Jul 20 2013

Le Tour 2013: Stage 20

Well it’s pretty much over except deciding the places between 2nd and 5th.  Chris Froome would have to fall off his bicycle for anyone else to have a chance.

Not even a greasy day yesterday ending in a fairly heavy steady rain made anyone take a flyer on forcing Froome to act as both he and Contador (and everyone else at the top of the General Classification) simply played it safe and let the next to last day of racing tick by without many changes.

Particularly galling, at least to Pierre Rolland, is that he still is a point behind in the King of the Mountains.  If the leaders duke it out on the final climb today up the Beyond Category Annecy – Semnoz to the summit finish, it’s highly likely that Chris Froome will be the only Yellow/Polka Dot dual winner since 1970.

General Classification

Rank Name Team Time
1 FROOME Christopher SKY PROCYCLING 77h 10′ 00”
2 CONTADOR Alberto TEAM SAXO-TINKOFF + 05′ 11”
3 QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander MOVISTAR TEAM + 05′ 32”
4 KREUZIGER Roman TEAM SAXO-TINKOFF + 05′ 44”
5 RODRIGUEZ OLIVER Joaquin KATUSHA TEAM + 05′ 58”
6 MOLLEMA Bauke BELKIN PRO CYCLING + 08′ 58”
7 FUGLSANG Jakob ASTANA PRO TEAM + 09′ 33”

I suppose it’s possible that André Greipel could beat out Mark Cavendish for 2nd, but other than that I don’t see much possibility for change.  Chris Froome is 9th with 92 points in a group of 6 riders including Christphe Riblon with 83.

Points

Rank Name Team Points
1 SAGAN Peter CANNONDALE 380
2 CAVENDISH Mark OMEGA PHARMA-QUICK STEP 278
3 GREIPEL André LOTTO-BELISOL 227
4 KITTEL Marcel TEAM ARGOS-SHIMANO 177
5 KRISTOFF Alexander KATUSHA TEAM 157
6 ROJAS José Joaquin MOVISTAR TEAM 155
7 FLECHA GIANNONI Juan Antonio VACANSOLEIL-DCM 123
8 KWIATKOWSKI Michal OMEGA PHARMA-QUICK STEP 110

King of the Mountains is pretty much up for grabs (except for tha caveat above about Chris Froome).  It finishes today as no points will be awarded tomorrow.

King of the Moutains

Rank Name Team Points
1 FROOME Christopher SKY PROCYCLING 104
2 ROLLAND Pierre TEAM EUROPCAR 103
3 NIEVE ITURRALDE Mikel EUSKALTEL – EUSKADI 98
4 QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander MOVISTAR TEAM 97
5 RIBLON Christophe AG2R LA MONDIALE 93

Radioshack made a comeback yesterday and is once again comfortably in 2nd.  There is a certain amount of speculation Team Saxo-Tinkoff is thinking ahead and playing for next year’s sponsorship money which would account for their extraordinary passivity in support of their lead rider, Alberto Contador, yesterday.  Katusha is the only other team under an hour in arrears but just barely.

Team

Rank Team Time
1 TEAM SAXO-TINKOFF 230h 46′ 35”
2 RADIOSHACK LEOPARD + 03′ 39”
3 AG2R LA MONDIALE + 07′ 37”
4 MOVISTAR TEAM + 15′ 51”
5 BELKIN PRO CYCLING + 29′ 24”

Nairo Alexander Quitana Rojas could easily finish 2nd in the General Classification and win the King of the Mountains title.  In any event it’s a pretty impressive performance for a young rider and he’ll finish on the Champs-Élysées as one of the top contenders for next year’s Le Tour.

Young Rider

Rank Name Team Time
1 QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander MOVISTAR TEAM 77h 15′ 32”
2 KWIATKOWSKI Michal OMEGA PHARMA-QUICK STEP + 10′ 36”
3 TALANSKY Andrew GARMIN – SHARP + 10′ 52”
4 BARDET Romain AG2R LA MONDIALE + 19′ 21”

Today’s final racing stage is relatively easy as far as Alpine stages go with 3 Category 3s, a Category 2, a Category 1, and a Beyond Category.  The one descent of note is from Mont Revard to Montcel.

Sites of Interest-

The Stars Hollow Gazette Tags-

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