A long coastal section with exposed roads that are narrow in parts, enough to fray the nerves any day but the forecast is for more crosswinds. The stage ends with a punchy uphill finish, perfect for Peter Sagan and everyone who tries to follow his wheel.
Stage 5 Wrap: a sprint royale with all the big names in action and a grand win for André Greipel. Rather all the big names left in the race after Nacer Bouhanni crashed out early in the stage thanks to a banal crash or, in his words, “an idiot’s crash” to leave the team without its leader. It set the tone for a nervous day with Astana, BMC, Tinkoff-Saxo, Sky and Etixx-Quickstep riding almost in team time formation, a column each on the front of the bunch as they each tried to avoid danger. Perhaps it wasn’t visible on TV but it was stressful all day with riders packed like sardines into the road. After early escapee Pierre-Luc Périchon was caught nobody else bothered going away and the inevitable sprint happened.
It was the kind of finish where can watch the final kilometre again and again and spot something new. Etixx-Quickstep’s lead out didn’t work and Mark Cavendish drift off in search of another wheel while Giant-Alpecin powered along only for John Degenkolb to misfire but André Greipel came around and passed the likes of Alexander Kristoff and Arnaud Démare who’d launched early and were fading in the head wind. Already wearing the green jersey Greipel collected 50 points on the finish line and 17 in the intermediate sprint to extend his lead to 151 points over Peter Sagan in 119.
Mark Cavendish makes news when he loses and if the sprint didn’t work out he’s usually able to bounce back at the point he’s written off and for those who say he’s too old, he’s just turned 30 while André Greipel’s about to reach 33.
Finally it was good to see Michael Matthews get the combativity prize rather than the usual automatic attribution of the prize to the day’s fruitless breakaway. Orica-Greenedge are down to six riders already after Michael Albasini leaves. For the combativity prize the only dilemma is who to reward given just how many others are struggling with injuries.
The Route: a coastal jaunt for the last 120km and all the harder for it. After the road reaches Dieppe it climbs for the King of the Mountains points twice and then takes the cliff road for most of the way. The screengrab image below gives you an impression of the terrain, look to the right and you can make out the sea.
The shot’s from February so the crops will be a little higher but as you can see that’s all the cover the race gets from the sea breeze. It’s also up and down too and, unlike the image above, in places the road gets narrow too, the kind of width where two cars approaching in opposition directions would have to slow and check each other to ensure they can pass. If the bunch found yesterday stressful today could be as tiring.
The Finish: an uphill run to the line. Labelled the Côte d’Ingouville by the race the locals seem to call it Côte Sainte-Marie and can use a funicular railway to get up. It starts climbing before the 1km to go point and all on a large wide road.
It’s listed as 850m at 7% but runs steeper at the start. This isn’t some medieval finish you get in, say, Tirreno-Adriatico but a main road used by buses and when the bunch thunders up at speed there are huge gains to be had by being on the right wheel. The profile suggests it rises all the way to the line but it’s flat at the top for 400m before the line.
The Contenders: this is the stage for Peter Sagan (pictured age 15 winning a stage in an international junior U-18 race). His late surge to the line showed his power and speed but he really excels in uphill finishes like today, he was even in the mix on the Mur de Huy until the steep bends. As long as he can be liberated from servile duties he’s surely the most obvious pick especially his team will be shepherding Alberto Contador so if there’s a crosswind there’s the strong chance they’ll all be up front, something that’s less obvious for some of the other picks below.
John Degenkolb is also another versatile rider who can win uphill sprints like this, see his triumph at the Hattah Damn in the Tour of Dubai. Today’s finish is flatter but he’ll hope to headbang past everyone on the flat run to the line.
Edvald Boasson Hagen has been looking good in this race, often at the front of affairs but he’s never been a pure bunch sprinter, preferring some hills to reduce his rivals, see his Tour stage win in Lisieux for a good example. Today is almost a replay of that day, suits him a lot more although since joining MTN-Qhubeka he’s beefed up so the climb could be hard work. Greg Van Avermaet is an excellent finisseur too but an infrequent winner, a safe pick for the top-5 perhaps.
Davide Cimolai won an uphill sprint in Paris-Nice ahead of Michael Matthews but is an infrequent winner. He beat Bryan Coquard that day and The Mosquito has picked this stage as an ideal finish, it certainly suits his 57kg build and track-honed leg speed. Whether both make the cut in the crosswinds is another matter. A safer bet for the French could be Tony Gallopin as he’s proving very fast uphill but he’d prefer the climb to go on and on (ie Saturday’s Mûr-de-Bretagne) and he could be a useful help for André Greipel‘s green jersey points grab. The big German climbs well and is confident so he could be in the mix but if he can scale sharp climbs, producing sprint at the top is a big ask. Can Mark Cavendish make it there? He’s been climbing ok but if not then Zdeněk Štybar is Etixx-Quickstep’s best pick as Michał Kwiatkowksi seems to be on domestique duty. Julien Simon can save Cofidis, he’s a useful uphill sprinter at times but a Tour stage is a big ask. Lastly Bora-Argon 18’s Sam Bennett is a fast sprinter but does well in uphill finishes too, hard to see him trouncing Peter Sagan but watch to see if he can show the jersey.
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Peter Sagan |
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John Degenkolb, Edvald Boasson Hagen, André Greipel |
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Coquard, Cavendish, Kristoff, Kwiatkowski, Bennett, Štybar, Cimolai, Simon, S Yates |
Weather: sunny and dry but cool. Temperatures will not exceed 19˚C degrees with north-westerly wind around 15km/h with gusts up to 30km/h.
TV: the finish is forecast for 5.20pm Euro time. Check in early to see if the race is being ravaged by crosswinds or if some teams are trying to exploit any meagre breeze otherwise be sure to catch the final half hour.
If you can’t find it on TV, you’ll find it online with Cyclingfans and steephill.tv for links to feeds and streams.
Sagan comes in 2nd sooo often. I suppose that’s the curse of being so well rounded?
Degenkolb’s sprints could use a heavy metal soundtrack. Headbanger indeed. Cavendish’s soundtrack would of course be Flight of the Bumblebee.
So much excitement so far, can’t believe it’s only stage 6. As always, though, crashes are a bummer. Especially Spartacus. 🙁
Sagan was like a rocket yesterday!
He may have been second but his top speed was insane. He really turned it on in the final meters.
I agree, Sagan was (to quote him “on the wheel of the Greipel”) flying at the end. Greipel blew by Cav and then Sagan blew by Greipel – a metre too late.
Messy finish – to quote Sagan again: “it was a very big mess in the group”.
AG came out of the last corner at 29mph/46kph and accelerated up to 43mph/69kph……you can follow his TDF rides on Strava. There were 9 Riders posting their stages… https://www.strava.com/pros/384548
It’s interesting that you focus exclusively on non-GC riders. Any particular reason for not seeing the top guns winning today? Is it not hard enough?
Not even worth it, there wont be a split and its much too risky for GC guys to mix it up in this kind of finish
It doesn’t seem selective enough, especially as it’s flat to the line so the likes of Valverde could be overhauled. I’d like to be wrong though, it’d be good to see the big names sprinting to the line. They’ll have to follow though as they can’t afford to be on the wrong side of a split.
What happens if a team has less than 5 riders in the TTT?
Go round again until the required number of people have crossed the line? 🙂
They ride as four if there are four. They can start together but finish individually.
Do you mean that they get the winners’ time + 30%, not matter what?
Surely if, say, the winners finish in 30 min and the four come home in 32 min, they get that time and not the winners’ time + 30% (39 min in this case)?
That would be unfair and a double punishment.
Thanks for the clarification.
Although with the removal of your original comment, I now look like I’m having an argument with myself.
I often have those.
Send Tony Martin out as a Team of one……The other eight only slow him down…… 🙂
And would Dan Martin be in there with a shot? Or Rui Costa?
Not a long enough climb surely?
Hey! ….I’m Lanterne Verte!
Am i right in concluding that the difference between this being a boring or exciting stage is wind. And, if so, does anyone know if that wind forecast, both strength wise and directionally, is conducive to echelons?
It’s not just the wind strength, it’s also the terrain. If it’s very exposed with open fields as opposed to woodland you don’t need much wind, just 20-25km/h was enough to split the race apart in the 2013 Tour on the stage to St Amand Montrond. Of course the more exposed the road and the greater the wind, the more necessary echelon formations become.
Thanks 🙂 I think i might watch it then.
I am beginning to pity poor Thibaut Pinot… I wonder if he shouldn’t just go home and save himself for a possible Vuelta victory.
He aint going anywhere but carrying on as per Mad Marc Madiot….
http://www.cyclingnews.com/blogs/marc-madiot/marc-madiot-blog-cyclists-are-warriors-to-be-respected
Daniel Friebe made a good point in the Cycling Podcast, which is that for Pinot’s continuing development, its perhaps more important that he doesnt give up on the GC so soon (and turn to trying to grab a stage win), as the area of mental strength is something he has to develop if he’s going to be able to progress to really competing head-to-head with the likes of the main 4 guys in the future…Seems a reasonable POV…
I agree, he’s had a pretty ordinary week but the best thing is to keep going unless he’s actually doing some damage to an injury. He can make leaps up the GC once they reach the mountains. Probably not to the podium but a lot higher than he currently is.
Bardet is nowhere too – perhaps he’ll re-appear in the Pyrenees? I hope so.
Bardet’s not having a fab time, for sure. Though he did finish in that big front group with all the faves on st 4, so fair play to him for that
It was a fair point from Friebe, but surely another option for Pinot would be the mountain jersey? Friebe’s point was that another stage win wouldn’t advance his career, but surely that doesn’t mean that it has to be GC?
The real test is his resilience. It’s keeping his head together that’s the harder part. Besides the mountains jersey requires competing for summit finishes, he’s only six minutes down and won’t be given much room if he tries to go in the early break.
Loads of riders have been tweeting about how exhausting and stressful yesterday was, more tiring than a mountain stage one said.
Cav has seemed to take a couple of failed sprints before winning one that starts a series. Problem is there aren’t that many sprints this year.
Top sprint to watch, solid win from Griepel but Sagan was absolutely flying-obviously Griepel had eased off to celebrate which distorts things but it looked like if it was another 5 metres Sagan would have won.
Thanks for the great preview!
As the last kilometer goes straight into the land, will it be back wind? That might be good if someone attacks on the climb (Dan Martin, Van Avermaet, etc.) Or maybe it’s just impossible to get away with such an “easy” climb and all the strong contenders…
I’d love to see Julien Simon win this – he’s been a favourite of mine since his doomed heroics into Lyon a few years back. Not the first or last time he’s failed to pull that sort of move off, his nickname within Sojasun was “C’est baisé” because they were the words that he’d radio back with when he realised that things weren’t going to work out.
If Dan Martin is to have a chance he would need to position himself a bit better than on the Mur De Hui. No point in having a fast finish if you leave it too late or start from a bad position
Huy, that is before someone else corrects it.
Thanks for the wrap and review. Classic’s Week is certainly delivering.
Agree that giving the combativity award to Matthews was a novel and thoughtful choice. Should be done more often.
(small grammatical point: did you really mean “banal crash” in reference to Bouhani? I might be missing a linguistic flourish there but it reads clumsily to me. Moronic crash perhaps? )
Banal in the sense used by Arendt: commonplace, ordinary, random, inane.
That was it.
Ok, my political theory is not that strong and so I’ll take your point. But…..my literary training is at a reasonable level and so I’m still going to maintain that another word could be perhaps have been used in the interests of linguistic excellence . Innocuous maybe?
Just my view from across the Inrng Cafe table. Can someone pass the croissants please?
Strikes me that Greipel is doing what Cavendish used to do when his train wasn’t quite so reliable – bouncing from wheel to wheel and doing it very well. Tony Martin was pulling on the run in to the sprint yesterday but swung off perhaps a little early? Maybe protecting himself and the yellow jersey is compromising him a little?
I noticed that too. Payback for Cav? Or, just TM realizing he mustn’t get gapped by Froome?
Tony Martin was on the front full gas for some time. There’s a limit even for the Panzerwagen…
I agree Sam, especially into a strong headwind too.
In fact both the sprint stages have been into headwinds and yesterday was a slight uphill pull too.
Cavendish is not as powerful as Griepel and Sagan, is it a case of mis-timing his effort with the headwind and then running out of gas ?
Agreed – he was pulling for about 1.5km of the last 3 I think! Cav made the point that they missed Trentin who was injured – which makes sense. They did look one guy short, between Martin’s pull and Renshaw lead out.
That’s true Cilmeri.
I think the fact that Sagan and Griepel are finding Cavendish’s wheel,and sitting on it, in the run-in is probably putting him under pressure and causing him to pull the trigger slightly too early perhaps.
He’s aware of their presence and is jumping the gun, or certainly mis-calculating his finish into the wind.
Fair enough. I know that Trentin was out and even Tony Martin can’t pull into a headwind forever. However, it did look a little like they had a plan and had to stick to it, and as a result Renshaw hit the front too early. On both occasions Cav has had to go open up the sprint too far out and it looks like he just can’t live with Greipel on the longer sprints. Two thoroughly deserved wins for the Gorilla, though, using other’s wheels cleverly.
Also, Cav was dropped and got lost in the crowd from what I could see. Renshaw was looking around for him and when he realised how far away he was, he sat up to stop towing others.
No Matthews? I thought he’d have deserved a couple of rings!
Matthew is terribly, terribly wounded and was struggling to stay in the race yesterday, no chance of a win.
Hehe, not even a ring for GVA. That’s realistic: no ring for win, but I would surely put 3 instead if it was for podium!!!!
He is in fact not fast enough too outsprint the likes of Sagan, Degge and Kristoff, and he has not the power of a Gilbert to build a small advantage on the climb and to maintain it to the finish.
Agree on Sagan, he was too fast in the sprint yesterday, he is the prime pick for today. But I would not be so surprised to see the likes of Cavendish or Greipel survive the climb until the last 400m. If I understood well this is wide straight road where you could use the speed acquired on the flat.
I would not be surprised neither to see splits in the bunch due to the terrain.
Surprised to see S Yates sneaking in with a one ring, but no mention in the preview. What’s the rationale? I’d have thought this wasn’t his type of climb?
He’s punchy and he has a bit of a kick on him – more so than his brother…
He did well on the Mur de Huy too
I’ll be glad when this first week’s over. Where are those who claim LeTour is raced each day at full speed while the Giro racers just dawdle along until the TV coverage starts? More than once I’ve tuned in and thought the damn thing must be neutralized again! Way too much “JRA” with riders full across the road like it’s a parade. ZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Another solipsistic keyboard warrior unworthy of the site, mouthing off in thread after thread after thread.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Wonderful you used the word solipistic. Thanks, made my day. Ethical solipism
There’s nothing more boring than someone complaining about someone else’s threads – as you can read here.
Ideally if you disagree try to explain why rather than just sniping at a fellow reader.
Personally this Tour has had plenty of drama and action, to think the bunch has been riding along with nothing happening is curious, is it the same race?
Larry, I’m with you if we speak of getting rid of a commonplace point of view that isn’t true anymore since years. Things have been changing during the last 20 years or so, and now every year each race can sort out differently shaped because of changing circumstances. We could even say that the Giro has been providing a compelling and hard-fought first week more often than the Tour in recent years, also because it was the Giro which first brought in greater innovation in terms of course.
That said, I think you’re being a little unfair. The first four stages have been really interesting, even if maybe Tuesday didn’t provide as much excitement as last year and even if the only *great* stage was Sunday’s. On the other hand, we must admit that stage five and six have been deeply boring, and today was even disappointing, given that much more could be expected (albeit the wind wasn’t that intense).
Last year’s Giro had four quite dull stages to get started (still interesting because of the landscape, the crowds, the sprints etc., but the same could be said about yesterday or today) and things got really moving only from half of the whole race on, although the end of the first week wasn’t that bad. All in all, I’d say that – till now – this Tour has *started* better than the 2014 Giro. Ok, the 2013 Giro was really good from the 2nd or 3rd stage through to the end, 2010 was kind of legendary and this year was simply incredible… but meanwhile we had 2012, too, and it really wasn’t that special.
This Tour has got time to become really boring… or quite the contrary. Till now, we got a very fine first week and a couple of days during which the peloton has shown its most ovine DNA aren’t enough to be that critical. It’s true that we haven’t seen that much attacking spirit, big teams apart, but fatigue and fear take their toll.
Boredom is going for the “remontada”… from 4-0 to 4-3. Hope the weekend will set things ok again 😛
looks like that was a spectator causing the TM crash
Tony’s error crossing a wheel with the Europcar rider.
Yet more terrible television. We miss the end of the race – the crucial part: Stybar going away – whilst the director shows us men lying on the ground. When will they learn? Show the aftermath and repeats of the crash AFTER the finish. There is plenty of time to show this and we are watching because we want to see who wins.
Surely, this is the most basic thing?
Imagine you’re the producer, you’ve got the yellow jersey on the ground with Nibali and van Garderen too. Not an easy call.
pip? split screen?
Very easy. You show the live sport, which is no good when repeated.
You show the ‘human interest’ afterwards, which will be the same as when live.
I think most cycling fans would rather see the denouement of a race, rather than a man sitting on the ground – regardless of his apparel.
The entire stage ruined: did Stybar do a monster ride to leave the others behind? Or did they just let him go because no-one wanted to chase?
And if we do find out, how exciting is it to find out after the fact? Not at all. No drama.
It was the latter, from what we saw you could see the hesitation among the riders as they did not have anyone to chase.
+1
In the world of newspapers, front pages with ‘BAD NEWS’ always outsell those with ‘Good News’. I guess the same applies with TV?
‘… from what we saw…’ – but how did he get into that position in the first place?
And the reason we were watching was because we wanted to see it – not read about it later.
But I shall stop ranting now, as I’m ranting at a French director who is not reading this.
Sagan second once again. Glad I didn’t jinx Stybar, he was my pick. I should have bet on today’s stage! Happy for Stybar, one of my faves and a classy rider.
Tune in tomorrow for Episode 7 of the French thriller “The Curse Of The Yellow Jersey”.
* blood curdling screammmmm *
Who wear’s yellow on Friday?
Tony Martin unfortunately can’t continue now, but he was awarded the yellow Jersey. Technically I would suspect that he officially still holds it until he doesn’t sign in tomorrow, but the team has said he is getting surgery instead. Do the rules have a solution for this problem?
What is the expectation for the peleton on Friday? Does Etixx-Quickstep have the social responsibility or does it fall on Sky? Of course at some point the sprinter ‘s teams will kick in to gear.
This “responsibility” thing because you have the yellow jersey is a bit silly. Sky will not drive for a single metre simply because they have that jersey in the team.
Tomorrow is one of the last few sprint stages, if Cav wants that win, his team will have to work for it.
Bad news TM having to quit in yellow as well, rotten rotten luck. I was secretly hoping for one of his epic solo efforts in the next couple of weeks. Ah well maybe the Vuelta again then.
I think it would be best to honor TM and the yellow jersey
to have NO ONE wearing it tomorrow. After all , to
crash and severely break bones in the last Km of a 190 + Km stage
whilst wearing the yellow, has this ever occurred ?
There are quite a few examples from history of the second-placed rider not wearing the MJ when the race leader has crashed out and abandoned overnight. Merkcx /Ocana is one but there are more recent ones too. Froome can choose I think – the RD can offer it and then its Froom’s call.
Robbie McEwen offered a credible explanation, as to why Cav isn’t winning at the moment. His initial thoughts were that Cav’s looking leaner & lighter, so may be lacking some power as a result. That as he is out of contract and currently negotiating, the pressures on to bring some evidence to the table, that he’s still the fastest around (just as well Kittel stayed home) and that the lead out train isn’t firing (mistakes explained here, already). He did point out that making the mistake, once, of sprinting & dying, from too far out, is excusable, but repeating same error, twice, points to pressure. Suggested that Cav sticks to plan and lead out train. Time will tell….