Cavendish wins his second stage while Armstrong moves to third place overall

July

When the wind blows at the Tour riders must beware. Today many of the top contenders lost 40 seconds to a group of 28 riders due to the wind and hard riding by Team Columbia-HTC and Astana.

Of course one of the questions will be, did Lance’s old friend, George Hincapie tip him off to the attack of Team Columbia? Lance jumped from tenth to third place and now could jump into Yellow with a good team time trial tomorrow.

Riding in the flat windy sections is a beautiful thing to watch and one of the hardest skills to learn. Riding at high speed into a cross-wind is very difficult. The echelon that form across the road due so for this reason. In most conditions a cyclists drafts directly behind the other riders in a pace line. But in winds over 10 mphs or so you need to move to the leeward side of the rider in front. So if the wind is from your right you sit about six to 12 inches to the left of t he riders rear wheel in front. You also overlap the wheel, which is partly why this gets dicey. So on most roads you can get about 8 to 12 riders spread across the roadway this way and then people stack in behind the last rider on the echelon. The term riding in the gutter comes from this 45 degree pace line. Only the best flatlander riders can hold the pace on the windward side and their goal is to drop riders clinging on to the back of the group. You have to battle for the wheel and leeward side to hang on. Once you’re out of that safe position you’re in the wind and will be quickly on your own or falling back to another group. This is a battle of nerves and position.
These condition demand both fitness and a knowledgeable rider who has instincts and awareness of the wind direction on the course. The GC riders who used these skills today were Armstrong, Cancellara, and Rogers. 40 seconds is a lot of time to loose on a flat stage.

Here’s the top ten today:
Provisional Results
1    Mark Cavendish (GBr) Team Columbia – Highroad
2    Thor Hushovd (Nor) Cervelo Test Team
3    Cyril Lemoine (Fra) Skil-Shimano
4    Samuel Dumoulin (Fra) Cofidis, Le Credit En Ligne
5    Jérôme Pineau (Fra) Quick Step
6    Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Team Saxo Bank
7    Fabian Wegmann (Ger) Team Milram
8    Fumiyuki Beppu (Jpn) Skil-Shimano
9    Maxime Bouet (Fra) Agritubel
10    Linus Gerdemann (Ger) Team Milram

Here’s the top five overall:
1.    Fabian Cancellara (Swi) Team Saxo Bank
2.    Tony Martin (Grem) Team Columbia-HTC         +33”
3.    Lance Armstrong (USA) Astana             +40
4.    Alberto Contador (Spa) Astana            +59
5.    Bradley Wiggins (GBa) Garmin-Slipstream         +1’00”

This entry was posted on Monday, July 6th, 2009 at 1:04 PM by Randall Wolf. Print This Post | Email This Post

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