Showing posts tagged stage 18
Still the fastest man | Stage 18 Cav! What a terrific victory - the best sprinter in the Tour taking the win in Bordeaux, a city that has hosted more stages and more sprint finishes than any other city bar Paris. HTC-Columbia once again shouldered the bulk of the workload early to keep the break within reach before really knuckling down to take control at the head of the field up until the last couple of kilometres. Missing Hansen and Renshaw, they were always unlikely to be able to maintain their train all the way to the finish. Today they would need to improvise and this they did brilliantly, Cavendish leaping from train to train before diving for the wheel of Petacchi then sprinting over the top of him. It was his most McEwenesque victory, and one that will have won the Manx missile a whole bunch more fans. Schleck will need a significantly improved time trial and a better plan if he is to seriously threaten Contador. And if he doesn’t, he’s destined to continue to be cast in the role of Raymond Poulidor to Contador’s Jacques Anquetil for years to come. View high resolution

Still the fastest man | Stage 18

Cav! What a terrific victory - the best sprinter in the Tour taking the win in Bordeaux, a city that has hosted more stages and more sprint finishes than any other city bar Paris.

HTC-Columbia once again shouldered the bulk of the workload early to keep the break within reach before really knuckling down to take control at the head of the field up until the last couple of kilometres. Missing Hansen and Renshaw, they were always unlikely to be able to maintain their train all the way to the finish. Today they would need to improvise and this they did brilliantly, Cavendish leaping from train to train before diving for the wheel of Petacchi then sprinting over the top of him. It was his most McEwenesque victory, and one that will have won the Manx missile a whole bunch more fans.

Schleck will need a significantly improved time trial and a better plan if he is to seriously threaten Contador. And if he doesn’t, he’s destined to continue to be cast in the role of Raymond Poulidor to Contador’s Jacques Anquetil for years to come.

TDF 2010 | Stage 18 Pancake flat, the 198km Stage 18 from Salies-de-Bearn to Bordeaux is one that the sprinters will be determined to not let get away - especially given what they’ve had to endure over the past week just to stay in the race. However, finishes in Bordeaux are occasionally pinched by the breakaway and there’s definitely a chance of that happening again - if the group that gets away is big enough. My tip: Cav. He’s tired. They’re all tired. But he’s still the fastest man in the race.

TDF 2010 | Stage 18

Pancake flat, the 198km Stage 18 from Salies-de-Bearn to Bordeaux is one that the sprinters will be determined to not let get away - especially given what they’ve had to endure over the past week just to stay in the race. However, finishes in Bordeaux are occasionally pinched by the breakaway and there’s definitely a chance of that happening again - if the group that gets away is big enough.

My tip: Cav. He’s tired. They’re all tired. But he’s still the fastest man in the race.

Daylight second | Stage 18 We had always known Alberto Contador was capable of dominating in the mountains but very few people expected he was capable of delivering such a crushing performance as he did in the 40.5 kilometre Stage 18 ITT. What was even more extraordinary than his vanquishing of the Brothers Schleck, Armstrong, Kloden, Wiggins and Nibali, was that he even mangaged to beat out Fabian Cancellara by 3 seconds for the Stage win. Stunning. Punchy Russian Mikhail Ignatiev (Katusha, 3rd) set the early best time before Olympic champion Cancellara tore around the course at an extremely impressive average speed of 50.1 km/h to set the new best time. Of the GC contenders, Wiggins got closest to Cancellara’s time some 39 seconds back, moving him up from 6th to 4th on GC. Andy Schleck, not noted for his time trialing, rode one of the best races against the clock of his life, finishing in 21st and losing only 1:45 to the winner and hanging onto 2nd on GC by 1:14. Schleck’s hard work this year under the tutelage of Bobby Julich clearly paying off. Armstrong could only manage the 16th best time, finishing 1:29 behind the winner but this was still good enough to bump him one place into 3rd on GC. While Kloden lost 53 seconds, Nibali lost 2:05 and Frank Schleck 2:34 dropping him from 3rd to 6th. The day unquestionably belonged to the maillot jaune. Contador now has a 4:11 lead over the second placed Andy Schleck all but guaranteeing him his 2nd Tour win. Extraordinarily though, less than two minutes separates 2nd placed Andy from his brother Frank in 6th; and 7th placed Nibali only another 1:16 back. All eyes now turn to the Ventoux on Saturday, where in one final knock-em-down, drag-em-out fight, 6 riders will battle it out on one of the Tour’s most mythical climbs for the last two places on the podium. View high resolution

Daylight second | Stage 18

We had always known Alberto Contador was capable of dominating in the mountains but very few people expected he was capable of delivering such a crushing performance as he did in the 40.5 kilometre Stage 18 ITT. What was even more extraordinary than his vanquishing of the Brothers Schleck, Armstrong, Kloden, Wiggins and Nibali, was that he even mangaged to beat out Fabian Cancellara by 3 seconds for the Stage win. Stunning.

Punchy Russian Mikhail Ignatiev (Katusha, 3rd) set the early best time before Olympic champion Cancellara tore around the course at an extremely impressive average speed of 50.1 km/h to set the new best time. Of the GC contenders, Wiggins got closest to Cancellara’s time some 39 seconds back, moving him up from 6th to 4th on GC. Andy Schleck, not noted for his time trialing, rode one of the best races against the clock of his life, finishing in 21st and losing only 1:45 to the winner and hanging onto 2nd on GC by 1:14. Schleck’s hard work this year under the tutelage of Bobby Julich clearly paying off. Armstrong could only manage the 16th best time, finishing 1:29 behind the winner but this was still good enough to bump him one place into 3rd on GC. While Kloden lost 53 seconds, Nibali lost 2:05 and Frank Schleck 2:34 dropping him from 3rd to 6th.

The day unquestionably belonged to the maillot jaune. Contador now has a 4:11 lead over the second placed Andy Schleck all but guaranteeing him his 2nd Tour win. Extraordinarily though, less than two minutes separates 2nd placed Andy from his brother Frank in 6th; and 7th placed Nibali only another 1:16 back. All eyes now turn to the Ventoux on Saturday, where in one final knock-em-down, drag-em-out fight, 6 riders will battle it out on one of the Tour’s most mythical climbs for the last two places on the podium.