? Or did he just defer a decision on the matter? It will be interesting to see if he enters the Vuelta.
Glyn
Guest
An excellent synopsis with one ill-considered point: Vincenzo Nibali. Yes, it did look as if the shark was not going to make any attempt to be a team player, but did you not watch stage 9? Without Nibali coaxing Aru up the final clmb the latter would have lost twice the amount of time, as evidenced by Aru himself in interviews after the stage. Time will tell if stage 9 was a one-off, or indeed if shepherding Aru is even effort well spent.
Sean Lee
Expert
Yeah, I'm ready to embrace the change. I especially enjoy McEwen's take on things. I like Phil and Paul, but Phil's increasing inaccuracies are becoming harder to excuse.
HardcorePrawn
Roar Guru
IMO Matt Keenan does the châteaux bits just as well, and if anyone is going to regale us with tales of Lance Armstrong I'd now prefer to hear Robbie's "Shut your mouth or I'll fill it with my fist" stories over Phil's continued disappointment with the disgraced American.
Scuba
Guest
Non-cycling fans like Paul reading facts about the various châteaux on the route and Phil bumbling his way through attempts to identify cyclists now that he can no longer just fill in time by talking about "a certain Mr Lance Armstrong". Phil is still excellent at calling a sprint finish but elsewhere they are a light of other days. Unfortunately I don't see the coverage excluding them any time soon.
HardcorePrawn
Roar Guru
Geoff, you've reminded me of a bone of contention from this year's tour: I've found the Keenan/McEwen partnership to be a revelation (they impressed at the Giro too), to the extent that I don't look forward to the last 50kms when Phil and Paul take over the commentary. For a long time I was a fan of the two Englishmen too. I can only guess that commentating on the entire stage must be too much for one duo, but I'm surprised that SBS haven't dispensed with the services of the two veterans and gone for an all-Australian line-up instead. SBS often send out viewer surveys after a significant broadcast, whether that be a sporting event or the latest Scandinavian drama. I wouldn't be surprised if I'm not alone in preferring Matt and Robbie's commentary and for the network to react accordingly once they receive the results of their survey.
Sean Lee
Expert
Everyone is waiting for Quintana to make his move, and to win he'll have to make one at some stage, especially with Froome likely to gain more time on the first time trial. But when will it happen? Oh, the suspense! How spectacular would it be to see him put in a dig on the slopes of Mont Ventoux? I'd like to see that.
Sean Lee
Expert
There is no doubt that the injuries Contador received on day one courtesy of that nasty slide across a traffic island were more serious than he has let on. He is not the rider he once was, but there is no way he would have lost the time he did had he been fully fit. Is it really the end of Alberto? Or will this unfinished business at the Tour tempt him to postpone retirement for one more year? I still think he will call it quits, but it wouldn't surprise if he saddled up once again. But yes, it was a disappointing way for him to leave the Tour.
Geoff Parkes
Expert
Thanks Sean, I slept well last night after a string of very late nights! Spot on about Froome, it's hard to fathom how idiotic some people are and it sends the wrong message to penalise the riders. Another lowlight was the goose who stepped out in front of George Bennett at the bottom of the Arcalis - that was heavy contact, the last thing a rider needs after nearly 5 hours and still in contention for the stage. Although more curious was Phil Liggett's reaction which was all about concern for the spectator going down and not for the rider. It's like he and Sherwin are blabbering so much, there's an inverse reaction between the volume of talk and the accuracy and awareness for what is happening. I've found McEwan to be much more insightful and far less manic. I loved that Froome took the initiative on Saturday's descent. And that Quintana sat on his wheel for the whole of Sunday's climbs without giving his hand away too soon.
HardcorePrawn
Roar Guru
A good breakdown of the opening week Sean. I was surprised to find myself quite upset by Contador's exit, hardly a fitting end to his Tour career.