Le. Tour. De. France.
As predicted a sprinters’ race with Marcel Kittel picking up his second stage victory and the teams of Giant-Shimano, Cannondale, and Omega-Pharma QuickStep dominating the final kilometer. Peter Sagan wasn’t able to put much pressure on Kittel and was in fact losing ground to Mark Renshaw at the finish.
In the General Classification Vincenzo Nibal continues to lead with no less than 20 riders a mere 2 seconds behind after the 3rd Stage. In the points competition Peter Sagan leads with 117, followed by Marcel Kittel at 90 and Bryan Coquard with 88. Their next nearest rival is 41 points behind. No climbing points were awarded yesterday so the leader in that contest is still Cyril Lemoine with 6, Blel Kadri has 5, and Jens Voigt and Nicolas Edet are in a 2 way tie for 3rd with 4 each. In team results Sky, Astana (-00:12), and BMC (-00:14) are in front with only NetApp-Endura and Trek within a minute of the leaders. Peter Sagan, Roman Bardet, and Michal Kwiatkowski are in a 3 way tie for the youth championship.
Today’s 102 mile stage starts in Le Touquet-Paris-Plage with is a Channel coast resort town and not anywhere near Paris Paris. It’s flattish, but not nearly as flat as yesterday with 2 category 4 rated climbs. Lille Métropole is just outside of Belgium where tomorrow’s racing will be. It’s likely to be another day for the sprinters with the intermediate Sprint Checkpoint shortly before the day’s second climb. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that Marcel Kittel will pick up his 3rd stage victory in 4 days since Giant-Shimano seems very highly organized and the ability to position your sprinter for the final kilometer more than almost any other factor seems to be determining element in the sprint stages so far.
1 comments
Author