Ok, so the first week of Le Tour is done and dusted, and what have we discovered, if anything? As always, at this relatively early stage there are more questions than answers, but I'm going to have a go at trying to answer a few of the more pertinent ones that have jumped out at me! As well as that I'm going to dish out my 1st week awards - good and bad - and try to make a few precarious predictions as to where this years race might be headed!
So where do we start? Of course, we start with the main man and that man this week has been Britain's Chris Froome.
Well, Chris is well placed, in yellow where he likes to be, but does he look as strong as he has done at this stage in 2013 & 2015 when he won his first two overall victories?
That's a hard one. On the face of it one might be tempted to suggest that his position is precarious by comparison to 2013 & 15. At this stage in 2013 he had a lead of 2m2s and in 2015 1m59s over Colombian ace Nairo Quintana, the man most people expect to be his main rival once again. So by pure numbers it's easy to suggest that Froomey is struggling and is set for a big fall come the high Alps in the final week of the race. In both of his Tour wins Froomey has hit the first week hard, and in particular the Pyrenees, where he has typically opened significant time gaps over Quintana and his other main rivals. This year however, although he did win Saturdays mountain stage it was only by a matter of seconds and not the minutes that perhaps we are used to seeing. Does this mean that he is on the back foot already and has only way to go as the Tour rages on - backwards?
I don't think so! If you listen to Chris speak, as well as how Dave 'the Maestro' Brailsford talks about him, I think it's fair to say that the 2016 version of Chris Froome is a much more relaxed, chilled and realistic animal. If it's possible at 31 years of age, I think Chris has finally grown into his role as a (budding) cycling legend and seems to be able to handle the stresses, strains and demands of being the Tour favourite in a much better manner than perhaps we've seen previously. He himself has pointed to his normally dominant first week and must be fully aware of the relative disparity in the comparative time gaps this year and the potential consequences as the race develops. But Team Sky are also a very different animal this year compared with their previous winning years with both Froomey and initially Wiggins (in 2012) when the Sky train was all dominant and, despite all the success, gained only scorn amongst sections of the press (particularly in France) for the manner of their victories. However, this year Team Sky have also grown into their role as (arguably) the top team at this years tour. The Sky train is still there, but it is no longer the rigid (and boring?) locomotive that we've seen before. The development of Brailsford's Team Sky and by proxy, Chris Froome, has come about as a result of their experiences over the past few years. Their learning curve has been steep indeed, and one would be hard pressed to suggest that they haven't taken on board any of the lessons learned since the team's inception in 2010.
We saw the first indications that the 2016 version of Team Sky was perhaps somewhat different from previous versions in the Dauphine where the riders seemed to have much freedom to explore their own races whilst still maintaining the basic remit of protecting their team leader, Froomey, and winning the day, which they duly did. The evolution of the team and it's riders has continued this week with riders appearing in breakaways as well as adopting different tactics in the early mountain stages where Sergio Henao, for example, has certainly been given his head to try and ride his own race, in stark contrast to 2011 when Froome was held back under team orders to guide eventual winner, Bradley Wiggins, over the high Alps.
Criticisms of Froomey being a boring, robotic rider in previous years have surely been laid to rest this year after his extravagant downhill attack and eventual stage win in Saturday's stage, if not by his elbowing of a Colombian fan who got too close on the ascent! I think Chris is riding well within himself and has preserved his legs (relatively) and energies for what is still to come.
The first week has seen the peleton cover just over half the distance of this years Tour, some 1769kms. The coming week features 2 more mountain stages, including on Thursday a mountain top finish of the legendary Mont Ventoux and on Friday the first of this years TT's, which is a longish, relatively hilly day with an uphill gradient to finish, all of which should suit Froomey well. Whilst Quintana has undoubtedly improved his time-trialling the 37.5km TT should see Froome putting a bit more time into Quintana. The big test though will surely come on the ascent of Mont Ventoux where we can reasonably expect Quintana and the other GC contenders to all have a bash at taking Froomey's crown! However, Ventoux is a climb Froomey knows well having won there in 2013 on the way to his first overall victory. If he does make the first move on Thursday I can see him running the show again and stretching his lead further over a somewhat reticent 2016 Quintana.
One would think that if Quintana truly has designs on this years Tour he would need to attack early on on Mont Ventoux to try and test Froome's endurance to it's max. But I've sensed a certain reluctance in Quintana so far to really put himself on the line, for example on Saturday when he failed to chase Froome down, despite being on his wheel, as they topped the mountain and instead he sat up and waited for Valverde to arrive before he began his chase. Does that indicate a lack of confidence in his own ability? Or maybe he's not sure of his own physical capabilities coming into this years Tour having not raced for some time, despite successes earlier in the year when he beat Froome (e.g. Tour of Romandie). Maybe that lack of racing the past few months will be telling in the final wash? Or maybe I'm reading too much into it all and he's really is just biding his time. By the end of this week we shall all know a lot more.
But what of the rest of the peleton?
Froome aside, the other big stories this week are perhaps also British. The return to form, after a seemingly long absence, of Mark Cavendish with 3 fantastic wins this week. Cav's post race interviews are always a mix of emotion, angst, muttered phrases and either beaming smiles or black scowls, but they are always entertaining! If I, for one, had been doubting Cav's ability to get back to his best after a long performance hiatus, then it must be said that Cav himself never shared in those doubts and is now perhaps as good as he's ever been and has, this week, overtaken Bernard Hinault's total Tour victories with a staggering 29 wins! He has more chances this week, though with the Olympics just round the corner one has to question whether we will see Cav racing all the way to the Champs Elysees this year.
Britain's other big successes this week have been Fridays amazing mountain stage win by 35 year old youngster Steve Cummings of Team Dimension Data (Cav's team) and the second placing overall (some 16secs behind Froomey) and white jersey holder (best young rider) of Adam Yates (Orica Bike Exchange)! Cummings win was arguably the best and biggest win of his career and comes at a time when most are digging out their pipe and slippers but Cummings, bucking the trend, just seems to be getting better and better! Has he found the secret of eternal youth I ask? And so for Cummings this week I give the Never Say Die Award which is also known as the Cher 'I can turn back time' Award!
At 23 years old and being well into the final year of his contract at Orica Adam Yates is probably this years hot young thing and must have new offers of employment filling his inbox every morning! His form so far this Tour has been quite staggering given that his chin is a mass of stitches after the inflatable flamme rouge collapsed on top of him during Friday's stage! He has managed to stick with all the big guns in the mountains so far, however, it must be said without setting the peleton on fire. Nevertheless, he could well be Britain's next grand tour winner (after Froome) in the making and for this reason I award him the Week One Hottie Award, an honour he is sure to live up to in the coming fortnight!
Other winners and losers this week include the Evergreen Peter Sagan (evergreen because he is destined to spend the rest of the Tour in green) who can surely gain worthwhile employment, once his cycling career is over, as a cartoon voice-over character; Alberto Contador, who followed up a very heavy fall on the opening day by trying to outdo himself the next day by tumbling over again, and in the end abandoned the race during Sunday's stage. Contador's days of challenging the best during the grand tours are now probably behind him and if he decides to continue next year (perhaps with the new Bahrain team) then it may well be in more of a support role! BMC's Richie Porte also had his share of bad luck losing time on his GC rivals with a mechanical failure some 5kms out during Monday's (I think!) stage and his chances of pushing for overall victory seemed to have dissipated in the process! Marcel Kittel, who looked so great earlier in the year, looks a bit below par but still managed to win Tuesday's stage ahead of Sagan, but does look to be second best this year to a rejuvenated Cav! Andre Griepel has been way off the pace despite having had good lead out trains for most of the sprint stages and is languishing in the sprinters wilderness right now! Best Newcomer Award goes to British sprinter Dan McClay riding in his first Tour and who has managed to finish in the top 10 of every sprint stage thus far! Keep it up Dan! And talking of Dan's, it wouldn't be right to finish without giving a mention to Ireland's Dan Martin who is showing that maybe he does have the makings of a GC contender after all. The Etix man is running hotter than ever after finishing to second in last month's Dauphine and finally seems to demonstrating that he has the confidence to stick with and even attack the top GC guys in the high mountains. But for both him and Adam Yates, the final's weeks high Alps tests will be the true test of their mettle and will show whether they really can compete with the very best over a 3 week grand tour!
Ok, I'll be back next week with another round up of Tour news! In the meantime, enjoy this weeks racing and get on your bike!
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