Froome is back in charge
... but now he expects ‘war’
CHRIS FROOME reclaimed the lead in the Tour de France yesterday after stealing back a few seconds from an out-of-position Fabio Aru in the steep uphill finish of stage 14 to Rodez.
The defending champion reversed his overnight deficit to Aru and now leads overall by 19 seconds from the Italian. Froome’s team supported his own efforts to ensure he was in front at the bottom of the lung-bursting final climb to the top of the Cote de Saint Pierre.
‘It’s a really big surprise,’ said Froome. ‘I didn’t think I would be able to take the yellow jersey back on a stage like that. It’s an amazing feeling, especially after having had such a tough day in the Pyrenees.
‘ We knew the finale in Rodez would be selective but I’d never have believed that I would have taken 25 seconds back from Aru.
‘It’s all thanks to my team that we were at the front of the peloton all day, especially for that final climb.
‘ Every second counts. Today things have changed again, but every day it changes a little so you have to fight for every second.’
Like all the riders, however, Froome is only looking one day ahead, to today’s daunting stage to Le Puy-en-Velay, which includes a first category climb early on and, more pertinently, another in the last 30 kilometres. ‘It’s going to be all hands on deck again,’ he said. ‘It’s going to be war.’
Froome’s resurgence appeared to take his closest challengers, Italian national champion Aru and French hero, Romain Bardet, by surprise. Both were caught further back in the field as Froome moved ahead to sprint across the line a few places behind the stage winner, Australia’s Michael Matthews.
‘We have given up the yellow jersey once,’ Froome’s team- mate Luke Rowe said, ‘and I saw a pretty disappointed Froome after that so I don’t think he’ll want to give it up again.’ Froome and his team will have been significantly boosted by a performance which combined power and tactical nous.
Yet the intrigue over Froome’s relationship with team-mate Mikel Landa continues to fascinate. Many believe Froome’s Spanish teammate is the strongest rider in this year’s Tour, given his back-to-back performances in the mountain stages in the Pyrenees last week. At the moment he is playing the part of the dedicated team-mate, but if Froome has another wobble, many suspect that will not last.
On Thursday, Landa outrode a flailing Froome on the summit finish at Peyragudes and on Friday’s fast and furious stage to Foix, he was again the big winner, vaulting his way up the race classification, thanks to an early breakaway, to establish himself as a genuine contender for victory in Paris. Team Sky claimed they had executed a tactical masterclass by elevating Landa to a position close to the race lead, thus giving the defending champion’s rivals two Sky riders to worry about, rather than just one.
‘For us, with Mikel moving up like that, that’s a perfect position for us,’ Froome said. ‘Going into some of the big mountain stages coming up, it could be a good card for us to play again.’
Yet Sky have been here before, famously in 2012, when Froome, clearly the strongest of the two in the mountains, sacrificed his own chances to support Bradley Wiggins. Although Wiggins won the Tour, that relationship quickly went downhill and has never properly recovered.