Welcome to stage 8 of the Tour de France and it's a first for many things: our first mountain stage, our first French stage, our first Cat.1 climb(s) and the first stage of week two. A day in the Vosges - naturally, coming out of Germany - and a fourth chance to shake up the GC so far. Seven categorised climbs as we make our way from the industrial city of Mulhouse near the German border (there'll be ample support for the Deutsch today) to our summit finish at La Planche des Belles Filles, which is 5.9km at 8.5%, with some slopes of over 20% in the last 500m!
It should be an exciting stage from start to finish, between what is sure to be an exciting fight in the breakaway for the KoM jersey and to hold off the peloton, the battle for stage honours and the GC fight, where two riders are within seven seconds of Gesink in yellow! We should see who has the early form of the big three: Gesink looked the best by some margin on our Strazne summit finish, but Spilak lead in the bunch on each of the next two hilly stages. But in Bavaria it was Taaramäe and his T-Mobile team who made some huge gains on those two and moved to just 2 seconds off the GC lead. Let’s not forget the Estonian won on La Planche last year, on a vastly different stage though. We'll also get a glimpse of the top5 contenders in the likes of Lecuisinier, Sicard, Wellens and others. Also interesting will be Intxausti, who dropped several minutes in the hills but could carry some 3rd-place-in-the-TTT momentum into this and be a real thorn for the favourites and outsiders, a la Taaramae last year on his way to a comeback to the top 5. Wow, I'm excited for this!
On a stage such as today there's going to be a big fight to get in the morning breakaway and therefore at least one failed attempt is likely. Unlucky for Dumoulin, Reis, Bostner, Van Niekerk, Bonnin, Turek who are chased down hard by Van Baarle before the foot of the Firstplan.
Nerz, obviously really wanting this after getting his team to chase down the last attempt, leads a next flurry of attacks.
Vinhas leads this move over the Firstplan with 1'49 to the peloton. With him are Nerz, Burmann and Fraile. A strong move but a small one for such a stage. Fabbro was a part of this but has been dropped and is now in no man's land. Meanwhile Pavlic has seized control of the peloton to discourage any more attacks.
With Fabbro being dropped Festina decide they need a new attempt and so the polka dot jersey Le Roux attempts a bridge, followed by the always-active Vermeltfoort.
Nerz and Vinhas (crossing in that order) perhaps burning out potential help too quickly as they drop everyone, even Fraile, over the Petit Ballon!
All but that dup have been caught by the pack now. No real competition for the KoM sprints, but Nerz takes another one here and moves 9 points away from the lead. The gap registers at 2'18 here at the summit of the Col du Platzerwasel with 90km to go. Meanwhile just 84 men left in the peloton!
Nerz leads over the Cat.2 Col d'Oderen and takes the KoM lead. The gap is closing to the Isostar and Berg-lead peloton, now just 1'30.
30 seconds now as Nerz wins on the Col des Croix, 36km to go and two more climbs!
Kirsch is on the attack over the top of the Col des Croix! Vasyliv, Poljanski and Formolo follow him.
However they, and the breakaway duo, are caught by Isostar before the penultimate climb of the Col des Chevrères.
Pernsteiner-Kratochvila-Jaramillo-Spilak on the front with 3.3km to go on the Chevrères, and the other favourites behind. Isostar may be newbies on the PT scene, but they know what they are doing!
Sicard attacks! Not in the mood to be smothered by Isostar, with 2.5km to go on the climb and exactly 20km to go in the stage he goes, and it's Taaramäe who follows first! Most other GC contenders looking to come too, the white jersey of Lecuisinier chief among them! Who'd have thought we'd get attacks before La Planche? But we have, and Spilak and Gesink are being put to the sword!
That trio is away and now Wellens trying to go as well, with Barguil, Intxausti and Spilak behind them!
Gesink and Schelling in the wheel of Spilak quickly, the Slovenian now following his teammate Pernsteiner. Meanwhile Taaramae counters and looks to go solo here from 19km out! With 30 seconds between him and his closest rivals the Estonian is seizing the opportunity to attack Spilak and Gesink when they can't follow!
Spilak has found his way to the front of this chasing group (with Sicard, Lecuisinier, Barguil, Wellens and Gesink) but Taaramae already has 35 seconds! Another 45 seconds between this group and the peloton.
A gap formed before the summit between Spilak and his companions, which has dropped Lecuisinier and Wellens from the group. 12km until the base of the La Planche des Belles Filles climb!
No organisation here in the peloton, Nibali manages to find his way to the front and looks to go himself. Schelling eventually follows the Sicilian!
10km to go, Taaramae extending his lead as Sicard and Barguil blow off the struggling yellow jersey Gesink and catch Spilak!
Taaramae hits the climb with 50 seconds in hand and is all in for this attack! As we can see there's a huge amount of fans on this climb, they've been eagerly awaiting the riders for hours and hours and they're about to get their reward!
Dekker lead the peloton all the way down the descent, past Nibali and Schelling, caught Lecuisinier and Wellens and now goes onto the attack with the yellow jersey in sight - an impressive effort from our 20th on GC, who should be moving well ahead of that if he can keep this pace to the finish!
Spilak doesn't look like he has any answer to Taaramae as Sicard leads on the early slopes of La Planche, and Taaramae, within view but not within reach, extends his gap to nearly a minute and a half!
Dekker goes by Lecuisinier and Wellens but they aren't caught by the peloton. However Kolesnikov and Roche also attack up to them! This doesn't bridge but does catch them, and also brings six more riders across: Nibali, Brambilla, Schelling, Galta, Haig, and Bongiorno!
Taaramae with 1'36 now and the gap only growing, 2.3km to go and unless he blows up this is a major statement as he's well on the way to yellow, the stage win and a hefty time gap!
Gesink not blowing up, just riding his own tempo, but well behind where he'd like to be as Dekker catches him. A great ride from the Aegon man who has work to do in the fight for a top 10.
Though in saying that this Dutch duo have been gaining on the Spilak group at about the same rate Taaramae has been gaining, so this is a really good ride! Not far behind are Wellens, Lecuisinier, Nibali and Kolesenikov as the group fractures again.
Spilak finally takes over the lead from Sicard of the second group and immediately Barguil finds the extra bike length uncloseable whilst maintaining a reasonable tempo and is distanced. The Slovenian starts to close the gap to Taaramae, but unless the Estonian cracks it's too little too late.
Roche and Brambilla have caught up the the yellow jersey group as they begin to lose time again to Spilak and Sicard, now up to a minute with 1.6km to go.
Taaramae is done with the hardest slopes (aside from the final 200m) and has 1'41 in hand with 700m left. Spilak only shutting a second every 100m really and not good enough at all.
Guess his priorities are impressing the ladies instead of gunning for seconds...
This obviously means a lot to Rein Taaramae, and he doesn't sprint home for seconds, but rather takes his time to celebrate and soak in a simply wonderful win. Sometimes great riders have days when they just can't be stopped - Rein Taaramae seems to have them a lot, and today could be one of the biggest in his career if this is the gap that wins him Le Tour de France.
Don't forget that he's going to gain 8 or 12 seconds on Spilak and Sicard via bonuses and 20 on everyone else as well!
Spilak is sprinting for every second and the GP Liechtenstein winner looks to shut the gap as quickly as possible, as well as take 12 bonus seconds, over the tough final slopes.
He does it under 1'30 and drops Sicard. An impressive last kilometre, but it was nowhere near enough when you go into it nearly two minutes down! A nice third place for Sicard, gaining time on everyone he really could have ever expected to gain time on.
A great ride from Barguil, staying within himself and not losing much time to Sicard as well as gaining time and all his other rivals for the top 5. 4th on the stage is nice too.
Wellens and Gesink look the strongest in this next group as Lecuisinier tires on the final hairpin!
The Belgian takes a solid fifth, over 2'40 down on Taaramae, whilst Kolesnikov is a very impressive sixth, taking the tougher but shorter inside line to overhaul Gesink, who has not only lost yellow, but taken a big blow to his chances at wearing it on the Champs-Elysees!
Dekker, Roche and Lecuisinier round out the top 10. The former two (and Nibali in 11th) will be quite happy with their performance - especially Roche, who obviously found the short final climb to his liking, but the white jersey will not, losing some major time to rivals Sicard and Barguil - for both the podium, and for best Frenchman!
A solid stage for Brambilla and Haig in 12th and 13th, and good days for the next three in, Formolo, Kangert and Salinas! Schelling and Bongiorno will be disappointed with their late cracking and time loss here, as will Galta even further behind.
Another awful day for Intxausti, who actually looked attentive on the penultimate climb, but finishes in what's left of the peloton.
A massive statement in the Vosges and the Germans in attendance will love to see T-Mobile man Rein Taaramae in yellow after a huge performance which put him nearly two minutes ahead, with an ITT where he could gain another minute or two perhaps in two days. After his team and he made it a level playing field yesterday, his rein has begun with a powerful serve to Spilak and Gesink - and it must be said after his form so far, Sicard, who has moved to third. If he goes on the offensive in the ITT, it'll take quite the return to stop him. However there is still a long way to go.
Gesink slips to fourth and moves to the green jersey after shipping major time to his podium rivals, whilst Nibali impressed and has moved to fifth as reward for topping a solid first 7 days with this performance. Roche and Kangert are the same, whilst Flugel does enough to stay in the top 10 for a few days more. Lecuisinier will be fuming after such an awful stage sees him slips to ninth, whilst Dekker is much the opposite, a solid stage moving him into the top 10 after a kick up the rear (an overreaction to be more precise) from his manager in the pressers.
Le Roux did a valiant job defending it but Dominik Nerz made clear his ambitions for how to bounce back from a torrid first week by racing straight into the polka dot jersey with ease. Vinhas looks for consolation for his team's woes by moving into third, and should provide an excellent challenge for the German for the next two weeks.
Many winners and losers here to be dissected by the press, fans and managers in the coming hours. The top 5 fight all over the place as Sicard impresses, Taaramae soars and Gesink and Lecuisinier falter. Barguil and Wellens with strong performances as they look for a comeback towards the top 10, Roche proving he's not going down without a fight and continuing the PCT success and Kolesnikov with a marvellous day. But three of the biggest losers are Nipuna Manamalange, Tom Scully and Silvain Dillier. They missed the time cut and are the first riders eliminated from Le Tour this year.
