Stage 17 - History Repeating....Again

Breakaway wins mountain stage – Thomas Voeckler battles Frederick Kessiakoff for the King of the Mountains Jersey – Chris Froome drags Bradley Wiggins up the final climb when he could have exploded away to a stage victory himself. No this is not a recap of the previous stage, but a description of Stage 17, a short 143.5km sojourn in the Pyrenees. Former alleged doper Alejandro Valverde won the stage from Froome and Wiggins but who really gives a f**k by this stage – I was watching Adam Scott storm his way to a first round lead in the The Open at Royal Lytham and St Anne’s.

The stage pretty much went the same way as EVERY OTHER SINGLE MOUNTAIN STAGE THIS YEAR. Voeckler and Kessiakoff got in the day’s break and Voeckler was able to outsprint his Swedish rival at the top of every mountain pass to extend his lead in the mountains classification to an unassailable 11 points. He will now where the jersey all the way to Paris and I doubt there has been a more deserving winner in recent times. Tejay Van Garderen and Thibault Pinot both finished with the other main favourites (about 15 seconds behind Froome and Wiggo) and the game between them for the White Jersey remains just over 3 minutes.

In terms of GC – Vincenzo Nibali lost about 15 seconds after being unable to go with the Sky duo in the closing stages and in the process put paid to any chances of moving up to second overall in Paris. He had earlier managed to sneak into the day’s break but the relentless evil empire would not let the gains extend beyond 20 seconds so he sat up and returned to the peleton. Froome could have actually gained more time on Nibali but when he attacked in the closing km’s Wiggo could not keep up and he had to slow down to allow his millstone teammate to catch up. The big loser was Haimar Zubeldia who cracked big time and lost 11 minutes. He slipped down to 7^th allowing the BMC duo of Tejay Van Gardern and Cadel Evans to move up one spot each, despite Cadel losing another 2 minutes on the stage.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Thomas Voeckler

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean Tweet of the Day

@SC_Cycling – If the jury had any sense of humour, Froome would have been awarded most combative. #TdF

Stage 16 - V Is For Voeckler

Thomas Voeckler is the only thing making the 2012 Tour de France even worth watching. The plucky little Frenchman led over all 4 epic Pyrenean climbs last night, romping away to a stage victory and getting himself the lead in King of the Mountains jersey classification in the process. It was a ride and performance truly worthy of the great race, something we have not seen enough of in the 2012 edition. Voeckler was victorious after outlasting the day’s 38-man strong break, winning by over a minute and a half from Chris Anker Sorenson with Gorka Izaguirre third.

There was also a shake up in the GC as Cadel Evans was dropped on the final climb of the Col de Peyresourde and lost over 4 mintues to the leaders. He was later found to have ‘intestinal issues’ which is cycling code for destroying the toilet on the team bus after the race. He has dropped from 4^th to 8^th overall and now actually trail Tejay Van Garderen his teammate in the overall standings. TJ has been quick to declare that BMC now has co-leaders which is a nice little punch in the kidneys for the defending champ. TJVG has increased his lead in the Youth classification to 3:48 from Thibault Pinot. The podium now looks settled as Wiggins-Froome-Nibali (in that order), as an attack from Nibali on the Peyresourde initially dropped the entire peleton, only for Froome to again drag Wiggins back to the Italian’s wheel by the top of the climb. That elite trio finished around 40 seconds ahead of the rest of the favourites.

For mine the other GC contenders have got their tactics all wrong this year. A single attack on the final climb has proven insufficient to dent the strength of the Team Sky armada. The only chance they had was to hit Sky again and again to see if they could shatter the team and Wiggins on one of the earlier climbs, and put real time into him. But instead they led Sky dictate the pace over the first three Cols and by the time they got to the Peyresourde it was too late. It is this lack of ingenuity that has made this Tour an absolute procession for Wiggins and he has been basically served the race on a platter.

That is the beauty and contrast of Thomas Voeckler though. He is old school and rode the day’s stage without a race radio as he wanted to let his body, mind and instinct do the talking – which it did to aplomb. He is arguably the second greatest hero of the Tour de France over the last decade, behind only Lance Armstrong in his important to the race. He will be a sad loss to world (and especially French) cycling when his career comes to an end. He now leads the mountains classification by 4 points from Frederick Kessiakoff (the previous leader) who was also in the days break but crumbled over the last 2 climbs. The only interest left in the race for me this year is to see if Voeckler can hold on to the polka dot jersey.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Thomas Voeckler

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean Tweet of The Day

@saddleblaze – Jean-Rene Bernaudeau on Voeckler: “There aren’t enough superlatives to use for what Thomas has achieved. It’s like winning a monument.”

Stage 15 - SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING!!!

The second rest day came a day earlier at the Tour de France, with a breakaway coming home around 12 minutes ahead of the peleton. To take the absolute piss out of the repetitiveness of this year’s event, Frenchman Pierrick Fedrigo won his second career stage into Pau and his 4^th Tour Stage overall. He defeated Christain Van de Velde in a heads up sprint, while for once magical Frenchman Thomas Voeckler could not conjure a miracle and could finish only third. Obviously there was no change to the GC.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Token Bradley Wiggins hate

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Question whether The Shire is the biggest crime against humanity since Apartheid?

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean Tweet of The Day

@StueyOG – Durin TDF’s I’ve ridden thru-roads laid down by moses, flares, mustard gas, champagne showers, blind spectators, now tacks. Imagine that in motoGP

Stage 14 - Puncture-gate

Is it just me or is this Tour the most ho-hum in living memory? There were a couple of half decent climbs last night but a gigantic breakaway got away to lead the peleton home by over 15 minutes. Erstwhile barradoeur, Luis Leon Sanchez was finally rewarded for hanging in the Tour despite his crashes and injuries early in the week, breaking away in the closing kilometres for a deserved victory. Second, for the second straight stage was Peter Sagan, who has been absolutely everywhere at this year’s, and only further cemented his stranglehold on the green jersey by getting in the day’s move. France’s Sandy Casar was third.

All the main GC favourites finished together, but their distance from the winning break was exacerbated by the biggest news story of the day – punctures! Cadel Evans had put it yet another futile attack (God bless him!) on the Mur de Peguere that was reeled in by the evil empire, only to discover he had a rear puncture. He had to wait over a minute to steal the wheel of his first teammate to arrive (quality support BMC – where was TJVG FFS!?) – but Steve Cummings also had a puncture! Finally the neutral service car arrived and Cadel was on his way – only to puncture again on the descent and need a bike change!!! The man can attract drama. It turned out that the main field had been obliterated by tyre troubles with the story soon surfacing that someone somewhere had strewn tacs all over the road – one can only guess in the hope of creating their own real life Mario Kart stage (obviously banana’s were unavailable). Wiggo was kind enough to slow down the peleton to give Cadel and BMC at least a chance of chasing back on (we can still hate him though). Pierre Rolland showed some true French class by attacking on the descent anyway but Liquigas and Lotto chased him down like he was an escaped convict to put him back in his place.

Other than those shenanigans there was not too much too the day’s stage (feels like I’ve said that a lot this year).

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean’s Tweet of The Day

@nyvelocity – Pierre Rolland can look forward to about 4 years of getting his every move shut down by BMC

Stage 13 - Lucky For Some

July 14 – Bastille Day. Back in the EPO era, intermediate stages like this used to be the domain of breakaways. But over recent years the sprinters have wanted even more glory and so we often see the day’s break chased down in the battle for the green jersey.  And that is exactly what happened on Stage 13, a 217km journey from Saint-Paul-Trois-Chateux to Le Cap d’Agde. Andre Greipel was the winner in a semi-depleted peleton, defeating Peter Sagan in a photo finish with Edvald Boasson Hagen third. With the majority of the sprinters shelled off the back on the day’s final cat-3 climb, they were absent of the finish, allowing Sagan to extend his lead in the green jersey competition to over 80 points from Greipel and Matt Goss. He is now certain to win it as long as he makes it to Paris.

In what would otherwise have been a non-event of a stage, the reason the sprinters were blown out on the final climb was an unexpected attack from Cadel Evans. While he led over the top of the climb, he was unable to hold off the evil empire who slowly paced leader Bradley Wiggins back to Evans over the remainder of the climb. It is good to see Cadel trying something though to break up the complete and utter boredom and predictability that this race is going to provide over the final week.

Other than that there is not too much to add. I’m sure many Brits will be creaming themselves over seeing Bradley Wiggins lead out the sprint for Boasson Hagen in the yellow jersey but I don’t care. In fact my interest in the race is often severely diminished on any day that Greipel wins.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock Mclean Tweet of the Day

@englishwhistler – Good to see Le Tour visiting one of the Teletubbies on Monday, Po will be pleased. #tdf #Letour

Stage 12 - Redemption

Pretty regulation intermediate stage of the Tour de France, with Stage 12, 226km from Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne to Annonay Davezieux, won by a breakaway. In yet another feel good story at this year’s race, victory on the day went to journey pro David Millar, who won the fourth Tour stage of his career, and his first since 2003. Millar was the most vaunted rider in the day’s break, and had enough nous in the finishing sprint to defeat Frenchman Jean Christoph Peraud with Egoi Martinez in third.

The two big climbs of the day came to early to do any real damage to the peleton, and as a result there was no change to the GC, and neither of the leaders in the mountains classification scored points on the climb. The bigger controversy was the sprint finish of the peleton – with Australian Matt Gloss relegated to last in the bunch for dangerous sprinting. He had led the main group over the line but his interference with Peter Sagan was deemed illegal by the race committee. As a result, he sacrificed his green jersey points on the stage, allowing Peter Sagan to take an ominous 50 point lead in the competition.  If the competition wasn’t already as good as over, it is now.

In a fairly mundane stage it was good to see Millar finally get another win at the Tour almost 9 years after his last. He has been to hell and back in the world of professional cycling and there is no one more deserved of success.  The victory, 45 years to the day that arguably Britain’s greatest cyclist, Tom Simpson died on the climb of Mount Vontoux could not have been more timely.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean Tweet of the Day

@richardbirdge7 – Wiggins won the 4km at Beijing and may win #letour – is that not the same as someone winning the 1500m and the marathon in athletics

Stage 11 - Civil War

Only one man can beat Bradley Wiggins at this year’s Tour de France. Sadly that man is teammate and fellow Brit Chirs Froome. Wiggins showed his first sign of weakness at this year’s Tour on Stage 11, an epic 148km trek from Albertville to La Toussuire. However the weakness was generated by an attack from Froome, and when Sky realised that they quickly called their lieutenant back to help drag Wiggins up the climb. The day was another triumph for France – they went 1-2 on the stage as Pierre Rolland won by almost a minute from Thibaut Pinot. Wiggins and Froome also went 1-2 on GC as Cadel Evans was cracked on the final climb. In his defence he had at least tried to animate the race on the earlier Cold de la Croix de Fer, attacking and trying to put Wiggins and Sky under pressure and paid for his attempts at the finish. Not much more can be asked of Evans – he has tried everything in his power to stay within touching distance of Wiggins but just does not have the legs to match his Commonwealth companion this year. Wiggo had a subtle dig at Cadel's attack in the post race press conference - a laughable call when your own teammate would have blown you out of the water had he not been called back to haul your anemic ass up the mountain because you were floundering as badly as The Falcon does on the Alpine passes in Winter. Wiggo - you are a grade A douchebag. Wiggins now leads Froome by over 2 minutes, with Nibali the closest non-Sky rider at 2:23 in third.

But the major interest on the stage will be the team dynamics as Sky – it would appear that Froome is the more inform rider (excluding the time trials) and if left to his own devices he would be potentially be able to challenge Wiggins for the title. In fact Froome’s ride but back memories of a young Andy Schleck toying with his rivals on L’Alpe d’Huez while teammate Carlos Sastre rode to a solo victory up the road. But it just won’t happen. This EXACT same situation occurred at the Vuelta last year, when Froome had to pace Wiggins up climbs DEPSITE WEARING THE LEADERS JERSEY!!! As a result Joaquin Rodriguez was able to steal the race from under their noses. And I would like to see Vincenzo Nibali do similar here I just can’t see it happening, not with Wiggo having another 50km time trial up his sleeve. I would also like to see Froome just ignore team rules and ride for himself ala Contadar with Astana and Armstrong in 2009, but given the massive lovefest that appears to be Team Sky I can’t see this happening either.

Props must also go out to the French who have had a banner three days in the lead up to Bastille Day on Saturday – Pinot on Stage 9, Voeckler on Stage 10, and then the Rolland-Pinot quinella overnight. The future for French cycling looks very promising and if either of those two can learn to put in a decent time trial the whispers of the next French tour winner will be growing into a dull roar. One disappointment for France was their loss of the Polka Dot Jersey – with so many big climbs on the stage the jersey was always going to pass to someone in the days’ break, and that turned out to be former wearer Frederick Kessiakoff who now leads the classification by 11 points from Pierre Rolland – hopefully Rolland can pull him back over the next week to take the title for France. France did move up to second in the Youth Classification however, thanks to Pinot’s performance – he now trails Tejay van Garderen by just under 2 minutes. This competition is now a race and 2 as Rein “pea-heart” Taaramae absolutely blew up and lost over 20 minutes on the day.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock Mclean Tweet of The Day

@whityost – Froome might want to consider starting an anonymous Twitter account so he can continue attacking Wiggins after the stage

Stage 10 - Long Live Le King

The beauty of the Tour de France is its endless regeneration. A race that seemed destined for a boring procession was again reborn on Wednesday night, as Le Tour’s true spiritual leader Thomas Voeckler staged yet another coup with a glorious victory on Stage 10, a 194.5km slog from Macon to Bellegarde-sur-Valserine. Voeckler was the strongest of his breakaway rivals and had enough to hold by 3 seconds from Michele Scarponi with veteran Jens Voight another 4 seconds back.

There was no change to the GC, although not for lack of trying. As predicted by many, Vincenzo Nibali staged a daredevil descent off the Grand Colombier, and by the valley floor had put almost a minute into Bradley Wiggins with the help of teammate Peter Sagan who had been in the day’s break. But as was the case in an almost identical stage in the Dauphine, Wiggo’s Sky team paced him back along the valley floor, and Nibali was caught on the Col-de-Richemond. It was a brave and clever move from the Italian but the overall result is just more evidence that this year’s Tour is largely done and dusted as a contest.

It is for that reason that it is the moment’s that Voeckler is able to generate time and time again that keep the Tour alive, and in the hearts of sporting and cycling fans the world over. The plucky Frenchman has battled tendinitis all season, but still had enough courage to drag the day’s break of the Col du Grand Colombier and the Col de Richemond with little help from his rivals. In doing so he garnered himself the lead in the King of the Mountains classification, and there would be no one in the race more deserving of wearing the polka-dot jersey in Paris than Voeckler. If that wasn’t enough, his tactical nous allowed him to break clear from his rivals  in the crucial closing kilometres – and hold in a desperate finish to record a famous victory – Allez Tommy!

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Thomas Voeckler

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean's Tweet of The Day
@nyvelocity - Little known fact, Voeckler's riding face is the same as his 'passing a kidney stone' face and his 'making baby Voeckler's face

Stage 9 - Game, Set, and Match

While Britain mourned yet another Wimbledon tragedy on Sunday night, they will soon have reason to cheer on another sporting front after Team Sky, and in particular Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome, destroyed the Tour de France in Stage 9’s 41.5km individual time trial from Arc-et-Senans to Besancon. In doing so, the British duo all but ended the 2012 Tour de France as a contest, and it will now, sadly, take a monumental collapse from Wiggins to see him lose the race from here.

The fears of cycling fans the world over came to fruition on Monday night, as Bradley Wiggins demolished his rivals to take the time trial by 35 seconds from teammate Chris Froome. Four-time champion of the world Fabian Cancellara was third, over 57 seconds behind. The more telling numbers though was the deficit of the GC riders to Wiggins – Evans lost 1:43, Nibali 2:07 and Menchov 2:08. That translates to a Wiggins lead of 1:53 on GC from Evans, with Froome @ 2:07 and Nibali @ 2:23. But for mine this race is done. There is another longer time trial to come for Wiggins to put even more time onto the field and he does not look like losing any time at all in the mountains. He will have to have a massive off day somewhere to lose this title – and I can’t see it coming. Wiggins performance was the most dominant in an individual time trial I have seen since the Lance Armstrong days – interesting given the dark clouds of suspicion that have hovered over that rider in recent days. It is also interesting that a rider who came of age as a 4km pursuit specialist is now smashing the world’s best over 40km as well as dragging his body over some of the world’s toughest mountain ranges. It is also interesting that this massive and career best performance has come in a year in which his home country hosts the Olympics….

Evans must be disappointed with his performance to finish so far behind Wiggins, especially given he also failed to beat the time of team mate Tejay Van Garderen and Sylvain Chavanel. Given he was already a minute behind Wiggins at the first time check I guess he defended his position over the back half of the course ok, but he would have hoped for much better than this.

This was the risk of the route chosen by Christian Prudhomme for this year’s Tour. The large amount of time trial km’s was designed to get the mountain men to attack early and often. But if they were not able to drop Wiggins, he was likely to burn them in the time trial and then suck their wheels for the remaining two weeks of the race. It now looks like that will happen, and sadly we could be in for one of the most boring Tour’s on record.

The more exciting contest might be for the White Jersey, which was regained by Tejay Van Garderen after he finished 4^th on the day. He leads that competition by 42 seconds from Rein Taaramae and Tony Gallopin, and all have shown they have the climbing ability to win it. The points and mountains jersey’s will also be keenly fought over but those classifications were sidelined today.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Frederick Kessiakof

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock Mclean Tweet of the Day

@prongle28 – Wiggins already eaten over a minute out of Evans. He is motoring…but not on drugs. C*nts. #TDF12

Stage 8 - Calm Before The Storm

A regulation intermediate mountains stage last night with a lone survivor from the day’s break holding off the heads of state of the Tour de France in the closing 20km. The winner of Stage 8, a short but punchy 157.5km journey from Belfort to Porrentruy was won by one of the wunderkids of French cycling, Thibault Pinot. He defied Cadel Evans by 26 seconds, with the Australian second for the second straight day, while another Frenchman Tony Gallopin was third. Bradley Wiggins was close behind in 4^th to ensure he lost no time to Evans and retained the Yellow Jersey going into tomorrow’s time trial.

The big news of the day however was the crash that saw defending Olympic Gold Medallist Sammy Sanchez retire from the race. Brought down by fellow Spaniard Alejandro Valverde (his third crash in as many days), early reports are that Sanchez has a broken collarbone and a dislocated shoulder. There is almost no chance he will be fit to defend his Olympic title in London – an extremely sad result for all of cycling.

The other interesting development was in the Youth Classification, as Rein Taaramae was unable to back up yesterday’s strong performance, finishing over 2 minutes down on Pinot on the day. While at least this suggests he is not on the gear, it does mean his lead in that competition has been reduced to just 46 seconds from Gallopin and Pinot. However, I’d back Taaramae to be more consistent over the three weeks (and he is ok against the clock) so he must still be the favourite to win that classification. With 7 mountains on the day’s stage it was always going to be one for King of the mountains points – and in the end Pinot’s breakaway companion Fredrik Kessiakoff did enough to take the jersey off the shoulders of yesterday’s winner Chris Froome by a single point. The green jersey was a non-issue on the day.

Other than that there is not much more to add as we look forward to tonight’s potentially Tour deciding time trial.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Fredrik Kessiakoff

White Jersey – Rein Taaramae

Brock McLean Tweet of the day

@Cyclocosm – Yesssss! Eff this radio BS. White-haired DS screaming out of the window is the only way to give encouragement. Plus 30 watts at least. #tdf

Stage 7 - Sky Heights

We are only a week into this years Tour de France but we can safely say this year’s edition is a race in two. Cadel Evans and Bradley Wiggins finished second and third on the stage respectively, and left all of the other potential GC rivals in their wake on Stage 7 199km from Tomblaine to La Planche des Belles Filles. Sky’s Chris Froome won the stage on a day when the Sky team turned back the clock, dominating the race in a manner not seen since the hey day of US postal. Fabian Cancellara was dropped in the early stages of the final climb and thus lost his Yellow Jersey. The new wearer, for the first time in his career , is Bradley Wiggins, who holds it by 10 seconds from defending champion Cadel Evans. You can forget the rest.

The story of the day was the complete an utter devastation of the peleton by Team Sky, and in particular Australian’s Michael Rogers and Richie Porte who did all the ground work for Froome and Wiggins. In the end, one by one the GC contenders were popped out the back, including Denis Menchov, and only in the last 200m or so Vincenzo Nibali. If these guys can’t stay with Evans and Wiggins on the climbs, they are no chance of making up time on them in the time trials. In fact it must be said that Wiggins form looked ominous. For half a moment it seemed he would be unable to match Evans late surge for the line and victory (Froome eventually delivered the 1-2 punch for Sky coming around Evans for the win), but he was quickly on the Australian’s wheel to ensure there were no time losses. You would think Wiggo would have the advantage over Cadel in the time trials so Evans main hope looks to be to break Wiggins from a longer way out on some of the longer climbs.

His main issue in doing that may be lack of team support, with the BMC boys nowhere to be seen in the finale, while Sky had three other riders helping out Wiggins. That is a major concern, and it will be interesting to see whether that pattern continues in coming mountain stages. If it does, you would have to say Wiggins is the current favourite to wear the jersey in Paris. Chris Froome’s stage win allowed him to take the lead in the mountains classification, a jersey he could win if he is not sidetracked working for Wiggins. Tejay Van Garderen’s inept performance in assisting Evans saw him lose the White Jersey to Rein Taaramae who put in a superb ride to finish 5^th on the day. He was the second to last man dropped by the first three over the line.

The most pissweak performance of the day goes to Frank Schleck who was dropped inside the first 3 km of climbing on the stage. Paul and Phil have been talking this guy up as a contender all week but the Falcon knew better. After crashing and losing time yesterday he couldn’t even hang with the key climbers today. He may as well pull out of the race.

Yellow Jersey – Bradley Wiggins

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Chris Froome

White Jersey – Rein Taaramae

Brock McLean Tweet of the day

@endurants – Frank Schleck dropped on a climb, not even in high mountains yet...bet he’s calling home tonight to see if Andy has the bunk bed ready

Stage 6 - Metz Massacre

Just an idea, but has anyone suggested to the riders that they consider attaching training wheels to their bikes at the Tour de France this year? Because they just cannot stay upright for more than 20km at a time! Crashes again marred Stage 6, a 210km road rash fest from Epernay to Metz. And this time several GC contenders were made to pay the price. Of those who survived (around 60 or so) Peter Sagan again showed his total and utter dominance over the field to record his third victory in just 6 road stages. An injured Andre Greipel was second while an uninjured and mentally fragile Matt Goss was third – sadly for the Aussie if he couldn’t win today, I can’t see him winning a stage at this year’s event.

But the bigger story was the carnage of the crashes. Frank Schleck, Robert Gesink, Ryder Hesjedal and Alejandro Valverde all lost big time in a pile up with 25km to go and are now all out of GC contention. That realistically means that the clash for the overall title has already been reduced to just four riders – Cadel Evans, Bradley Wiggins, Vincenzo Nibali, and Denis Menchov – and I currently have them marked in that order. How Menchov avoided the crash is anyone’s guess because he is normally a magnet for stacks and unnecessary time losses in the opening week of the Tour – maybe that suggests that this is his year!? Fabian Cancellara also survived the pile up and thus retains the yellow jersey for another day. It remains to be seen whether he can hold it on the climb to La Planche des Belles Filles tonight. There was some anger that Orica Green Edge continued to put the hammer down following the crash but that was the only option if they were going to catch the breakaway (in the end they only got them in the last 2km) and give their sprinter a chance for a win on the day. The fact is if you don’t ride in the front half of the field and get caught in a crash you can have no sympathy. Half the difficulty of Le Tour is maintain focus in every kilometre for the entire three week race.

Sagan’s win sees him extend his lead in the points classification to 31 points over Goss who, while performing ok at the intermediate sprint , cannot crack for a win when it matters at the finish. It would be hard to see Sagan losing the jersey from here (crashes pending) as he has shown he can match with the power sprinters on the flat while he is almost unmatched in the peleton on the rolling classics type stages.

Tonight we see the first real hit out for the GC contenders with the stage finishing on the Cat-1 climb to the ski resort of Les Planche Des Belles Filles.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@Manxrock - Footballers take note: Poels rode 10km with a 'rupture' in his spleen, kidney, and three fractured rib & Griepel popped his shoulder #TDF

Stage 5 - You Cannot Be Serious!!!

At one stage last night I had to check my Foxtel IQ to make sure I was not watching a replay of Stage 4. Because the two stages where exactly the same!?!?!?! And when I realised that Andre Greipel had in fact won Stage 5, 196.5km from Rouen-Saint-Quentin, to take back-to-back stages in the great race – I lost my shit (and no – this douche bag is not in my fantasy team).

So in summary, it was a dead flat stage with a break that got caught in the closing kilometres – some B-grade sprinters caused a massive pile up, and with half the peleton on the deck Grepiel won again, Matt ‘The Shark’ Goss somehow snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, and Tyler Farrar ended up on the floor. In fact poor Tyler was so fed up with hitting the deck that he made a post race V-line for the Argos-Shimano bus (their Sprinter Tom Veelers was the alleged culprit of the stack) in order to have a tete-a-tete with young Tom. Only the Garmin management held him back from doing something completely unprofessional – but it would have made for good TV. Mark Cavendish finished 5^th on the stage after leaving his run too late, but given he couldn’t even get past Sammy Dumoulin I doubt he was at his best.

One victim of the pile up was Peter Sagan who was taken out and failed to contest the sprint finish – thus losing out on mega points in the Green Jersey competition. His lead has been cut to 18 points from Gossy and ze-German. There was no change in GC.

Other than that the major highlight of the day was the fact that USADA allegedly has enough alleged evidence to allege that Lance Armstrong run an alleged doping program to such an alleged extent that they could put him in the slammer for about half a century…allegedly. And apparently every man and his dog is coming out of the woodwork to testify. Hopefully Greipel was his supplier.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@BradToothGrin – hate him that much that I don’t even know how to spell his name correctly. Greipel. Griepel. Meh.

Stage 4 - Missile Launch Aborted

I am just putting it out there. I do not like Andre Greipel. It may be due to his former abrasive relationship with ex-teammate Mark Cavendish. It may be the fact he looks like he would have been a concentration camp guard in the early 40s. In short, when he wins a stage because the greatest sprinter in the history of the world crashes out, I am less than enthused. (It would be a bit like getting excited over a NSW SOO victory in a game where Billy Slater wasn’t even playing – oh wait – they couldn’t even manage that!)

 Griepel was victorious in Stage 4, a 214.5km dead pan route from Abbeville to Rouen after a huge pile up inside the last 3km totally destroyed the peleton. Of those that were left, Gripel took the chocolates from Alessandro Pettachi and Tom Veelers. Matty Goss finished in 4^th, and must be disappointed with that effort. At this stage it, while it looks like he can get himself in to winning positions, he just does not have the form to finish things off for a win. As the crash occurred inside the last 3km there were no time losses so there was no change in the GC.

All the action was in the final 5km of the race so there is not much more to add. Cavendish showed his true superiority over the rest of the field by winning the intermediate sprint, while Peter Sagan extended his lead in the point’s classification by finishing 5^th on the day. He now leads that classification by a massive 55 points. It looks an unassailable lead unless Cav can pull out 4-5 wins on the remaining sprint days.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@liam_mchugh – #TDF12 Stage 4 is over. Time to celebrate July 4^th by shooting a firecracker through a beret & wrapping a croissant around a hot dog

Stage 3 - One Day In Calais

The pundits got it right again on Stage 3, with the much fancied Peter Sagan taking the win on the 197km trek from Orchies to Boulogne-sur-Mer. In what turned out to be a day more reminiscent of a one-day-classic than a flat tour stage the Slovak phenom was too strong on the run into the finish, easily accounting for Edvald boasson Hagen and Peter Velits. In fact the win was so dominant that Sagan earned a 1 second time bonus over the rest of the peleton. It was not nearly enough to dislodge Fabian Cancellara from the Yellow Jersey however, with the Swiss star putting in another solid performance to finish 4^th on the day. Sagan did increase his lead in the points classification however, and he is proving the man to beat for the Green jersey at the early stage of this competition.

The stage itself, just like a classic, was filled with action in the closing stages with a number of crashes marring the finish. None of the big GC contenders were caught up in it, although Sky’s Konstantin Sivtsov was forced to abandon, which had the British twitter community in a massive tiz as they feared it would irreparably damage Bradley Wiggins tilt at the overall title (it doesn’t and it won’t). Wiggo was delayed by a crash inside the final kilometre after Oscar Freire hit the deck, but as the field was already inside the last 3km the peleton were all awarded the same time (a shame – would love to have seen the whinging from the Poms if that had cost their golden boy time).

There was also a bit of fire at the day’s intermediate sprint with crackpot Dutchman Kenny Van Hummel nearly annihilating the entire field with a move that was reminiscent of Let’s Elopes 1992 Melbourne Cup win. Still, after nearly being put into the ground by KVH, Mark Cavendish managed to get out into the clear and storm over the top of him in third gear. He even had time to turn over his shoulder and give KVH a massive (and deserved) spray as he crossed the line – classic Cav!

But there is no doubt the day belonged to Sagan who this season is stamping himself as a future superstar of the sport. He has backed up 4 wins in 6 stages in the Tour of California with 2 wins in the first 3 days here and literally looks unbeatable at the moment. The youngster is a freak! The other rider who deserves a shout out is Sylvain Chavanel (my tip for the stage) who put in a mighty attack in the closing 5km in attempt to repeat his French championship win on this finish last year. He gained as much as 11 seconds but the final climb proved a little too tough as he was swept away by the charging light brigade in the final 500m. Michael Morkov (the V is silent! Just in case you didn’t catch the 15 mentions of this on the coverage last night) padded his lead in the mountains classification by somehow sneaking into the break away for the third straight day – a fair effort in anyone’s books.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@neilroad – That intermediary sprint was equivalent of prison fight – even tho it isn’t important you still need to slap a guy down if disrespects #tdf12

Stage 2 - Cav's Back

Predictability continued at the 2012 Tour de France, with Stage 2, a 207.5km ride from Vise to Tournai, representing the first chance for the pure sprinters at this year’s race. And has been the case for the last 4 years at Le Tour, when a sprint stage is there for the taking, Mark Cavendish wins. Resplendent in the World Champions jersey, and ominously wearing a gold helmet in this Olympic year, Cavendish powered over the top of German Andre Greipel to record his 21^st career stage win. Australia’s Matt Goss was third, having led the peleton at the intermediate sprint earlier in the stage.

Other than that there is not too much to add to be honest on what was a bread and butter day in the Tour. The bunch finished as a group so there was no GC change. New sprint sensation Marcel Kittel had stomach problems and thus didn’t participate in the sprint finish, but Shimano’s back up sprinter Tom Veelers did manage 4^th so you’d have to think Kittel would have been there and there abouts had he been fit. A semi surprise was Sagan finishing 6^th in the final sprint to take the lead (Mark Cavendish is now second) in the Green Jersey competition from Fabian Cancellara. If Sagan can regularly finish top 10 on dead flat stages than it may be hard for the pure sprinters to catch him in the points classification. Michael Morkov participated in the days break and thus padded his lead in the mountains classification by a juicy 1 point.

Early rant for the day is the farcical use of yellow at this year’s tour. Obviously the yellow helmets are a new innovation – they look awful and will clash with pretty much every teams outfit. And in reality the race for the teams classification garners about as much interest as the Foxtel Cup – i.e. no one cares! The one team who’s outfit may match the helmets (and they will be zero chance of ever leading the classification) is Saxo Bank, who have somehow transformed their team colours in 12 months from classic white and black to some hideous combination of dark blues and yellows.

Anyway – tonight’s stage looks a corker with a true classics style profile across the north of France. I suggest it’s one that is worth staying up to watch.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Peter Sagan

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@Cyclopunk – So that’s 83 professional wins for Mark Cavendish & 196 for Marianne Vos. I wonder which one’s in the higher income tax band? #womenscycling

Stage 1 - On Expectations

The Tour de France continued in predictable fashion over night, with a classics style stage of 198km from Liege to Seraing in Belgium unsurprisingly dominated by classics style riders. Pre-race favourite Peter Sagan took the win, outsprinting Fabian Cancelllara, resplendent in his yellow jersey, and Edvald Boasson Hagen. Belgian Phillipe Gilbert was 4^th. A small group of 40 made it to the finish but none of the main overall contenders lost any time (apart from that no-name German I highlighted yesterday who has now fallen out of the top 10).

Peter Sagan has won virtually every race on earth so far this season, so it was no surprise to see him win out on the day. He was given a dream path to the finish after hoping on Cancellara’s whell in the last 1500m, as the Swiss blew away from the peleton in trademark style. In taking the win Sagan struck a blow in the green jersey competition (he now trails Cancellara by just 6 points) with fellow rivals such as Mark Cavendish and Matt Goss absent from the finale. The market has moved heavily in his favour in this competition but we’ll get a better idea by the end of this week as to how the battle will go between the pure sprinters and the allrounders.

Overall the stage was pretty damn predictable (and if you didn’t have the top 4 finishes in your fantasy line up you should probably give the game away). Break of random French dudes goes out, gets caught, peleton winds it up in the last 10k, sprinters get blown off the back, strong man power away up the hill and classics specialists finish 1 2 3 4 5 – stock standard Tour de France in the modern era. Still, I think these style of stages give the first week a bit more flavour than the old school dead pan stages where it would be dead flat for the first 6 days and the sprinters would take turns at the glory.

We did get enough bobbles on the parcours to have a first leader in the mountains classification and Michael Morkov, a member of the days break will take the first polka dot jersey. He seemed pretty excited about it too after wrapping it up on the day’s second climb. Tejay Van Garderen finished in the main bunch so kept is slender lead over Boasson Hagen in the youth classification. The other highlight was an intrepid fan thinking the optimal place to grab a photo opportunity would be smack bang in the middle of the road as the peleton bore down on him. Needless to say the riders who crashed will not be happy with that performance.

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Polka Dot Jersey – Michael Morkov

White Jersey – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean Tweet of the day:

@Thollenshead – Sagan won #tdf stage 2 but @f_cancellara was the strongest. I’m calling a win like that #weaksauce for not taking a pull in the last 2k.

Prologue - History Repeating

The 2012 Tour de France kicked off as it did 8 years ago with a prologue in Liege, Belgium. And as was the case in 2004, Fabian Cancellara was victorious, taking the first yellow jersey by 7 seconds from Bradley Wiggins and Sylvain Chavanel. Promising American Tejay van Garderen finished 4^th, a performance good enough to garner the White Jersey.

Wiggins was obviously the best of the GC hopefuls finishing around 10 seconds ahead of Cadel Evans and Vincenzo Nibali and a handful ahead of Denis Menchov. I’m sure the British press will be declaring this a decisive performance from Wiggo, but for fans of Cadel I would not be too worried. Wiggo is a former pursuit Gold Medallist at the Olympics and the 6km course would have suited him perfectly. Cadel will be able to match him better over the longer time trials later in the race.

To be honest the stage went almost perfectly to script with most riders performing on expectations. World time-trial champion Tony Martin will be disappointed at a 45^th place finish but he had to change bikes which is an absolute disaster over such a short distance – his performance can be totally ignored. Peter Sagan had been spruiked pre race and similarly disappointed but he also pulled his shoes from the pedals which put paid to his chances. Hopefully he doesn’t rue the lost points in the green jersey battle later in the race.

The biggest suprise to me was Patrick Gretsch, a German who finished 7^th, just 12 seconds behind Cancellara. I’ll admit I have NFI who this guy is so he will be one to keep an eye on and learn a bit about in the early stages.

But the day belonged to Spartacus, who over the last two years has seen his title of King of the Classics slip to Phillipe Gilbert and Tom Boonen, and his dominance against the clock surpassed by Tony Martin.  The Swiss star is one of the nice guys on Tour and no one will be upset at him wearing the Yellow jersey at the first week of the tour again. Chapeau Fabian!

Yellow Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

Green Jersey – Fabian Cancellara

White Jeresy – Tejay Van Garderen

Brock McLean tweet of the day

@bazzargh - time trial (n): a cycle race where the riders set off one by one and Cancellara wins. #tdf

Preview

It is that time of the year again when The Falcon is your guide for a glorious three week tour of France. 2012 is a big year for Australia – Cadel Evans is the defending champ and Australia’s first ever professional cycling team, Orica-Green Edge makes their Tour debut. As always The Falcon’s definitive guide should be your first port of call for all things Le Tour.

The Route

This year’s route is a class of new and old. The new – less pure flat stages and more stages that have a classics like profile. The old – 100+ kilometres of time trialling! The idea behind this set up is to get the mountain men to attack as much as possible in order to counter the masses of time they will lose in the races against the clock. I think the idea has merit and we should see some animated racing throughout the three weeks. However, courses like this have backfired in the past, with TT specialists dominating early and then just sucking wheel over the Alps and Pyrenees. The result is racing that is boring as s**t. This is likely to be the tactic adopted by Bradley Wiggins and could potentially kill the race as a spectacle (of course if Cadel employs the same methodology it will be tactical genius!).

The Contenders

This year’s race looks to be a race in two – so you either have to be in the camp of either Cadel Evans or Bradley Wiggins. There is no way in hell I could tip Wiggo to win Le Tour so that means I am backing Cadel to go back-to-back! He will be suited by the mass kilometres of time trialling and showed last year that he can hold his own with almost anyone in the mountains. He should have the weight of the world off his shoulders after last years victory and if he plays his cards right he will be extremely tough to beat.

In their own Olympic year the Brits are screaming from the rafters that Wiggins is unbeatable but I don’t buy it. Sure he is the best time trialler of the contenders but for me he has yet to prove himself a consistent climber over a three week Grand Tour. He has won the Dauphine twice but that is a weeklong race and for me he has that mental fragility about him that Cadel had during his early cracks at tour favouritism. I’m banking he will blow up at some stage and I can’t wait to see it happen!!!

For third I like the Italian Vincenzo Nibali. A solid all round rider he should not concede too much time to the power riders in the time trials and can also hold his own in the hills. He is a former Vuelta winner and knows how to dose his efforst when required.  If Liquigas ride for him he is a definite podium threat.

The complete bolter is world time trial champion Tony Martin. If he can gain enough time on his rivals in the time trials (potentially 1:30 in each one) he might just be able to gets it out in the mountains to pull off the mother of all shocks.

The Sprinters

The Green Jersey this year will be determined by whether or not Mark Cavendish pulls out of the Tour early to prepare for the Olympics. If he gets to Paris he will win the thing but I reckon he’ll be gone before the Pyrenees.

That gives Aussie start Matt Goss every chance to wear the jersey in Paris. He won a stage at the Giro d’Italia and won Milan San Remo (the sprinters classic) in 2011. That suggests he has what it takes to drag himself over the mountains and for me he is the second fastest man in world cycling (as evidenced by his world championship silver medal last year). Go you good thing.

The man to beat is obviously young phenom Peter Sagan. This guy is the Phillipe Gilbert of 2012 in that everything he has touched has turn to gold – including four dominant wins in the Tour of California. He might not be quite as fast as Goss but he will be able to win those intermediate stages where the true sprinters get dropped. Last years’ Cavendish v Gilbert battle went to Cav though and for that reason I have gone with the pure sprinter.

There are a host of other contenders with the best two for mine Marcel Kittel and Tyler Farrar. Kittel could be the next Cavendish – he is extremely fast and knows how to win if he gets to the final kilometre in position. Farrar has been highly ranked in this competition in the past two tours and is likely to be there or thereabouts again this year.

The Climbers

Usually an absolute lottery to pick this jersey and no different this year. Generally you have to go with a guy not quite good enough to win the GC but with a fair bit of mountain ability. That has left me with Michele Scarponi, who is the official 2011 Giro D’Italia winner following the enforcement of the Contador doping ban. He won’t have the TT ability to hang around on the flat so he should be free to fly and chase mountains points in the climbs. Other hopefuls include Sammy Sanchez and Frank Schleck but they will have to put themselves out of GC contenders before they are allowed any rein. For a complete bolter a good Aussie hope is Matty Lloyd who won the climbing classification at the 2010 Giro.

The Youngsters

The bookies have Dutchman Steven Kruijswijk as the hot favourite for the white jersey coming off a strong classics season, but really this title is not really determined until late in the final week when we can judge how the youngsters are coping with the difficulties of a 3 week slog. Rein Taaramae must be a chance of avenging his narrow defeat in this classification last year, while if Tejay Van Garderen does not have to look after Cadel too much he is a chance of finishing high in this classification as well.

Brock McLean award for tweet of the day:

@FakePaulKeating on the SBS Tour fantasy completion

do you get refunds if a team member gets outed for roids? #TdF