Stage 13 Saint-Étienne / Chamrousse - Porte Cracks, Nibs Attacks

The Tour has reached the Alps for two days of slog in the big mountains. The 197.5km route from Saint-Etienne to Chamrousse had a category 3 climb and category 1 climb with a final 18.2km long ‘hors categorie’ ascent to Chamrousse at 1730m.

Gabs knew the riders were going to need loads of fuel in the tank for a stage in the big mountains so he grabbed some zucchinis gratefully offloaded by locals up to their ears in the things and some Saint-Marcellin cheese and cooked up a big bunch of Zucchini and Cheese Flan. The butter in this recipe is used to grease gratin dishes used to bake the flan in so don’t be shy and go the whole hog on a block of butter. This takes the Beurremetric Counter up to 750g.

Back to the race the riders were facing awesome climbs in the heat. I see teams are slow off the mark on the helmet shower idea. According to Matthew Keenan, or Keeno for short, noted fire trucks were deployed ahead of the peloton in case the tarmac suddenly erupted into flames in the heat. 30 degree temperatures are pretty warm but these French roads can’t take a bit of heat? Seriously? On a 40+ degree day the road to my chateau is as good as gold.

On the slopes spectators were out in force. Phil seriously needs to brush up on popular culture. As the motocamera passed two spectators in superhero costume Phil asked, “Is that Star Trek?”. Paul corrected him with, “That’s Captain America”.

So far there hasn’t been a lot of discussion on the roadside random front (morph suits, whatever happened to those?) There has been a little more commercialisation this year with oversized bidons running up the road flogging fruit juice or whatever.

Oversized bidons are the least of the rider’s problems with Jakob Fuglsang (Asstana) coming a cropper on a carelessly discarded regular sized bidon on the road. He picked himself up, kit torn and bloodied, but pushed on insisting it was ‘just a superficial flesh wound’.

Just a superficial flesh wound

The talk of the day was Richie Porte (Sky). All eyes were on the Tasmanian to start nibbling into Vincenzo Nibali’s (Asstana) lead. But it all went wrong on the lower slopes of the final climb to Chamrousse. Whether it was a hunger flat, melting roads, lack of a shower helmet or as Paul calls it simply ‘a strange reaction’, Porte looked like he was rolling back down the hill. Instead of nibbling into the lead Porte found himself left holding a plate heaped with time. If he’s going to get back into the race he’s got a lot of eating to do.

Further up the road Alejandro Valverde (Moviestar) made a move but Nibs wasn’t having any of it launching a shark attack at 7km to go. Nibs triumphed on the stage and added some valuable time.

It’d be brave/foolhardy of me to declare Vincenzo Nibali Tour winner with still a week to go, but from here it’s looking like it’s his Tour to lose.

Stage 9 Saint-Giron / Bagnères-de-Bigorre – Hooray for Hollywood

As day two in the Pyrenees dawned the peloton prepared for another gruelling day in the saddle for the 168km stage between Saint-Giron and Bagnères-de-Bigorre.

This was going to be another challenging stage after a day of hard climbing and with more mountains to cross than the number of bidons a domestique can humanly stuff into a jersey.

Froome started the day in yellow after yesterday’s triumph. But it was a different story today with his Sky lieutenants left far behind. Tasmanian team mate Richie Porte, who rode so strongly the day before, was all but left behind in Saint-Giron finishing about the time the rest of the tour was checking in baggage for the flight up north for the rest day and the next stage from Saint-Gildas-de-Bois to Saint-Malo.

The Froome Dog would finish the day in yellow but in the space of less than 24 hours the wheels had seemingly fallen off the Sky train. Team member Kiryienka is out having finished outside the time limit. Cyril Gotye of Oooorpcar was left wondering if this was the Sky team we used to know.

But it was not all gloom and doom. Movistar’s rising star Nairo Quintana had a good day with a top ten finish in the GC. And it seems quite a few of the fans are starting to develop a bit of a Quintana crush for the young Columbian.

At the podium preso Froome failed to show at the allotted time to accept the yellow once more. Reports suggest he had gone to the team bus. We waited...And waited. What was going on? Was this a diva like straight-to-trailer-Hollywood-tanty? Froome did show in the end. We’ll just have to wait for OK! Magazine to reveal the real truth behind his slow-show.

 

 

What really went on in the Froome Dog trailer?

 

With the podiums out of the way, it was time for Le Tour to pack the bags and head for the airport. Being a relatively short domestic flight, a feeding station was set up on the tarmac between the terminal and the plane. Riders grabbed their musette bags whilst trying to avoid any collisions.

Gabriel Gate had popped some Escargots aux Beurre d’herbeset de Noix or snails in walnut butter into the bags. How you get butter from a walnut I don’t know. I always thought it came from cows. Still what’s been a snails paced start Gabs has delivered with a healthy 150g of butter. A good start but he has A LOT of catching up to do.

Before I leave you to enjoy the rest day, here’s a joke that would make Mike Tomalaris proud; Why did the arthroscopic surgeon set up his practice in the mountains in the south of France? Because he likes the peer in knees.