Tour de France 2009 - Stage 6

stage 6 - Gérone - Barcelone 181.5 km

Le Tour de France becomes Vuelta a'Espana?

Many of the non European pros are based in Girona, i think the whole Garmin team lives there, Lance used to live there, so you get my drift. They are pretty used to this terrain and these roads.
This all Spanish stage might just see a bit of action as everyone jockeys for position - or at least a stage win - before the big hills hit. It is undulating terrain that will make a few of the sprinters uncomfortable and should see some competitive racing



There are 5 categorised climbs.

Km 32.0 - Côte de Sant Feliu de Guixols - 2.0 km climb to 5.4 % - Category 4
Km 55.0 - Côte de Tossa de Mar - 3.8 km climb to 4.2 % - Category 4
Km 98.0 - Côte de Sant Vicenc de Montalt - 3.3 km climb to 5.2 % - Category 3
Km 110.0 - Collsacreu - 4.1 km climb to 5.2 % - Category 3
Km 159.0 - Côte de la Conreria - 4.7 km climb to 4.5 % - Category 4

The finish is also a climb - although only 1.7km at an average of 3%, it does have a 500m section that is at 6%. It is going to mean many of the sprinters will struggle and the strong punchy riders, the classics riders and the GC contenders might just be the ones to try and win this stage.



No doubt there will be breakaways and on a stage like this they may succeed. The interesting thing Will be what happens in the peleton. Remember there is only 5 minutes separating the first 104 riders. they are not going to let a breakaway get to far. A few of the teams may have targeted this stage for a breakaway (especially the spanish ones) and we could see a host of really good riders that are not aiming at the General classification chasing the win here. Names like Heinrich Hausler, Stuart O'Grady, Alessandro Ballan, Kim Kirchen, Filippo Pozzato, Sandy Cassar, Luis Leon Sanchez and Oscar Freire spring into my mind. Guys like Hushovd and Cavendish are strong enough but i dont see this as a bunch sprint scenario at all.

Betting.
Going with 2 bets here.
Win - Oscar Friere - $7.20 Betfair.
Top 3 - Henrich Haussler $10.00 on Betfair

was tempted to go with Haussler e.w at $40/$10 but i think i will stick with top 3.

Escape artist finally stays away.

Voeckler finally wins a tour stage.

Thomas Voeckler is a breakaway specialist. Sure his breakaways dont usually succeed, but the little frenchman is always there, aggressive and living in hope that the peleton does not quite get it right. And so it was again in stage 5, 29km into the 196km stage Voeckler and 5 others set out on an adventure. So many breakaways do not succeed, especially on a flat stage like this one, but the Team Time trial from the previous day had obviously made the peleton get a little lethargic. They got closer and closer and Voeckler must have thought he was going to be denied again, so with 5km to go he split from the escapees. The peleton almost had their timing right, for they caught all but Voeckler and breakaway companion Mikhail Ignatiev who just managed to hold on for 2nd. Cavendish was at the head of the chasing peleton from Farrar and Ciolek. (damn it - if the peleton could count I would have had my Cav/Ciolek collects!)

Every year they have have a laugh at Voeckler and his seemingly misguided attacks. Usually the commentators talk about how he loves to be seen, loves the camera and likes to win an intermediate sprint or climb. However in 2004 he became a national hero when he and Aussie Stuart O'Grady led a 5 men breakaway that succeeded. That stage was also stage 5 and also the day after the Team Time Trial. The peleton was not interested in chasing that day and the gap got fairly bit, the final break was over 12 minutes. O'Grady won the stage but the big time meant that Voeckler was in Yellow. He held that Jersey for 10 days before Lance decided he wanted it back. Ever since he has been trying and failing, but finally he got a coveted Tour de France stage win. I guess i would probaly do the same.

The coastal winds did cause a split in the peleton again however nothing of note changed, all the main names were in the group that led the split and margins remain the same.

Tour de France 2009 - Stage 5

Stage 5 - Le Cap d'Agde - Perpignan 196.5 km





The stage is dedicated to Salvador Dali, who called the Perpignan railway station the “cosmogonic centre of the universe”. The icon of surrealism, who was touched by a form of fascination for the spectacle of cycling, created the 1959 Tour’s postcard. If his influence inspires the pack in the Corbières or along the seaside, anything will be possible!




Another flat stage that has a slight rise in the middle, 2 cat 4 climbs that are really not going to trouble anyone. Intermediate sprints after 40km in Capestang, 107km at SaintJean de Barrou and then at 158km at Canet-En-Roussillon. The looks like the last stage for the sprinters before the Pyrenees, so it should be keenly contested and we might actually see the big guns having a go at he intermediates, unless of course the usual French led breakaway comes. Doubtless though they will get caught. The wind however is the factor. The same Mediterranean breeze that caused the split in stage 3 and gained Lance that valuable time will be present again. About 40 of the last 60km is along coastline , so with tired legs from the TTT yesterday teams are going to have to watch for breaks, might be time for a strong rider to have have a go and chance his luck a few kilometers out. Either way with the prospect of bigger climbs ahead we are looking at a bunch sprint again, we have not seen big long lead out trains over the last 500m, Columbia have blown them away! Lets just hope it provides the same sort of excitement as stage 3!

Betting
Win
Bunch Sprint = Mark Cavendish.
$1.75 to win with Betfair. Tick - might as well take that one.
$1.37 to finish top 3 with Betfair. Take that as well.

Top 3 finish.
Im sticking with Ciolek here, i reckon Milram just got muscled out the other day in stage 2, i think that they will want to improve and can deliver this guy to a few top 3 finishes - $6.00 to place.

Betfair are also running a market - winner without Cavendish.
Back Hushovd @ $4.00

**EDIT 4.00pm - Hushovd to finish first 3 - $2.56 is better value.
take that instead.

So the logic is that the Cavendish bets allow us to Collect $17.50 + $13.70 = $31.20 - an $11.20 profit. Then seeing as there is no quinella or exacta betting we look at at least one of Hushovd to or Ciolek to place to get a nice collect.

Astana takes a sledge hammer to the Tour!

Fabain retains the Yellow Jersey by 0.02 seconds from 7 time winner Lance Armstrong.


Swiss timing reigns supreme.

Stage 4 in Montpellier will be remembered as the day the Astana Team set about shredding their competition. Whatever happens in this tour from here on in, the Time Trial will be the point at which many of the leading contenders were crushed, now it might just be Astana v Astana. Team Astana set a cracking pace averaging 50.34km/h over the tricky 39km course, they finished in 46.29 - giving Lance Armstrong the same overall time as Fabian Cancellara. Both Men are locked on 10 hours 38 minutes and 7 seconds. However the computers tell us that Fabian is 0.02 seconds ahead. AS Fabian said after the stage, "Time was born in Switzerland, so that was on my side!". Fabians turn on the front over the last 200m was the difference in the end, im sure if lance had known it was going to be thousandths of a second he would have put that little bit more in!

We tipped Garmin here and were pretty happy with the price we got prior to the stage, we also bet Lance to be in yellow at the end. So there was no return - but oh what could have been!

So close.

But back to Garmin. They went out hard, very hard. They quickly lost Tyler Farrar, Danny Pate, Martijn Maaskant and Julian Dean. That left them with their main contender Christian Vande Velde riding with three time trial specialists in Zabriskie, Wiggins, & Millar as well as Hesjedal. They lost the 4 early because of the pace they set, they simply dropped them. I thought it might have been a strategy they had adopted - use up the 4 lesser TT riders early then let the big guns finish off, it certainly would have been a very ballsy move as the time taken at the finish is when the 5th rider crosses the line, so if anything happened after the 4 dropped off it was not going to work. I was riding with them though, i thought, yep, this is their stage, great move, all or nothing, and we collect! When they crossed the line they were fastest, 40 seconds ahead of Liquigas. However after the stage Vande Velde revealed that riding the second half of the event with only five riders (four really, since Ryder was doing his best but just hanging on at times.) was not the planned.

That makes their performance even more impressive. And I hope the 4 that were left behind are feeling bad. Not just because we backed them either.

So it took the colossus of Astana with their full complement of 9 men to defeat Garmin. In the end Astana won the stage by 18 seconds over Garmin and 40 seconds from Saxo Bank. Liquigas were excellent keeping Kreuziger in contention with a 58 second deficit and Columbia lost 59 seconds to the marauding team from Kazakhstan.

Lance is so close to yellow, but the other tale of the race is what has happened behind him.
In decimating the competition Astana have crushed the chances of some of the leading contenders.

Carlos Sastre - now 29th and 2 min 44 behind.
Cadel Evans - now 35th and 2 min 59 seconds behind.
Denis Menchov - now 72nd and 3 mins 52 seconds behind.

Sure Cadel missed having Thomas Dekker on his team who is good in a TT, should not have used EPO 2 years ago! Sure Menchov crashed, but that only cost him a few seconds, probably 20 in reality. Those two have no hope of winning the 2009 edition and I dont think Sastre, even though he is a better climber can either.

Even Rogers, Kreuziger and the Schleck brothers are going to find it hard from here.

The mountains are going to be mad!

Astana have this race by the throat.
They have riders in positions 2,3,4,5,7,11,& 18!

Here is a larger GC list with a few of the big guns highlighted.

General classification after stage 4

1 Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Team Saxo Bank 10:38:07
2 Lance Armstrong (USA) Astana
3 Alberto Contador Velasco (Spa) Astana 0:00:19
4 Andreas Klöden (Ger) Astana 0:00:23
5 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Astana 0:00:31
6 Bradley Wiggins (GBr) Garmin - Slipstream 0:00:38
7 Haimar Zubeldia Aguirre (Spa) Astana 0:00:51
8 Tony Martin (Ger) Team Columbia - HTC 0:00:52
9 David Zabriskie (USA) Garmin - Slipstream 0:01:06
10 David Millar (GBr) Garmin - Slipstream 0:01:07
11 Sergio Miguel Moreira Paulinho (Por) Astana 0:01:16
12 Christian Vande Velde (USA) Garmin - Slipstream
13 Gustav Erik Larsson (Swe) Team Saxo Bank 0:01:22
14 Maxime Monfort (Bel) Team Columbia - HTC 0:01:29
15 Roman Kreuziger (Cze) Liquigas 0:01:31
16 Michael Rogers (Aus) Team Columbia - HTC 0:01:32
17 George Hincapie (USA) Team Columbia - HTC 0:01:36
18 Yaroslav Popovych (Ukr) Astana
19 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas
20 Andy Schleck (Lux) Team Saxo Bank 0:01:41
21 Ryder Hesjedal (Can) Garmin - Slipstream 0:01:46
22 Jens Voigt (Ger) Team Saxo Bank 0:02:03
23 Kurt-Asle Arvesen (Nor) Team Saxo Bank 0:02:05
24 Kim Kirchen (Lux) Team Columbia - HTC 0:02:16
25 Fränk Schleck (Lux) Team Saxo Bank 0:02:17
26 Brian Vandborg (Den) Liquigas 0:02:25
27 Vladimir Karpets (Rus) Team Katusha 0:02:31
28 Franco Pellizotti (Ita) Liquigas 0:02:32
29 Carlos Sastre Candil (Spa) Cervelo Test Team 0:02:44
30 Nicki Sörensen (Den) Team Saxo Bank
31 Fabio Sabatini (Ita) Liquigas 0:02:50
32 Bert Grabsch (Ger) Team Columbia - HTC 0:02:51
33 Mikel Astarloza Chaurreau (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:02:54
34 Luis Pasamontes Rodriguez (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 0:02:56
35 Cadel Evans (Aus) Silence - Lotto 0:02:59
36 Serguei Ivanov (Rus) Team Katusha
37 Thor Hushovd (Nor) Cervelo Test Team
38 Stuart O'Grady (Aus) Team Saxo Bank 0:03:00
39 Mikhail Ignatiev (Rus) Team Katusha 0:03:02
40 Oscar Pereiro Sio (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 0:03:03
41 Hayden Roulston (NZl) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:05
42 Rui Alberto Faria da Costa (Por) Caisse d'Epargne 0:03:06
43 Heinrich Haussler (Ger) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:07
44 Volodymir Gustov (Ukr) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:09
45 Linus Gerdemann (Ger) Team Milram 0:03:11
46 Rigoberto Uran (Col) Caisse d'Epargne 0:03:12
47 Rinaldo Nocentini (Ita) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:13
48 Nicolas Roche (Irl) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:16
49 Jérôme Pineau (Fra) Quick Step 0:03:17
50 José Ivan Gutierrez Palacios (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne
51 Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne
52 Filippo Pozzato (Ita) Team Katusha 0:03:18
53 Luis León Sánchez Gil (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne
54 Lloyd Mondory (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:21
55 Sylvain Chavanel (Fra) Quick Step 0:03:23
56 Juan Jose Oroz Ugalde (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:03:24
57 Gorka Verdugo Marcotegui (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:03:25
58 Brett Lancaster (Aus) Cervelo Test Team 0:03:28
59 Frederik Willems (Bel) Liquigas 0:03:32
60 Mark Cavendish (GBr) Team Columbia - HTC 0:03:33
61 Stéphane Goubert (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:34
62 Robert Gesink (Ned) Rabobank 0:03:36
63 Chris Anker Sørensen (Den) Team Saxo Bank
64 Cyril Dessel (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:38
65 Christophe Riblon (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:42
66 Vladimir Efimkin (Rus) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:44
67 Hubert Dupont (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:03:46
68 Nikolai Troussov (Rus) Team Katusha 0:03:47
69 Aleksandr Kuschynski (Blr) Liquigas
70 Igor Anton Hernandez (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:03:48
71 Alexandre Botcharov (Rus) Team Katusha 0:03:51
72 Denis Menchov (Rus) Rabobank 0:03:52
73 José Luis Arrieta Lujambio (Spa) AG2R La Mondiale
74 Carlos Barredo Llamazales (Spa) Quick Step 0:03:55
75 Laurens ten Dam (Ned) Rabobank 0:03:57
76 Sébastien Rosseler (Bel) Quick Step 0:04:03
77 Rémi Pauriol (Fra) Cofidis, Le Credit en Ligne 0:04:04
78 Iñigo Cuesta Lopez De Castro (Spa) Cervelo Test Team 0:04:05
79 Egoi Martinez De Esteban (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:04:09
80 Juan Manuel Garate Cepa (Spa) Rabobank
81 David Arroyo Duran (Spa) Caisse d'Epargne 0:04:10
82 Christophe Kern (Fra) Cofidis, Le Credit en Ligne 0:04:12
83 Grischa Niermann (Ger) Rabobank 0:04:16
84 Sandy Casar (Fra) Française des Jeux
85 Jérôme Coppel (Fra) Française des Jeux 0:04:17
86 Alessandro Vanotti (Ita) Liquigas 0:04:23
87 Jérémy Roy (Fra) Française des Jeux
88 Tom Boonen (Bel) Quick Step 0:04:25
89 Peter Velits (Svk) Team Milram 0:04:27
90 Johannes Fröhlinger (Ger) Team Milram 0:04:28
91 Mark Renshaw (Aus) Team Columbia - HTC 0:04:29
92 José Angel Gomez Marchante (Spa) Cervelo Test Team 0:04:30
93 Stijn Devolder (Bel) Quick Step
94 Mickael Delage (Fra) Silence - Lotto 0:04:31
95 Christian Knees (Ger) Team Milram 0:04:32
96 Juan Antonio Flecha Giannoni (Spa) Rabobank
97 Daniele Bennati (Ita) Liquigas 0:04:34
98 Alessandro Ballan (Ita) Lampre - NGC 0:04:35
99 Stéphane Auge (Fra) Cofidis, Le Credit en Ligne 0:04:40
100 Joost Posthuma (Ned) Rabobank 0:04:46

Tour de France 2009 - Stage 4 (TTT)

stage 4 - Montpellier Montpellier 39 km





The team time-trial (TTT) is making a comeback in the Tour de France after a 3 year absence, but with one major change: the time recorded on the line will be taken into account without tables. Previously there was a maximum amount of time a team could lose. Real time is still the absolute rule at the 2009 Tour. That is also why the route in Montpellier is short, the last 2 TTTs were almost 70km in length, this is just 39km.

results from the TTT at the 2009 Giro - 20.5km
1st - Columbia 21.50
2nd - Garmin + 0.06
3rd - Astana +0.13

at the 2008 Giro it was Garmin (called slipstream at the time) beating CSC and Columbia by 6 seconds.

The only other TTT on a stage race of any note this year was the Tour de Romandie (in Switzerland) but it is no team rode that race with the same or even a similar TdF roster.

Tour de Romandie
1 Team Columbia-High Road 18' 37"
2 Caisse d'Epargne + 10"
3 Team Saxo Bank + 16"

I would think that Columbia, Garmin, Astana and Saxo-Bank are the big guns here.
Riders like Cadel Evans face the prospect of losing time to other big name GC contenders tonight, it is a real test of team strength. The time is for the first 5 riders across the line. Garmin have a very very good TT outfit, Millar, Vande Velde & Zabriskie area all super TT riders. We know Astana has Lance, Levi & Contador, Columbia goes very well too though and saxo bank have a unit of good all rounders as well as big Fabian, the best TT rider in the business.

The combined times of the fist 5 riders from the ITT in stage 1 was thus:
1 Astana 00:59:46
2 Team Saxo Bank +00:31
3 Garmin - Slipstream +00:44
4 Liquigas +01:25
5 Colombia +01:46

The betting reflects that.
$1.77 Astana
$5.10 Garmin- Slipstream
$7.80 Columbia - HTC
$9.10 Saxo-Bank

Every other team is greater than $100 on betfair!

We are going for the upset here, i think this stage is the sole focus of the 2009 Tour for Garmin - we will back them to win.

but some insurance:

Rider in Yellow at end of Stage 4.
Fabian Cancellara $1.50
Lance Armstrong $3.20
Tony Martin $6.60

If Astana get enough time off Saxo Bank (40 seconds) and they beat Columbia (by 7 seconds), then Lance will be in Yellow at the end of this!
$3.20 for that - yep, take it as well, much better than the price for Astana winning.

Stage 4 Betting
Garmin to win $5.20
Lance in Yellow $3.20