Four riders gear up for frenetic finish
Three-time champ Froome finds strength in numbers with trio gaining ground
LE PUY-EN-VELAY, FRANCE— The battle for victory will go down to the wire at the Tour de France.
With just six stages left before the three-week race reaches the Champs-Elysees, only 29 seconds separate the top four riders in the general classification.
Defending champion and threetime winner Chris Froome has an 18-second lead over Fabio Aru of Italy. Frenchman Romain Bardet, the runner-up to Froome last year, is 23 seconds back from the leader, in third place. In fourth, is Colombian Rigoberto Uran.
It’s an unusual situation ahead of an intense final week of racing that includes two Alpine stages in high altitude and a short time trial.
“It’s the hardest fought battle in terms of Tours de France I’ve done before,” the British rider said during Monday’s rest day. “I’m just grateful I’m on the right side of those gaps.”
Froome has the strongest team and remains the favourite to win in Paris, despite some rare signs of weakness.
He endured a bad day in the Pyrenees during a grueling stage to the ski station of Peyragudes, when he lost the overall lead to Aru after wearing the race leader’s yellow jersey for seven days. But the Team Sky leader recovered in style two days later, when Aru was trapped at the back of the peloton in Rodez.
On a windy day in the south of France, Froome and his teammates showed their superiority by riding at the front when the peloton stretched out and managed to put 24 seconds into their leader’s closest rival.
Going forward, expect Froome’s teammates to ride at the front in the mountains and to set a punishingly fast tempo — all designed to prevent others from attacking.
The collective strength of the Sky Team was on display Sunday when Froome was forced to change his rear wheel in the final 40 kilometres and got dropped.
“I was just standing there on the side of the road with my teammate Michal Kwiatkowski, trying to change wheels. I thought it was potentially game over for me,” Froome said.
But Kwiatkowski handed over his wheel and Froome was helped back to the front by teammates Sergio Henao, Vasil Kiryienka and Mikel Nieve, erasing a 45-second gap.
Froome has also shown great composure and calm when in trouble. At risk of losing the leader’s jersey, he did not panic while Bardet, Uran and Aru failed to join forces at the front.
“I think Chris was strong because he was calm. The temptation can be to go too hard too quickly, you panic a little bit, go really, really deep to get on too quickly and of course you just explode,” Team Sky manager Dave Brailsford said.
Here is a look at the other contenders ahead of Tuesday’s Stage 16 that will lead the peloton to the gateway to the Alps in Romans-sur-Isere.
FABIO ARU: Aru, the former Vuelta champion, is paying the price for his Astana team’s weaknesses. The Kazakhstan-funded team has lost members Jakob Fuglsang and Dario Cataldo in crashes, and Aru has to be self-sufficient when in trouble.
He will ride on his favourite terrain from Wednesday when the race enters the Alps. His only option if he wants to succeed Vincenzo Nibali on the list of Italian winners of the Tour will be to attack.
ROMAIN BARDET: Bardet has made no mistake so far in his bid to become the first French winner in 32 years.
The 26-year-old climbing specialist finished runner-up to Froome last year.
“I’m waiting for an opportunity to create a time difference,” Bardet said.
Barden is a very attack-minded cyclist with a natural instinct for racing. In Peyragudes, his acceleration earned him the stage win. He will try to reproduce the move in the mammoth Stage 18 to the Col d’Izoard, which features a final 14.1-kilometre ascent to the top of the mountain, at an altitude of 2,360 metres.
RIGOBERTO URAN: Twice a runnerup at the Giro (2013 and ’14), the Colombian is now a serious contender for the overall win in France. “We knew Rigo was super good and capable of winning mountain stages, and that he was capable of being in the top five overall,” said Jonathan Vaughters, manager of Uran’s Cannondale-Drapac team. “But that he was going to be 29 seconds behind? No.”
An excellent climber with good downhill skills, Uran has utilized the very mountainous route in 2017. He won a stage in Chambery despite riding on a faulty bike, unable to change gears for the final 23 kilometres.
Uran skipped this year’s Giro in order to arrive in perfect shape at the Tour. That’s proven to be a good strategy so far.