Tour de France 2013: Stage 10 Winners and Losers

Winners

Marcel Kittel

Although his victory on stage 1 brought him the yellow jersey, perhaps this stage win will provide the greatest satisfaction for Marcel Kittel as he was able to record a victory in a sprint with all the big names present. With Andre Greipel given a near perfect lead out by his Lotto Belisol team, and Kittel forced to swerve to avoid the sprawling Tom Veelers, it seemed like the stage was Greipel’s to lose. However Kittel showed an incredible turn of speed overcome a deficit of three bike lengths in the final 200m to take victory by a wheel.

Jerome Cousin

With Cousin and Julien Simon in the break, the roadside supporters had two relatively local riders on the long slog across Brittany from the Atlantic coast to the English Channel. Knowing the Tour de France race jury, it was always likely that one of these two riders would be awarded the combativity prize, and this honour went to Cousin. A talented young rider, I doubt this will be the last time we see Cousin on the Tour de France podium, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see his aggressive style of racing pay off in more spectacular fashion some time in the near future.

Losers

Mark Cavendish

Whether or not Cavendish was at fault for Tom Veelers’ crash, the fact remains that the Tour is now half complete and the Manxman has only managed to chalk up one stage victory. Words will have been said in the Omega Pharma-Quickstep team hotel last night as their lead out train went AWOL in the final couple of kilometres, leaving Cavendish too far back in the final 500m. With only three sprint stage remaining, the Manxman will be keen to sort out these problems as quickly as possible, although I remain unconvinced that he has come to the race in good enough form.

Bauke Mollema

Along with the likes of Quintana, Rodriguez, Schleck, Martin, Costa, and teammate Laurens Ten Dam,  Mollema was the highest placed rider overall to get caught on the wrong side of a small split in the main field at the end of the stage, losing five seconds to the likes of Froome, Kreuziger, Contador, and Valverde. Although, this might not seem like much, with most of the main contenders looking pretty even in the Pyrenees, I can see the make up of the final top ten in Paris being decided by seconds, so good positioning going into the end of flat stages could make end up being important.  

Andrew Talansky

Another crash victim, Talansky was forced to chase hard to regain contact with the peloton for the final kilometres, but then found himself trailed off the back again as the pace went up at the front and he was forced to pay for his earlier effort. Going into the stage Talansky was sitting fourth in the young riders’ classification, 2:26 behind Romain Bardet. This might have been a deficit who could have overturned in stage 11, but after losing a further 1:40, any attempt to go into the Alps in third place in the white jersey competition will be difficult.

Stage 11 Preview

As with any flat time trial, the wind is likely to be the most important factor in deciding the result. The final 11 km are on exposed roads across marshlands on the coast. With a stiff north easterly wind I would expect reasonably big time gaps as the stronger time triallists come to the fore. The final 3km should be almost straight into this wind, so it will be important for the riders to save something for the end of the 33 km stage

Scenario

With a number of flat road stages over the next few days, tomorrow should decide the shape of the general classification until Ventoux on Bastille day on Sunday.

This is definitely a stage for the specialists, so I really can’t see beyond Tony Martin for the stage win. Other riders who would hope to challenge for a top ten would be the Orica-Greenedge duo of Cameron Meyer and Svein Tuft (although the latter rolled in last yesterday), David Millar, Tom Dumoulin,  Lieuwe Westra, and Movistar’s Jonathan Castroviejo and Ruben Plaza. However it’s a shame that Lampre’s Adriano Malori adandoned a few days ago, as I think he could have provided the stiffest test for Martin.

As far as the GC contenders are concerned, this should be an opportunity for Chris Froome to tighten his grip on the yellow jersey, and perhaps even challenge for the stage, although with a relatively short distance the time gaps probably won’t be vast.

I would expect the likes of Valverde, Mollema, and Ten Dam to lose time tomorrow, but it will be interesting to be see how Contador and Quintana get on, as this could be an opportunity for them to move up in the GC. Although losing a lot of time in the flat time trial in the Dauphiné, Contador looked to be in good form driving his team along in the Nice TTT, while Quintana continues to surprise some with the fact he is a Colombian who can hold his own against the clock.

Stage Win: Tony Martin

Yellow Jersey: Chris Froome

Apologies for the lack of coverage of the two exciting stages in the Pyrenees over the weekend. I have been away on holiday and so was unable to a good enough internet connection to write these daily summaries. Hopefully there will be uninterrupted coverage over the rest of the race.