Touroscopy - Stage 15 - the road goes skyward
Sunday, 20 July 2008 12:50
Buongiorno and welcome to Italy as the Tour de France makes a brief stop over. The peloton made the first climb of the Alps this Tour look very cruisy as they slowly rode parts of the group of their wheel. The Tour riders are so remarkable that they make the steepest climbs look good. There have been a lot of theories about the Silence Lotto team of Cadel Evans... we too have a theory which you can read under State of Play.
Losers
Oscar Pereiro - The Caisse d'Epargne rider crashed on the first descent of the day. He did it in spectacular fashion too with a over the handlebars exit on a tight hairpin turn. His team waited around for him, as too did the bunch but it was lights out for him and see you next year.
Team Silence Lotto - Where were you guys? your leader was getting hammered and there was not a team mate to be seen. What a dreadful effort by Cadel's team. Cadel must shoulder some of the burden of the race (see below) but really. To leave him isolated like that was too much. He cannot do it all by himself on at least the lower slopes of the big climbs. We need to fed ex the Paul Sherwen suitcase of courage to a few of Cadel's team mates.
Winners
Simon Gerrans - 'Gerro' had a great day out. He was in the break that at times had up to 15 minutes on the main field. This was a clear signal that the little man from Mansfield has come good after three Tours. Simon is a great fella and was one of our first interviews on firstoffthebike.com. His smarts in the finale was great to see as was his ability to come back after being dropped on the lower slopes of the final climb. Congratulations to him from all of us here at firstoffthebike.com
State of Play
What a day. A very cruisy first climb up to Italy and then the wind and rain on that first descent made it a very nervous one. Even though the cyclists are professional there still must be cautious. The Tour is a tenuous life for the riders as any second their time in the race can be taken away from them. A couple of crashes on the downhill run into Italy was testimony to how quickly a rider can be out of the Tour all together or on the deck.The break was away for the climb which was great for Evans because again the chase was not required.
But all this went pear shaped on the final climb of the day where it was whacking day! Cadel got smacked from all and sundry and ended up surrendering the jersey. And this is a good thing. Cadel does not need the weight of the race on his shoulders anymore.Neither does his team. Remember that Cadel is the best time trialist at the top end of the field. So they are going to need more than eight seconds on him.
On Cadel Evans team there has been a lot of talk about how his team is not up to the defence of the yellow jersey. Well that might be the case but it is surely up to the legs of Evans to make his own race. Silence Lotto could be the strongest team in the race but if Cadel can't get it together and win the Tour in the critical stages then the team is not so important. However they need to be around for some of the bigger, more critical passages of the stage.
