9/3 Stages 4/8 Saint-Amand-Montrond - Saint-Pourçain-sur-Sioule 177.1 km
With a more rolling terrain today, it is López Moreno and Andriy Grivko assigned the free roles. They do their best to get away in the early part of the race, but they do not succeed.
First it is Florian Vachon (Fortuneo) and Erik Baška (Tinkoff) getting away, a little later also Damien Gaudin (Ag2r) and Frederik Frison (Lotto Soudal), the four riders reaches the first KoM sprint together.
In the meantime López Moreno has attacked again, this time with success, 80 km into the race he makes contact.
On the next KoM he is still worn after the long pursuit so it is at the last KoM he gets his single KoM point of the day, a paltry reward considering his hard work in today’s ugly weather conditions.
36 km to the line, the pace is now very high with the breakaway at 2’06, on a downhill turn one of BMS’s captains GC 5th Rohan Dennis slips and hits the asphalt hard, it does not look good.
The fight for position is hard on the final 10 km before the slightly uphill finish. Astana doesn’t get Guardiniin in position to take part in the action.
It is Arnaud Démare at wheel of teammate Anthony Roux in the best position, Edvald Boasson Hagen coming up at the right side, Bouhanni and Kristoff not that far down to the left.
Arnaud Démare win’s the stage quite clearly in front of Nacer Bouhanni, Edvald Boasson Hagen 3rd
Evaluation:
Overall: To the undivided joy of the French spectators, only 24 years old Arnaud Démare from Beauvais in Hauts-de-France won the stage over another French rider, the first French winner in this year’s edition.
Démare climbs the GC to 3rd.
Again most of the favorites ended in top 10, only Caleb Ewan was not near the front, might be Orica was expecting Matthews to be their best shot on this uphill finish. Matthew got 11th place.
Rohan Dennis did not break anything but got some nasty bruises and lost 8’59, he is expected to race again tomorrow.
The early breakaway is started by Diego Rosa, Christophe Riblon (Ag2r) Jarlinson Pantano Gomez (IAM) and Merhawi Kudus (Dimension Data) catches up.
Rosa takes the first KoM but misses the 2nd, on the third he comes second behind Kudus, they get a shared KoM lead overnight, with 9 points each.
The breakaway with all strong riders gets a lead of almost 7 min. The hunt get very intense near the end, big chunks of riders have to lets go, due to the solid pace in this rolling terrain.
The break is caught with 5 km left.
Over the last top with just 2 km to the line, Vincenzo Nibali and Jakob Fuglsang sits in front, right behind Zdenek Stybar.
But Astana’s leaders are not strong sprinters, they lose positions on the final km. Peter Sagan wins the stage on front of John Degenkolb and Zdenek Stybar.
Evaluation:
Overall: Even if the media did not consider Sagan as a favorite, it is hardly a big surprise that he might win this stage if he was in the front group on the final km.
Amongst those important rider that lost considerable time today was Taylor Phinney and Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) and Louis Meintjes (Lampre)
Astana: “Vino” is not exactly overjoyed, but a shared KoM lead and a top 10, with none of the leaders losing time was an acceptable result.
Stages 5/8 Varennes-sur-Allier - Col de la Croix de Chaubouret
Location:
from Allier, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes to Loire, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
Description:
Very Hilly with summit finish at Col de la Croix de Chaubouret
10 km at 6.7%
Media Favorites:
Valverde (Movistar), Quintana (Movistar), Costa (Lampre)
Secondary Favorites:
Mollema, Bardet, Henao
Outsiders: Aru, Dumoulin, Thomas, Barguil
Astana: Fabio Aru - Luis León Sánchez - Michele Scarponi
Miguel Ángel López Moreno - Andriy Grivko - Andrea Guardini
Maxat Ayazbayev - Arman Kamyshev
10/3 Stages 5/8 Varennes-sur-Allier - Col de la Croix de Chaubouret 201.4 km
Astana chose to let the entire squad stay in the peloton. Instead it was a group of 5 including KoM leader Florian Vachon from Fortuneo - Vital Concept, forming the breakaway.
First one and a little later another rider attacks, for almost 90 km the two sits one by one between the breakaway and the pack, before they finally makes contact. At the sprint with 100 km left, the front group is now 7 riders they got 3’11 to the peloton.
Florian Vashon (Fortuneo) and Amets Txurruka (Orica) shares most of the KoM points, by the end of the day Vashon has a narrow lead. Over the last KoM sprint the remainders of the original breakaway has just 1’36, it will soon be over.
The first attack between the favorites is Nairo Quintana with Geraint Thomas on wheel. It is now clear that race leader Patrick Bevin is not able to follow on the steep slopes.
Aru in bad form haven’t got the legs, he chose to help Scarponi all he can before he has to let go.
Under the red kite most of the favorites get close to Quintana, Scarponi is sitting in the next group a little further back.
Quintana win’s the stage coming in with a group of 9 riders, his teammate Valverde is also in the group and takes over the GC lead.
The next group is Tom Dumoulin and Michele Scarponi they lose 39 seconds to Quintana, the result secures Scarponi a spot on the leaderboard.
Evaluation:
Overall: Fantastic stage seen with Moviestar eyes, taking over the GC combined with a stage win, but the GC is very tight, is not over yet, Simon Špilak’s 2nd makes him a new interesting GC contender not many would have predicted.
Patrick Bevin lost 6’15, from leader he is now 32 in the GC.
Fabio Felline (Trek) crashed and broke his wrist, he is out of the race.
Astana: Fine stage from Scarponi moving into top 10, the team will do everything to keep him there. Aru’s bad form was a known issue his time will come later in the season.
Johannes Fröhlinger (Giant – Alpecin) did not show up this morning, he has caught a vicious virus
Christophe Riblon from Ag2r makes an attack almost from the start of the race. Riblon is 3rd in the KoM probably his motivation for the solo breakaway.
Over the early KoM Diego Rosa attacks to get the points, Maarten Tjallingii (LottoNL – Jumbo) follows. The three of them form the breakaway of the stage.
Tjallingii and Riblon is a lot stronger than Rosa on a relative flat stage like this, Rosa struggles and sometimes even lose contact, he gets back but haven’t got power left on the climbs, coming 3rd every time.
The last survivor of the break Tjallingii was caught at about 5km left.
Under the red kite it is Dimension Data for Cavendish in front, with Kittel on wheel, a little further back at the right side of the road, it is Giant – Alpecin leading for Degenkolb, with Daniel Oss (BMC) close behind.
Kittel explodes on the inside of Cavendish, with Bonifazio and Modolo on wheel. Kittel wins the stage, Bonifazio 2nd and Modolo 3rd, they took the right wheel today.
Evaluation:
Overall: Great expected win from Kittel coming from behind. Trek’s young upcoming sprinter taking 2rd was quite unexpected with the hard competition in the race
Paolo Simion (Bardiani) has to abandon mid-way through the stage, also he has caught the virus, the medical staff is worries about the situation, this might be spreading.
Astana: Diego Rosa had a cruel day, fighting very hard only to see his KoM ambitions drift further and further away. Nibali fell back in the GC, but only due to the bonus sec.
Luis León Sánchez haven’t had his best race so far, the crash on stage two spoiled any GC hopes, so today he asked permission to stretch his legs and it was granted. He attacked right from the start on Col de le République (cat.1)
It ends up in a breakaway of 5 riders, the others are Jan Polanc (Lampre), Loïc Vliegen (BMC), Damien Gaudin (Ag2r) and Guillaume Van Keirsbulck (Quick Step), they get about 7’30.
Near the Intermediate sprint Katusha and Cofidis takes over responsibility in the peloton, setting a much higher pace, with 80 km left get gap is already reduced to under 5 minutes.
The last survivors from the break get caught inside the final 5 km, it is Cofidis setting an insane pace. At this point Astana has resigned, the riders a drained by the pace, not trying to hang on to the front just focusing on not losing time.
The aggressive riding from Cofidis seems to work out, with just 500m left Nacer Bouhanni has a nice gap to the other sprinters, in 2nd row it is point leader Elia Viviani, Trek’s Nizzolo and Démare with Kristoff on wheel.
But Bouhanni runs out of gas on the last 100m, it is Arnaud Démare from FDJ taking a narrow win over Katusha’s Alexander Kristoff, Bouhanni has to settle with 3rd. Arnaud Démare craps the “maillot vert”.
Evaluation:
Overall: The 2nd stage win from Young Démare is this year’s Paris – Nice, French media is boiling over with “can Arnaud take Green in the Tour” and all that Jazz.
Alejandro Valverde got 4th, quite good mixing in with all the top sprinters.
Astana: Not a day to write about in the Astana history book, Sánchez did what we could to animate the break, but the peloton wanted a different ending.
6/3-13/3 2016 Paris – Nice
9/3-15/3 2016 Tirreno-Adriatico
, but i hope Jacob will accomplish something.
