Cluses—Tignes, 144km
Well, the news to begin the day was that the Mighty Ace Renaissance Madman Mathieu Van Der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix) and Primoz Roglic the Relentless (Jumbo-Visma) would not take to the start of Stage 9 of the Tour de France. My selfish armchair spectator resentment of riders prematurely dropping out of Grand Tours while they can still go on is no secret. But—and perhaps it is out of pure biased favoritism for these two dynamic and Day-Making riders—in these cases I cannot really blame them. Primoz Roglic is battered and bruised up beyond recognition, it seems clear there is no way he is going to heal this Tour. He has already proven his tenaciousness time and time again. And given his premiere status in the sport perhaps it really would be better for him to pack it in: rest up, heal, and come out fighting at another large objective to salvage his season. In the case of Mathieu, there were rumors he did not even want to start this Tour, that he only attended to please sponsors and organizers. For some four years, probably since he saw the Rockstar Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) try his hand in Rio in 2016, Mathieu Van Der Poel’s biggest sporting goal has been a Gold Medal at the Cross Country Mountain Bike race at the Tokyo Olympic Games. Had a pandemic not pushed back the games, surely Mathieu could have taken an unreserved full-tilt run at this Tour de France. But already in 8 days he has accomplished all his goals and dazzled the crowds. Now perhaps, it is a little shameful that this Renaissance Madman himself has instigated and wreaked so much havoc that after 8 hard days of racing that brought the peloton down to dire straits of exhaustion with still a fortnight left until Paris, only now this Madman says the time is right to abandon this Tour and pursue other goals. But he is a Renaissance Man because amidst all his conventional road accomplishments, still he can hop into any other cycling disciplines at will and perform at the highest level. Personally—and again perhaps it is biased favoritism—I cannot begrudge seeing Van Der Poel walk away to prepare for this one special goal that does have even more worth to him than his debut Tour de France. But as the stage unfolded and it became immediately clear that the other Mighty Ace Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) was going to abandon all dreams of Yellow this Tour and not fight for GC any longer—though he began the day in second place Overall—I must say, then my heart started to sink. “Huh! Surely, UAE’s Tadej Pogacar shall take Yellow in an absurd cakewalk,” I said to myself. “All we can hope and watch for now is Quickstep’s Mark Cavendish’s stage record chase, maybe a decently interesting King of the Mountains battle for Polka-Dots, and then thrilling individual stages on the reg.” Ah! It is true that Pogacar may now have the GC sealed, which historically has often happened in the first mountain range in many editions of the Tour de France. But surprisingly, today at least did in fact turn into quite a GC battle that shall fondly be remembered. A battle where at least one bit player transformed into a hero and challenged the supreme one, the Young Beowulf Crowned King.
Tadej Pogacar’s UAE team once more let a large breakaway go up the road for the second day in a row, the Tour’s second day in the Alps. Tomorrow is the First Rest Day of this year’s Tour, but following the theme of this whole first week: this ninth day of the hellish first week would also be yet another harrowing affair. With hefty gains of elevation and large sums of points available at the tops of a Category2, a Category1, a Beyond Category, another Category2, and a summit finish to the top of another Category1 climb: this would be a proper day for the mountain goats to come out to play and clash swords for the King of the Mountains Polka-Dot Jersey competition. To begin the day wearing the Polka-Dots was Bahrain’s Wout Poels, a tall rider, but proven man of high quality in the high mountains. Yesterday’s nearly-man Michael “Rusty” Woods (Israel Start-Up Nation) was up for another go for KOM Points and the stage win from the break for the second day in a row. And throwing his hat into the KOM ring, 8 years after winning the competition for his first and thus far only time in his career was that generational hero, almost patriarch, and foremost pioneer of this greatest generation of Colombian cycling: Nairo Quintana (Arkea Samsaic). To the international cycling world, surely Quintana has lost his shine, and come down from his mid-2000-teens zenith; but the patriotic Colombians still love him even though he could not manage to be the first of their people to win the hallowed Tour de France. Many others made the break today as well including sprinter Sonny Colbrelli (Bahrain Victorious) in search of Green Jersey Points, the spritely firecracker Colombian Sergio Higuita (EF Education-Nippo), Jumbo’s American Sepp Kuss on this 4th of July, Quickstep’s Julian Alaphilippe the Musketeer and Champion of the World, Socrates Guillaume Martin (Cofidis), the Australian Lucas Hamilton (Team BikeExchange), and another young Australian Ben O’Connor who had newly joined the French AG2R Citroen team at the beginning of this season. Many of these latter named riders had little interest in the KOM competition, truly all their hopes lay in staying away to duke it out for the stage win. And once again, the UAE team indulged their desires: with 70km left in the stage, the breakaway leaders had a large 7:30 gap to the UAE-led peloton.
By this 70km to go point, the breakaway had been greatly reduced. Only a quartet of riders was left at the head of affairs, climbing the final slopes of the Beyond Category Col du Pre climb—Michael Woods, Nairoman Quintana, Sergio Higuita, and Ben O’Connor. Already many other men of the breakaway had fallen back…probably because it was yet another day of Biblibal weather. Yes, yes, many had on the indecipherable black rain jackets and many were violently shaking their arms sporadically throughout the stage. Numbingly cold conditions were simply salt in the wounds for this Alpine Queen Stage on the back of 8 days of exhausting racing. Julian Alaphilippe the Musketeer had already dropped back to the peloton and fully stopped with the team car on the side of the road to completely re-dress in fresh warm clothing—soaked through was everything else, and he barely had feeling in his hands. Yes, yes, that is why on such cold days you see cyclists karate chopping thin air: the violent motion at least marginally helps to regain dexterity in the numb fingers and hands which are absolutely essential for shifting gears, braking on descents, and opening food and gel wrappers among other things. Soon after cresting the Col du Pre, Mike Woods dropped from the leading quartet, also probably from frozen exhaustion. As the now leading trio scaled the Category2 Cormet de Roselend, the physical act of riding uphill became the least of their many pressing concerns.
Once the trio crested this Cormet de Roselend climb, there would come a very long descent into the Alpine town of Bourg-Saint-Maurice, and from there the Tour would then turn to climb the 20+km Montee de Tignes climb. Yes, those who watched the rollercoaster ride that was the 2019 Tour de France remember the name Tignes, this was supposed to be the mammoth final climb summit finish to be tackled on the day cut short by the impassible roads buried in landslides and frozen with ice. After two years of waiting, finally the Tour was going to make it to Tignes this day. O! But this long descent before the equally long Tignes climb could not be underestimated. If the riders did not take proper care of themselves on the way down, surely the freezing conditions would sap their strength and health for the long final ascent. Thus it was time for the second annual Unofficial Rain Jacket World Championships.
If you watched the October Giro last year, surely you’ll remember watching what was the first inaugural Rain Jacket World Championships on the Mighty Stelvio. When both of Sunweb’s Jai Hindley and Wilco Kelderman—both riding and defending podium positions on that Queen stage of the Giro—had the hardest time in the world putting on their rain jackets while continuously riding their bikes before the descent down the Stelvio. It was shockingly brutal viewing at the time, all held their breath thinking the two men would lose their balance and crash as they scrambled and struggled to get their arms in the sleeves; and as the coat sleeves dangled down, they looked like they would surely get caught in the revolving wheels at any second. Some retired cyclist commentators were “tisk-tisk-ly” saying these guys should have been practicing putting on jackets while riding in their training camps. A fair point, because it is often lost on the audience how much skill is required and practice is needed just to be agile enough to grab food, drinks, bags, and clothing from the roadside and team cars as you continue riding; and dressing and undressing on the bike is another level even beyond that. But in the Stelvio case, the reason the Sunweb riders were struggling so mightily was because their hands were very numb. Can you imagine putting on a tight aero-contouring jacket with frozen fingers? What about with frozen fingers while riding a bike? Yup, that day on the Stelvio was deemed by multiple commentators the Rain-Jacket-Putting-On World Championships. After watching many of the riders struggle similarly today: why not make these skillful wardrobe-changes an annual unofficial World Championships to look forward to from our comfortable armchairs? Oddly, I did not see any frozen-finger struggle days that would qualify at this year’s Giro despite day after day of dreary deluge, so this Stage 9 into Tignes shall play host to the 2021 Rain Jacket World Championships that are ever unwinnable—only losable. But if there was a winner of these Worlds between the trio today, I guess it must have been Sergio Higuita, because I remember his struggles the least. Ben O’Connor was probably the biggest loser: it took him ages to change his gloves and coat. And though Nairoman was pretty adept at disrobing and suiting up midride, at one point he had to strip down to his last undershirt layer and put on the heaviest-duty winter cycling jacket the team had available for him. Now, if this is the first news you’re hearing of these events, I am sure you must be wondering, “Why didn’t they just quickly stop on the side of the road for a few quick seconds to do all this, instead of going at this for agonizing minutes?” And potentially, you also do have a fair point, this is what talented bike-handler Julian Alaphilippe did after all. There must come some sort of time or limit where it is just easier to stop and then spend the energy to catch back up once dressed. But if your rivals can put on the jackets while riding, surely you want to match them, because surely they won’t wait for you if you stop. And most notably today, at this point the trio had an 8:20 lead on the peloton led by Tadej Pogacar’s UAE Team. Oh, and maybe I should mention this young Ben O’Connor started the day 8:13 down on GC.
Yes, yes, from yet another unlikely source, the Yellow Jersey was under attack. At the top of the Cormet de Roselend, Ben O’Connor was the virtual Yellow Jersey, at that moment he was leading the Tour de France. This Australian O’Connor came onto many cycling obsessed fans’ radars when he took a classy Tour of the Alps stage win over many headliner GC Grand Tour contenders of the day in 2018. He has shown talent in riding GC at stage races and Grand Tours before though the final results have not been equal to the flashes of potential. And in last year’s Giro he did manage to take a thrilling stage win for his old NTT team. But here at the Tour de France, riding for his new French team, in a position to take Yellow and even a stage: this was shaping up to be the biggest day in the 25-year-old Ben O’Connor’s cycling career thus far! But UAE was not just going to let this happen laying down, Young Beowulf Tadej Pogacar was in no mood to give up this Yellow Jersey he had just worked his ass off to move into yesterday. No, with the Rain Jackets on and the unofficial Worlds over, it was time game on for the finale of this stage. The lowly Ben O’Connor vs the full strength of UAE.
The first step was the long descent down…and Ben O’Connor received no favors from his Colombian breakaway companions. Quintana and Higuita, these two most diminutive of diminutive Colombian professionals, looked like dialed-in puppies on rafts navigating their way down Splash Mountain at the quickest speeds possible. The camera bikes could not keep up with these wet-descending masters, the freezing temperatures and wet roads did not seem to have any effect on their descending abilities. Colombia is situated on the equator, so it doesn’t have robust seasons of summer and winter. But surely many of these cyclists’ villages are nestled high up at 3000-to-4000m of altitude where freezing storming conditions are common. Yes, Quintana and especially Higuita blazed down this descent like little Evil Knievels…while O’Connor was not as confident. O’Connor took the sharp-wet turns much more cautiously. He didn’t completely bomb the straight sections with the velocity of a heat-seeking missile either. Perhaps his hands were still too cold, perhaps he just did not have the nerves of the Colombians. Luckily for O’Connor, behind UAE took the descent fairly calmly as well, because of or despite their rider Brandon McNulty riding off the road in a momentary lapse of concentration.
The tiny Colombians Higuita and Quintana had put 30 seconds into O’Connor as they reached the bottom of the descent. And as the climbing to the finish began immediately, neither seemed particularly interested to wait to regroup with the less-skillful descender O’Connor. At this point, O’Connor was certainly thinking more about the Yellow Jersey than the stage win, in fact at this point he may have been willing to gift the stage to one of the Colombians if they were more willing to work with him. But Ben O’Connor was the primary hero this day, and in this story Quintana and Higuita were ultimately just two more adversaries to overcome.
Whether they were yet officially on the climb or not, the entire last 30km of the stage were uphill. As a second step, O’Connor began recovering the time he had lost to the Colombians. With all the descending done, there was no more cautious riding left, it was absolutely time to empty the tank: Ben O’Connor was on a quest to achieve the greatest accomplishment in his sporting life. On their best days in the past, both Quintana and Higuita have looked like the greatest climbers in the world. But this background character turned underdog hero, Ben O’Connor was hunting them down like clockwork. Within 3km, with 27km left on the stage he caught the leading pair of Colombians. Then came the third step, the trio took on their last gels and drinks—the final fuel for the long final climb. Then a fourth step—not that any point-by-point plan was ever actually laid out—was to ride the climb full gas and just see what happens. At this point, O’Connor and the Colombians had almost 9:00 on the peloton, but behind UAE was actually doing their finest job supporting Pogacar thus far all Tour: Hurricane Hirschi had already done a heavy share of pacing on the early climbs, Mikkel Bjerg was still here and working despite sharing that early load with Hirschi, veteran Rui Costa was doing a great ride in service of Pog, and Davide Formolo and Rafal Majka had still not even needed to come to the front to work yet…and Young Beowulf Pogacar in Yellow himself looked very at ease. Yes, though O’Connor was virtually in Yellow by some-40 seconds, truly Pogacar could rip into that gap himself with another solo attack somewhere towards the end of this final climb.
With 22km left to climb and race, O’Connor and the Colombians’ gap was now 8:30 to the UAE peloton of GC favorites. O’Connor was offering a noble challenge today, O! but surely behind UAE would soon start the climb proper and this gap would really start to tumble. And yet, all of a sudden, without any warning to speak of—he must be a great poker player—Nairo Quintana completely cracked. The battery went dead, the lights went out, the wheels metaphorically fell off, he had completely bonked. It was no slow decay or agonizing scramble to hang on. In an instant, Quintana gently and politely swung over to the side of the road and completely dropped out of contention for the stage win. Behind, UAE was still eating into O’Connor’s advantage. They had now dropped the gap down to 8:00 to put Pogacar virtually back in Yellow, but now O’Connor had one less rival to contend with for the stage win. With some 19km to go, the black rain jacket came off. O’Connor was warmed back up, and it was time to show off the AG2R Citreon Jersey again in this finale to the sponsors’ delight. Yes, O’Connor unveiled the White Top with Brown and Red Lettering just in time as he ratcheted up the pace with 17km to go…an acceleration that put away his last Colombian rival, Sergio Higuita. By now, O’Connor only had a 7-minute lead on Pogacar and the UAE peloton. Yellow seemed now out of reach, but now O’Connor was on a crash course for a Tour de France stage win with a high place on the General Classification to boot.
And would you believe it, as UAE burned up their men pacing on the front of the peloton, with 13km to go Ben O’Connor reversed the tide. His gap to the peloton began to go back out. From 6:50 with 14km to ride, his lead shot back out to 8:00 once again with 8km to go. O! To see performances such as these are what cycling is all about. Before today, Ben O’Connor was a promising but-firmly-only supporting actor in this Tour de France drama. He had crashed and lost time at some point in the first week, and his dramatic role had been diminished even further. But now he was seizing his chance, now he was writing himself a bigger part with more lines—maybe even a solo musical number—in this Tour de France script. It was inspiring to see. Surely such a ride as this will motivate many an Australian in the amateur ranks all that much more to go on with the grueling ass-kicking training regime, because maybe one day they could ride like Ben O’Connor and have the greatest day of their cycling career as well. Yes, O’Connor matched and bettered the effort of that UAE squad for the middle kilometers of that infinite climb to Tignes. With 7km to go, O’Connor had the lead back out to 8:14 on Pogacar; O’Connor was virtually back in Yellow by 1 second.
It was an amazing effort and accomplishment for O’Connor just to even provisionally take Yellow again, by that point all of Pogcar’s UAE teammates had been burned. But with Pogacar isolated, onto the front came three Ineos Grenadiers to set the pace and probe for any chink in Young Beowulf Pogacar’s armor. It was the Grenadiers that actually ruined O’Connor’s Yellow dream, but luckily upfront, no one was within a mile of stopping O’Connor from taking AG2R’s biggest win of the season. To take Yellow and the stage would have been the ultimate, but to just have one or the other was great reward: a culmination of a career, a fairytale come to life for any professional cyclist. Though he would not take Yellow, Ben O’Connor would take the stage win today and move up to second on GC Overall. Behind, in the final kilometers with no teammates left and a few GC rivals around him audacious enough to try some attacks, once again Young Beowulf Tadej Pogacar figured the best defense was offense. For the second day in a row, Young Beowulf rode away from all opposition with relative ease. Pogacar would end up finishing only 6:00 down on O’Connor, and a further 30 seconds ahead of any GC rivals he had dropped in the closing handful of kilometers when he attacked.
Yes, Young Beowulf Tadej Pogacar has now extended his iron grip on this race. Ben O’Connor was the only one who made any gains. But as O’Connor moves up to only 2:01 back on GC and the rest of Pogacar’s rivals are now over 5:00 down, this O’Connor will be constantly watched and marked by Young Beowulf who is very eager to seal up his second Tour de France. Though O’Connor’s ride today was impressive, glorious, and heroic, it probably is not fair to expect him to challenge Pogacar much more than he has. This was O’Connor’s day, he will be lucky to string together a good GC run to hold his podium place—that would be a phenomenal result actually. Yes, because of Young Beowulf’s dominance already many are shifting their goals to simply just take second or third on GC this Tour. And that should actually prove a great battle. Sonny Colbrelli, the sprinter hunting Green Jersey Points, somehow managed to take third on this stage, the competition for Green is completely ON. And the KOM competition seems to be coming along nicely, especially with Nairoman donning the Polka-Dots tonight. And for the third day in a row, I will say: this is the Second Golden Age of cycling, who knows what will happen this Tour or in any of these great bike races. Maybe similar rebellions to the young king’s rule shall keep uprising. Maybe, just maybe, Young Beowulf Pogacar’s victory is not sealed air-tight.
Cycling Odysseys 