'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 However, rain has been predicted in the next 15 minutes. It's pretty warm again today but there are some ominous clouds overhead.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 It appears that Sagan, Rogers, Kwiatkowski and Treintin have got a bit of a distance on their fellow escapees through this wet bit of road. Will they try to hold this gap at the bottom or will they push on?
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 Grupetto update The dropped Cavendish group is now 5:40 back on the peloton and 8:04 behind the leaders. Arnaud Démare is also back in that group but sprinters such as Greipel, Kristoff and Degenkolb are all in the main peloton. So there is a lot of interest in making sure this break doesn't stay away all day.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 As the weather man predicted, it did rain briefly but it appears to be dry once more. The little dousing will be quite welcome from the riders in this heat.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 The peloton are approaching the intermediate sprint and we now see Giant and Lotto moving to the front to grab the remaining points available. Degenkolb leads Greipel over the line at 1:55 behind the break. There was no real contest there though.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 Peter Sagan pulls out a small gap on the escape group just to ensure he takes the points but there is no contest and he takes the 20 points easily and extends his lead at the top of the points classification.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 Now they are down in the valley, Sky have moved off the front - happy that they have kept their leaders safe - and Katusha resume their position at the helm. The gap quickly falls to sub 2 under their pace setting.
isn Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 "Was just amazed to see how froome caught Quintana and dropped Contador on the last 11% gradient climb. Clearly they had no answers for him. I was convinced that Contador could sit and stay with him while he struggled to catch Quintana. Froome just reeled him in slowly but sure on that climb. Contador is just not performing so far in this tour. Not sure if the giro just sucked everything out of him and he just somehow still got something up his sleeve (would like to believe that). So far he is definitely not performing this tour. Yes hubbers. I take my hat off for today's performance by froome. Well done." Phone screwed. Last night's post coming through now. Seems I'm doped.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 The Cavendish group is now 9:14 behind the leading group. Also in that group is Jean Christophe Peraud and Simon Yates, who is obviously feeling the efforts of yesterday's attack.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 The temperatures have gone above 30 degrees once again and rumour has it we could be in for even hotter weather when we hit the alps. Don't tell the riders that.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 There are two Sky riders on the front of the peloton on this descent. Alberto Contador has latched onto the back Tinkoff-Saxo have latched onto the back of them with Froome the fifth rider in the group.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 It was Pinot who took the points from the leading group, adding five points to his tally. He took one earlier on today also. He's no threat to the mountains classification though.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 Closing in on the top of this climb, the GC teams (and Thomas Voeckler) are on the front of the peloton now. Richie Porte is there for team Sky and Tinkoff have sent Roman Kreuziger up too.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 The escapees have got 5km to the top of the climb and Peter Sagan doesn't look like he's in a good place right now. He's got his jersey zipped down almost to the bottom and he's pulling a few faces. These five kilometres are going to feel like an age for the Tinkoff rider.
'Dale Posted July 19, 2015 Posted July 19, 2015 50 kms to go The leaders are only 1 minute ahead of the maillot jaune
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