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Published on Thursday, 09 July 2015 22:00

TDF Stage 7

Livarot to Fougères

Friday 10th July, 190.5kms 

Fougères was the finish city for a Team Time Trial of a ridiculously long 73kms in 1985, when the La Vie Claire team with Greg Lemond and Bernard Hinault destroyed the opposition and put 8 of their men in the top 10 of the GC. We're not far off the TTT on stage 9 here which could see another shake-up in the GC.

I don't know about you guys but I'm getting pretty fed up with the way this Tour is going so far. Silly crashes all over the place, today again a silly crash has taken Tony Martin out of the race and could have taken all four of the GC men out of the race as they were all tangled up in the incident. It looked to me like Martin clipped the wheel of the Europcar rider in front of him and that jolted him to the right where he bounced off a Giant-Aplecin guy, could have been Degenkolb, and then went down. It was confirmed tonight that he has broken his collarbone and is out of the race.

Up front, Sagan and the other guys conspired to throw away the stage as no-one wanted to chase down Zdenek Stybar who was oblivious to what had happened to Martin and seized his opportunity brilliantly to escape. Everyone waited for Sagan to chase, no one wanted to drag Sagan to the line. And so it was that even though I called 4 of the top 9 and would have had Sagan as winner were it not for Stybar we were left empty handed, a very frustrating end to the stage. Julien Simon finished 9th and rode a great finish for an 80/1 shot, Van Avermaet and Gallopin were 5th and 6th.

So it wasn't the brutal back-breaker people seemed to be getting in to a frenzy about, but just like I predicted a finish for Classics men. The crash took Van Garderen out of it and Contador finished ahead of him just to add more salt to the wounds. Simon did his part at least, he was their main man today and not Soupe.  

The Route

We continue to head west towards Brittany and head south west for a longish stage of 190.5kms from Livarot to Fougeres. Not much to say about the route, it's pretty flat and straight forward and we should just see a bunch come to the finish ready to contest a sprint finish. 

The finish could get a bit intersting though as they go through a roundabout more or less every kilometre for the last four, the second last of which is passed on both sides, which could see a bit of excitement as they come back together again. They go down the right hand side of the last roundabout with 900m to go and with 600m to go it kinks left a little on a little mini roundabout. The road curves round to the right until 90m to go, making it a pretty short sprint to the line.

Also, the road rises up for the last 600m, and it's very narrow, only one half of a split road, making it a pretty challenging finish to the stage, you can see the last 400m or so in the screenshots below in order from left to right, the final 90m or so is on the right. It rises at around a 3.2% gradient for the last 500m, easing a little near the line, but they will need to watch out for the roundabout which is just after the finish!

Contenders and Favourites

Another sprint, another chance for Mark Cavendish to finally get it right? It's almost certainly going to end in a sprint, but who's going to come out on top in this final sprint opportunity for quite a few stages? Well I'm going to change tact and hope that this isn't going to come back to bite me on the ass - I'm going against Cavendish in this one. I have not been impressed at all by him or his team and he has left us down twice already. The leadout just isn't functioning and they have had a pretty hectic week, and now they have lost Tony Martin as well they will have their work cut out for them on this finish.

Cav has been mis-timing his jumps and just hasn't got the powerful kick he is, or was famous for. I think the finish will catch him out again . The uphill finish on the tight road could see him struggle to get out and ahead and he could well be swamped by faster finishers again.

André Greipel has been superb, all power and speed and intelligent sprinting. His team have been good, better than Etixx, but he has finished the job brilliantly, unlike Cav. This could be another opportunity for Greipel to extend his lead in the Green Jersey again after Sagan closed the gap to just 3pts today (which I still think Sagan will win). This finish is going to be all about power and positioning and it could well need to be a very long sprint that wins it - you'll have to get in front and just try to stay in front, it's going to be very hard to come around on the tight, uphill finish. Greipel can often screw up his positioning, but he has got it pretty much spot on so far in this race.

The uphill finish brings other sprinters very much in to play, while ruling out lots of others, but I actually think it's only about 5 guys really that could win - Greipel is the 5/2 favourite, Cavendish is not favourite for the first time in a sprint stage, he's as big as 3/1.

The first of the other guys who should like this finish is John Degenkolb for Giant-Alpecin. He was very strong on the uphill finish at the end of the long 223km stage to Cambrai, leading from a long way out and holding off the rest of the pack. This is another long stage at 190kms and I think the GA squad will swarm to the front on this stage and set up Degenkolb for a long run at the line again and he has a big chance of winning his first Tour stage. He failed to beat Sagan today though in the uphill sprint in Le Havre, he'll have to be put in a good position at the bottom of the climb and try to go for a long one and hang on I think. At 12/1 though he looks a far better bet to me than Cav or Greipel.

Another rider who should have liked this finish is Alexander Kristoff, but he is clearly not 100% yet. He had been saying this to the media on Monday and Tuesday, that he feels he does not have his spring classics form, but that was obvious to see when he kicked for home on stage 5 but was swamped by Greipel, Sagan and Cavendish on the run-in. Again today he kicked, after getting a short lead-out by Purito, but just didn't have the power to challenge Greipel or Sagan and faded away to 11th. He may have to settle for a 5th to 10th place again.

Arnaud Démare came close to winning the stage for us on Wednesday but faded at the finish to not even land the place money, he might find this finish a little too hard for him though. We still haven't seen what Sam Bennett is capable of against these guys, but hopefully we will get to see him get involved in a sprint soon. There are suggestions he hasn't been feeling great, that certainly looks the case as he has not contested one finish yet. 

Bryan Coquard looks like he is finally starting to click, he sprinted to a very good 3rd place today up the hill. He also took a good 2nd place on an uphill finish won by Matthews in Paris Nice, but I worry about his positioning tomorrow on a narrow finish like this. Julian Simon was the man for Cofidis today like I predicted, but it may be that we see Soupe get a turn at sprinting tomorrow, it's not as hard a finish as today. Greg Van Avermaet could well be close to the front again and I think he looks a good match bet to beat Cimolai at a big looking 7/4. Bauke Mollema said that his legs were really good today and he was hoping to have a top placing at the finish but was held up by the crash - he could try again and is worth taking on Uran with in a match bet. 

So I think it's going to be between Greipel, Degenkolb, Sagan, Cav and maybe Démare and Coquard again tomorrow. Greipel certainly looks the strongest, but it may be that Degenkolb gets the jump on him this time and head-bangs his way up that hill to victory, or at least a good place at a decent 12/1. Sagan can land a podium spot again at a backable 5/1 each-way. Who knows, maybe he'll finally break his sequence of 2nd place finishes.

Recommendations -

1pt each-way on John Degenkolb at 12/1 with Corals

1pt each-way on Peter Sagan at 5/1 with Ladbrokes 

Matchbets

Greipel to beat Cavendish, Degenkolb to beat Bennett and Sagan to beat Kristoff - 2pts at 2/1 with Will Hill 

Mollema to beat Uran - 2pts at 5/6 with Will Hill

Van Avermaet to beat Cimolai - 1.5pts at 7/4 with Bet365