The cycling equivalent of watching paint dry ended with a brilliant finish by Mark Cavendish with Thor Hushovd and Tyler Farrar hanging on for dear life.
After Tuesday's Stage 10 of the Tour de France seemed to drag on for hours with a four-man breakaway riding within sight of the main peloton, the sprinters' teams took charge of the peloton with about 3 miles left in the race.
Teams Columbia and Garmin each positioned themselves at the front, but George Hincapie was able to make Columbia the dominant team for their sprinter, Cavendish. Teammate Mark Renshaw took over the lead briefly, then Cavendish drove to the finish as Hushovd and Farrar struggled in vain to pass.
It was the 24-year-old Brit's third Tour de France victory this year, with seven in his career. He might chalk up another one Wednesday as Stage 11 looks like another sprinter's stage.
Overall
There was no change in the overall standings, as Rinaldo Nocentini continues to hang onto the yellow jersey as the pre-race favorites bide their time until the Alps.
Maybe that's where the fireworks will begin.
So far, Nocentini and Fabian Cancellara are the only two cyclists to wear the yellow jersey over the first 10 days of the Tour. Everyone seems to be waiting for Team Astana to sort out whether Lance Armstrong or Alberto Contador will take the lead.
Armstrong-Contador rivalry
Reading Armstrong's quote about the simmering team rivalry, I was struck that maybe Versus should try to televise the Astana team dinners instead of the racing. CyclingWeekly quotes Armstrong from French TV:
Alberto is very strong, very ambitious and I understand that, I’ve won
this race seven times and I understand he wants to want it a second
time.”
Contador attacked in the Pyrenees on Friday, when Armstrong was ahead of him in the standings. Now Contador is ahead, by two seconds. He defended himself at Monday's rest-day press conference:
the stage and to wait for the attacks. The attacks never came and I
thought I could take benefit of the stage,” he said. “It’s one thing
that’s said on the bus and something else once in the heat of the
battle. I attacked and no one came with me. I knew I had to go as hard
as I could to gain as much time as possible. The entire (Astana) team
benefited.”
But Contador says he'll let Armstrong go if he attacks in the Alps.
The peloton enters the Alps on Friday with the 124-mile Stage 17 from Vittel to Colmar. Let's hope things shake up then.
Radio-free Tour
This was one of two stages during the Tour de France when the
organizers wanted to ban the use of radios allowing the riders to
communicate with the team cars. After threats of a protest, the
organizers agreed to just one radio-free day; they scrubbed the idea of
having another on Friday's stage.
Break
Breakaway formed about three miles into the race, and their greatest margin was about 3 minutes.
Three of the breakaway riders on
Bastille Day were Frenchmen, Thierry Hupond (Skil-Shimano), Benoit
Vaugrenard (FdJ) and Samuel Dumoulin (Cofidis). The fourth, Mikhail
Ignatiev (Katusha), is from Russia.
The peloton kept them within sight most of the race and chased them down within a couple of miles of the finish.
Recent Comments