Details

Published on Tuesday, 08 July 2014 14:30

Tour de France St. 5

Ypres to Arenberg Porte du Hainaut

Wednesday July 9th, 155.5kms 

This could be one of the most significant and important stages of the entire race. It may only be 155kms long and it may be almost totally flat, but this stage is going to be a beast. 9 sections of the Paris-Roubaix cobbles over the last 67kms. There could be carnage in this stage and the GC men need to be on their guard throughout.

The cobbles are going to be a real shock to the system for the GC men - the only GC TDF contender to ride Paris Roubaix in the last 15 years is Bradley Wiggins. The first section, the Carrefour de L'Arbre after 87kms is normally one of the last sections in Paris Roubaix, and is also one of the most selective and difficult. So the battle to be at the front hitting the cobbles could be pretty savage and could well go on for 5-10kms before they reach them. 

To make things worse, heavy rain is forecast for all day in northern France which should make the cobbles even more treacherous. Race favourite Chris Froome is going to have a hard day tomorrow - he came down heavily in a tangle with Mollema early in the stage and has suffered injuries to his wrist and shoulder and has nasty road rash on his hip. He was given a splint to rest on and he could be put under real pressure tomorrow if he is suffering as a result of the fall. We saw what a fall took out of him in Romandie, the man is too skinny and light, no padding!

Good results today again though for us after going in large on Kittel, it paid off as he won yet again and in the process landed the 8/11 bet in the 'other markets' to win 3 or more stages. We also had a good winner in Arnaud Démare at 25/1 each way, returning 2.6 points on stakes. Greipel was poor as I thought he might be, he just isn't in good form. In fact I laid him for 2pts at evens when I saw that two of his team, including Henderson went down in a crash. Unfortunately Haussler easily beat Rojas so it wasn't as good a day as it could have been!

The Route

The stage starts off in Belgium, in Ypres, to commemerate the great battle in WW1. After heading north-east for the opening 20kms or so as it heads deep in to Gent Wevelgem and Tour of Flanders Country they then start heading south for the rest of the day. After 60kms or so they return back to French soil and this time pass through the town of Roubaix on their way to Arenberg.

They take in sections of Paris Roubaix's cobbles, but as they are doing it from North to South they go through the sections in the reverse order to what they normally would do. The first section (section 9, as they count them down in reverse order) comes up after 87kms with the Carrefour de L'Arbre, one of the most important sections of P-R as it comes so late in the day. This time they hit it first. At 1.1kms it's one of the shorter ones but will set things in motion for the remaining 60kms. If you lose ground here you are fighting a hard battle for the next 90 minutes or so that's left in the stage.

At Templeuve at the 96.5km to go section they go through the Intermediate sprint, where you'd expect Sagan to take max points again unless the break of the day hasn't been pulled back yet. Shortly after, at the 103.5km mark they start on the 1.4km long Ennevelin a Pont-Thibault section 8. Then there are two sections in quick succession with the Mons-en-Pévèle (1km) and the Bersée (1.4kms). 

Then a brief respite for 10kms as they descend a little to the section 5, the 1.4km long Orchies à Beuvry-la-Forêt. At this point there is only 30kms to go and we could see a number of attacks here. With 25kms to go they hit section 4 at Tilloy-les-Marchiennes, the 2nd longest section of the day at 2.4kms long and just 1.5kms after getting over that is the Brillon à Warlaing (1.4km). 

With 16kms to go they hit the longest section of Pavé of the day at Hornaing, a very tough 3.7kms of cobbles with less than 15kms to go once through that section. The final section, section 1 is the last chance for guys to attack the group/what's left of it. It's 1.6km long and it's really going to be hurting at this stage. Once over that though it's a very short 5km dash to the finish. If riders are looking to try to get solo or in a break you'd think they'll have to do it long before section 1 though to give them a chance to build up a sufficient lead to hold off the chasing pack over the final 5kms. 

At the finish there is a slight drag up from the 2km to 1km to go marker, then a slightly downhill sprint finish, not that it's going to be one for the out and out sprinters, except the puncheur/attackers like Degenkolb.

Contenders and Favourites

Fabian Cancellara was installed as the 15/8 favourite with Paddy Power who were the first out with their prices. This is almost the same price he was for Paris-Roubaix in April - he was 2/1 favourite for that, but could only manage a gallant third behind solo winner Niki Terpstra and John Degenkolb who won the 'sprint'. Since then the other bookies have come out a bit bigger than that, ranging between 9/4 and 3/1. Cancellara is bound to be involved and he will almost certainly be one of the big protagonsits of the day. 

But I'm not sure I want to back him tomorrow at that sort of price. Yes, he is the master of this terrain. Yes he has won over these cobbles three times, but most recently, he just wasn't able to get away from his rivals who marked him too closely. He just didn't have the zip this year to leave them all behind. He also hasn't done a lot of racing since April and his results since then have been pretty average. He made an attempt at the stage victory on Saturday, surprising the sprinters teams a little but faded towards the end. I just think he is vulnerable tomorrow, especially given the conditions - the forecast is pretty bad. 

When Paddy Power opened with their prices I immediately jumped on one bet that I wanted to have - Greg Van Avermaet at 33/1.. GVA is flying at the moment and landed the each-way on Sunday for us at 50/1. He has been very prominent all race and has said that he is really looking forward to the cobbled stage. With a good strong team with him with Velits, Burghardt, Oss and Moinard to help him he should be in the right place come the business end on the cobbles. The 33/1 is long gone but there is still some 18/1 with Ladbrokes and that is worth an each-way bet. 

P-R winner Niki Terpstra is of course being mentioned as a favourite because of what he did in April, but I'm not having him after seeing him crawl up Jawbone hill on Sunday afternoon on his own some 15 minutes behind the leader. It maybe wasn't his ideal terrain but to be that far down and suffering as much as he was when he passed us has put me right off him. Add in the fact that he had to chase back on for Kwiatkowski yesterday (and again near the finish after he crashed) and he looks a poor bet to me.

He may well have been saving himself for this stage and should be far more at home here, but there is enough doubt there for me to avoid him. On the positive side for him,  the race enters Belgium,  the teams home,  and even passes by Lefevre's house,  so they're bound to be fired up. 

John Degenkolb was one who I thought might go well at Paris-Roubaix, but I didn't expect him to 'win' the sprint to take second behind Terpstra. He is a super strong rider and excels on these kinds of courses. He has been working really hard for Kittel the last few days and tomorrow is the chance for the team to work for him. As long as he is looked after up until the last 30kms or so he should be well able to stick with the leaders and possibly be right in the mix with the reduced group that should make it to the finish. And unlike P-R, they don't finish in the Velodrome in Roubaix, but on a straight road in Arenberg! There will be few left who will beat him in the sprint. 

Peter Sagan is bound to be one of the hot fancies for tomorrow too given his form, but like in P-R, I think if he does manage to hang in there all the way to the finish the cobbles will have taken a lot out of him and he may miss out in the sprint. Alexander Kristoff is one of those who if is still present in this front group he can pose a threat to Degenkolb and could beat Sagan. He has been knocking on the door so far, but is no match for Kittel. He got closest yet though today by going early but was just caught by Kittel on the line, finishing 2nd. If conditions are wet and muddy then he will have even more of a chance than others to land this. 

Sep Vanmarcke was Mr. Consistency during the spring cobbled classics, finishing 4th in P-R, 3rd in Flanders and 4th in Gent Wevelgem, but hasn't exactly displayed any sort of decent form in the Tour of Belgium and Tour de Suisse since then to justify backing him at such odds as 10/1. I would have wanted at least 20s on him I think. Yes, he may well be in the last 30 or 40 on the road because of his skills and love for these sorts of stages but I fear he will lack a little something at the end and will finish 6th to 10th. 

The sprinters Arnaud Démare, Marcel Kittel and André Greipel are three riders who on a really good day, with a relatively calm day of attacking could just make it to the finish. Maybe not all of them, but if they did they will be extremely hard to beat of course. But I can't see it to be honest, I think tomorrow is going to be brutal - I think Tinkoff-Saxo and Astana are going to sense blood with Froome's injuries and make this a very hard stage. They will make him suffer and try to break him tomorrow as they won't get many chances like this. Riis won't let these kinds of chances go easy.. Froome was going for an x-ray tonight on his hand, you'd think he should be ok to continue but of all stages to have an injured hand on this is not a great one is it! I laid out 3pts more on Froome at 11/10 after his crash this morning, he is now trading around 6/4 as people worry about his injuries.  

There are a few more who could muscle in on that last group - Thomas and Porte for Sky - Thomas in particular could be an interesting one at 80/1. Sylvain Chavanel or Haussler for IAM, Haussler is going well and will enjoy the wet conditions. Kwiatkowski, Lars Boom and Seb Langeveld, or Dries Devenyns at 250/1.

But I think it will come down to a small group of some 20-30 riders in the last 10kms and this may be reduced even further by the time they leave the last Pavé section with just 7km to go. Cancellara will be there probably, but so too I think will Degenkolb, Van Avermaet, Sagan, Vanmarcke and Kristoff to name a few. If that happens, Degenkolb and Kristoff will have a real battle with maybe GVA getting up on the podium too. 

Recommendations:

1pt each-way on Greg Van Avermaet at 33/1 (take the 18/1 now with Ladbrokes)

1pt win on John Degenkolb at 15/2 with BetVictor

1.5pts on Alexander Kristoff to come in the top 3 - currently 11/4 on Betfair. 

Lay Cancellara to place at 4/5 or better on Betfair to lose 2.5pts (to win 2pts)

Match Bets 

Bauke Mollema to beat Rui Costa at 8/11 with Paddy Power - 1pt

Sebastian Langeveld to beat Van Summeren at 4/7 with Bet365 - 2pts win

Degenkolb to beat Démare (4/9) and Vanmarcke to beat Roelandts (4/9) - the double pays just over evens with Bet365 - 2pts win 

Get the best tyres money can buy with a CyclingBetting special offer!

Continental GP4000s clinchers for under £27 with free delivery!