TdF Commentary 7/20

Stage 16 Recap

Fedrigo give France third consecutive stage win, Armstrong finishes in breakaway but too slow in sprint, Hushovd takes back green jersey

As expected, today's stage ended with a breakaway finish, with Pierrick Fedrigo beating the day's eight other escapees to the line in the final sprint.  Today's stage was very dynamic because of its rather odd layout, having two category-1 climbs, then two HC climbs, followed by a long flat segment.  The stage literally began on a category-1 climb, and multiple attacks and counterattacks resulted in the formation of  a lead group that included polka-dot jersey holder Anthony Charteau, Lance Armstrong, Stage 9 winner Sandy Casar, and some marginal GC contenders in Roman Kreuziger, Ryder Hesjedal, Alexandre Vinokourov, Carlos Sastre, and Bradley Wiggins.  It has already been speculated for a while that Armstrong would go for today's stage win, and as Team RadioShack got a more comfortable lead in the team classification, the team's directeur sportif Johan Bruyneel confirmed the plan.  Armstrong is very far out of GC contention, and this was really the last stage before he retires from the Tour where he could realistically compete for the stage win.

Anthony Charteau likely knew that he would not be competitive in the later HC climbs of the stage, so the BBox Bouygues Telecom team used a very well-intentioned but not entirely successful strategy: Charteau contested the two early climbs of the day, receiving 28 out of a possible 30 points.  Afterwards,  as the breakaway lost steam and the peloton closed, BBox sent Pierrick Fedrigo in a counterattack, with the intention of winning the HC climbs, thus preventing Charteau's rivals from getting maximum points.  Unfortunately, also joining the lead group on the counterattack were some strong KotM contenders in Damiano Cunego and Christophe Moreau, who both sacrificed the opportunity to get on the initial breakaway in favor of saving up for the more valuable climbs and possibly the stage win.  Cunego and Moreau would indeed make it to the finish with the lead group of nine, which crossed the finish line 6'45" ahead of the peloton.  Fedrigo was unable to stop Christophe Moreau from scoring 60 out of 60 points on the two HC climbs, and Moreau now has himself in a great position leading into the final mountain stage, as Charteau wasn't able to make it to the HC climbs fast enough to claim points.  However, Fedrigo got plenty of consolation in being the fastest on the final sprint for the stage win , giving BBox their second consecutive stage win and France their third consecutive, as well as their sixth overall.

Some aggression from Sandy Casar and Lance Armstrong picked up the breakaway's pace, and all the GC riders in the pack dropped back to the peloton - though it's no secret that they should be saving their energy for Stage 17 anyway.  Eventually, the lead group consisted just of Armstrong, Casar, Horner, Fedrigo, Moreau, Cunego, Ruben Plaza, Carlos Barredo, and Jurgen Van De Walle.  In particularly, Barredo attacked repeatedly to try to hold out solo for the victory.  After a few unsuccessful attacks, the group finally let him go with 45 km remaining, in essence agreeing to a sprint finish.  The chasers then let Barredo tire himself out and picked up the pace to catch him at the last moment, just as the sprinters teams do on the flat stages.  Eventually Barredo was caught with about 1 km left, and he finished behind the rest of the bunch, who sprinted for the stage win.  Lance Armstrong was hoping to be in a better position in the final sprint with the help of teammate Chris Horner, but in the end there were just too many other strong riders, and Armstrong finished his sprint halfheartedly to place in sixth.

The peloton's pace was very much unlike many of the previous stages.  No teams were trying to really break the peloton into pieces, and in the end almost all of the top GC riders finished in the peloton without any time gaps.  The exception was Ivan Basso, who was suffering from a case of bronchitis and was dropped very early.  Basso eventually finished in the grupetto, nearly 35 minutes behind the stage leaders, and drops all the way down to 27th in the GC, below the likes of Lance Armstrong and Cadel Evans.  Because the peloton remained intact, the only movements in the top 15 of the GC - other than Basso's disappearance - are the jumps of Ruben Plaza and Chris Horner, who now sit in 12th and 14th after finishing in the breakaway.  However, both riders are domestiques who will be working for their team leaders in Stage 17 and will likely lose enough time in the end to drop back down in the rankings.

Perhaps the surprise of the day was Thor Hushovd actually getting enough sprint points at the stage finish to reclaim green.  Unsurprisingly, most of the sprinters were dropped easily, but because the peloton wasn't pushing the pace, Hushovd, along with some fellow sprinters in Jose Joaquin Rojas and Gerald Ciolek were able to finish with the peloton.  Hushovd won the sprint in the peloton, ending the stage in 10th place to get 6 points, which gives him back the green jersey.  The Norwegian now has a four point lead over Alessandro Petacchi, and he will need to have great performances in the bunch sprints of Stages 18 and 20 to hang onto the prize.

This is a really special Tour at this point, because so many things are still up in the air.  At this point in many other Tours, some riders have such great leads in their areas that the final stages become trivial.  However, right now we have a great battle going on for yellow between Alberto Contador and Andy Schleck.  After the controversial events of yesterday, Contador has publicly apologized to Schleck, and the two are back on non-hostile terms.  In addition, the battle for third is equally as exciting, with Samuel Sanchez and Denis Menchov neck and neck, with Jurgen Van Der Broeck hiding in the shadows.  The battle for GC placing in the top ten is not overall as prestigious and won't see as much action, as the most exciting riders will be those competing for the higher honors.  Still, it will be interesting to see where everyone ends up after the Col de Tourmalet, and then looking ahead, after the Stage 19 time trial.

The green jersey race is still a close contest, especially with Thor Hushovd reclaiming green today.  Alessandro Petacchi has consistently been better than Hushovd on the bunch sprints this year, but perhaps Hushovd will be able to hang on for the win.  To win the jersey, Hushovd will need to beat Petacchi in at least one of the two remaining sprints.  The King of the Mountains competition will come to a close on Thursday, as there are no remaining climbs in Stages 18, 19, and 20.  However, this year the competition will come down to the very last possible stage (a relative rarity in the polka-dot jersey race), as Anthony Charteau will look to hold off Christophe Moreau, while a few other riders like Damiano Cunego can still be in contention with a spectacular performance in Stage 17 (and a little bit of luck).

Tomorrow is the Tour's second rest day, and it comes right before the monster stage of the Tour for the GC riders.  This will be a blessing for those who are good at using rest days to recuperate but maintain form, but it could potentially be horrible for those who find themselves out of shape after a day of not racing.  It sounds strange that certain riders would absolutely hate having a day of rest, but it's true.  Stay tuned for a preview of what promises to be an epic Stage 17 for the GC and KotM riders!

*****

Notable Stage Results

1	Pierrick Fedrigo	BBox Bouygues Telecom	5h31'43"
2	Sandy Casar	FDJ	+ 00'00"
3	Ruben Plaza	Caisse D'Epargne	+ 00'00"
4	Damiano Cunego	Lampre-Farnese	+ 00'00"
5	Chris Horner	Team RadioShack	+ 00'00"
6	Lance Armstrong	Team RadioShack	+ 00'00"
10	Thor Hushovd	FDJ	+ 06'45"
19	Ryder Hesjedal	Garmin-Transitions	+ 06'45"
20	Jurgen Van Den Broeck	Omega Pharma-Lotto	+ 06'45"
21	Andy Schleck	Team Saxo Bank	+ 06'45"
22	Alberto Contador	Astana	+ 06'45"
28	Alexandre Vinokourov	Astana	+ 06'45"
29	Samuel Sanchez	Euskaltel-Euskadi	+ 06'45"
30	Denis Menchov	Rabobank	+ 06'45"
34	Roman Kreuziger	Liquigas-Doimo	+ 06'45"
35	Joaquin Rodriguez	Katusha	+ 06'45"
37	Robert Gesink	Rabobank	+ 06'45"
39	Levi Leipheimer	Team RadioShack	+ 06'45"
46	Luis-Leon Sanchez	Caisse D'Epargne	+ 06'45"
52	Andreas Klöden	Team RadioShack	+ 06'45"
55	Carlos Sastre	Cervélo TestTeam	+ 06'45"
111	Ivan Basso	Liquigas-Doimo	+ 34'48"

*****

Notable GC Standings

1	Alberto Contador	Astana	72h50'42"
2	Andy Schleck	Team Saxo Bank	+ 00'08"
3	Samuel Sanchez	Euskaltel-Euskadi	+ 02'00"
4	Denis Menchov	Rabobank	+ 02'13"
5	Jurgen Van Den Broeck	Omega Pharma-Lotto	+ 03'39"
6	Robert Gesink	Rabobank	+ 05'01"
7	Levi Leipheimer	Team RadioShack	+ 05'25"
8	Joaquin Rodriguez	Katusha	+ 05'45"
9	Alexandre Vinokourov	Astana	+ 07'12"
10	Ryder Hesjedal	Garmin-Transitions	+ 07'51"
11	Roman Kreuziger	Liquigas-Doimo	+ 07'58"
12	Ruben Plaza	Caisse D'Epargne	+ 08'02"
13	Luis-Leon Sanchez	Caisse D'Epargne	+ 08'19"
14	Chris Horner	Team RadioShack	+ 08'52"
15	Carlos Sastre	Cervélo TestTeam	+ 09'02"
16	Andreas Klöden	Team RadioShack	+ 11'14"
27	Ivan Basso	Liquigas-Doimo	+ 37'18"

*****

Notable Mountains Results

1	Christophe Moreau	Caisse D'Epargne	60 pts
2	Pierrick Fedrigo	BBox Bouygues Telecom	54 pts
3	Lance Armstrong	Team RadioShack	48 pts
4	Chris Horner	Team RadioShack	39 pts
5	Sandy Casar	FDJ	37 pts
6	Ruben Plaza	BBox Bouygues Telecom	36 pts
6	Damiano Cunego	Lampre-Farnese	36 pts
8	Anthony Charteau	BBox Bouygues Telecom	28 pts

*****

Notable Mountains Standings

1	Anthony Charteau	BBox Bouygues Telecom	143 pts
2	Christophe Moreau	Caisse D'Epargne	128 pts
3	Damiano Cunego	Lampre-Farnese	99 pts
4	Sandy Casar	FDJ	93 pts
5	Jérôme Pineau	Quick Step	92 pts

*****

For full Stage 16 results and overall standings, visit the official TdF website.  Check back tomorrow for a preview of Stage 17.