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It was a day on which anything could have happened. And while, quite frankly, I didn’t expect much to happen, we were treated to another stellar sporting display with two races being hard-fought until the finish.
It was a stage that was touted as one for a breakaway and it only took a few kilometres for the pieces to start falling into place. A flurry of attacks saw a group of 32 form ahead of the peloton before a group of 26 riders got in the final break which stuck.
Often a group that big won’t work together to stay away but almost every team had at least one rider represented which formed the perfect combination to stay away. The closest rider to the overall leader in Chris Froome was Daniel Navarro (Cofidis) who started the stage in 20th overall, 23’26” behind on GC.
The escape bunch worked well together until 35km to go, at which point all bets were off. Jean Marc Marino (Sojasun) and Blel Kadri (Ag2r) leapt off the front and were soon joined by the Adam Hansen freight train. Rui Costa caught the leaders and surged ahead on the final climb of the day for an 18km solo win — a consolation for Movistar which has enjoyed little success so far this Tour.
Costa’s win was Portugal’s second victory in Gap in four years, after Sergio Paulinho’s victory in 2010.
But after Costa crossed the line we were treated to another race between the GC contenders ten minutes back. With 18km remaining on the final climb (Col de Manse) Contador attacked which prompted Richie Porte to shut the move down. With Contador back in the group, Saxo Tinkoff went the 1-2 with Kreuziger attacking … and Porte shutting it down again.
Meanwhile the high pace and the attacks had whittled down the yellow jersey bunch to eight riders (Froome, Porte, Contador, Kreuziger, Quintana, Valverde, Rodriguez, and Mollema) with Laurens Ten Dam being the only real GC contender to fall off the pace. More attacks from the Saxo duo saw Porte start to lose touch, but miraculously he managed to claw his way back.
It was after the GC bunch crested the Col de Manse that the action really started. Contador and Kreuziger began attacking on the descent leading to the former overshooting a corner and crashing lightly, almost bringing Froome with him. Interestingly, this incident happened on the same descent on which Joseba Belokia famously crashed in 2003, forcing Lance Armstrong to take a detour through a nearby field.
Froome was clearly irritated by Contador’s downhill attacks and said in the post-race TV interview:
“I think it was actually a bit careless of Contador and Kreuziger, they were really pushing the limits on the descent in trying to attack us. Alberto overcooked one of the corners and came off in front of me. He just took himself down.
I nearly went over him. I had to get around him and went off the road a little bit. I didn’t come off but I just had to unclip and get myself straightened up again and rejoin the race.
I just think at this stage of the race, he is obviously getting desperate. They are attacking on us on the descents and attacking us on the climbs. I just think it was careless to ride like that.”
This thrilling race-within-the-race benefited nobody except for Quintana who moved up one position into fifth place overall with Ten Dam dropping one minute on the leaders.
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- The start town for stage 16, Vaison-la-Romaine, was once a Roman city and, accordingly, the riders were given a Roman send-off.
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- Before the 2013 Tour, Koen de Kort had been teasing his teammate Marcel Kittel about his haircut. But in a bet, de Kort said he would get his haircut the same way as Kittel if the latter won three stages at the Tour. With Kittel notching up his third win on stage 12 de Kort stayed true to his word, getting his hair cut on the second rest day.
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- Brothers in hair.
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- A breakaway group of 26 riders moved away from the peloton early in the stage and was allowed, by the yellow jersey and others in the peloton, to battle it out for the win. The breakaway included Johnny Hoogerland and Andreas Kloden as pictured here.
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- It’s estimated that 15 million items will be thrown to spectators from the advertising caravan in this year’s Tour.
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- (l) Rui Costa attacked from the breakaway on the final climb with 18km remaining in the stage. He opened up a lead over his breakaway companions, including Philippe Gilbert, and was able to hold on for a solo victory.
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- Today’s win is Costa’s second Tour de France victory. His first came on stage 8 of the 2011 Tour when he attacked from a breakaway on the final climb to the Super Besse ski station, reeling in Alexander Vinokourov on his way to solo victory.
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- The gap between the breakaway and the yellow jersey group grew throughout the day, eventually ending up at more than 11 minutes. The high pace set by Richie Porte on the final climb whittled the group down to eight riders.
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- Contador was driving the pace in the yellow jersey group on the final descent …
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- … and might have been pushing a little too hard. The Spaniard came off, having overshot a right-hand turn and reportedly hit his knee on the ground. Froome, who was behind Contador said after the stage: “It actually put me in danger because I had to go off the road to avoid him. He couldn’t control his own speed and crashed.”
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- Nairo Quintana was the first in the yellow jersey group to cross the line, just ahead of Joaquin Rodriguez.
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