French Pyrenees

Hitting the Pyrenees led to a bit of a shake-up on the top of the table in the Tour. No sooner had I decided that for me the podium would be Nibali, Valverde and Van Garderen than a climb changed a lot of that. Obviously the lead is pretty locked in but The American BMC rider faded on the big last climb and was distanced by the French contingent.

It was a rare day where a breakaway stuck up front, a decent size one but with Voekler and Michael Rogers as the main interest. They fought it out, with some visible disagreement as the French rider hung back to wait for his team mate, Gaultier, to help his chance. Voekler was aiming for a hat-trick of wins into Bagneres dr Luchon, but was denied by an attack by Mick Rogers to stick him his first Tour stage win in 10 years of trying.

Behind this the GC battle put Valverde briefly off the pace as Nibali sat and followed the moves. Van Garderen was the big loser as he dropped off the elite group, and this gave Thibault Pinot the encouragement he needed to attack. Whether the huge descent to the finish was playing on his mind, as arguably the least strong downhiller in the peloton, he overcame this fear and came down fast with the top guys holing the gap and moving himself up to third overall with Valverde getting back on terms. He now takes the white jersey and sits ahead of his compatriots, Peraud and Bardet as well as Van Garderen.

There are some big mountains to come and Pinot will need to put some time into his rivals to hold them off in the stage 20 time trial, but it’s looking more and more likely that there might be a French rider on the podium in Paris for the first time in 17 years.

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