Veni, Vidi, Bini
Veni, Vidi, Bini
Girmay's grip on the green jersey gets tighter, as does Vingegaard's grip on Pogačar's back wheel
When this goes up on Friday morning, Stage 13 of the Tour de France will be underway. It’s a flat stage, though with a couple category-4 climbs in the final 40 kilometers. I expect it to come down to a bunch sprint, and for someone—probably Jasper Philipsen or Biniam Girmay—to win it.
After winning Stage 12—an improbable third stage win in two weeks—Girmay now has a 107-point lead over Philipsen in the green jersey standings. He’s also passed the all-important 300-point barrier. As I said in my last post, on Sunday night, 300 points has been good enough to win the green jersey the past eight Tours de France.
Bini isn’t home free yet. Even with only two flat stages left—one on Friday, the other on Stage 16—Philipsen would take 100 points by winning both even without scoring on any of the intermediate sprints. But that assumes that Girmay also doesn’t score, and so far, Girmay is leading Philipsen 3-1 in stage wins and has beaten him on four of the six sprint stages so far. Even if Philipsen wins both of those remaining sprint stages, Girmay could cut his losses to 40 total points by finishing second. And that’s not factoring in all the advantages Girmay has. He’s a better climber, better in breakaways, better able to steal points on intermediate sprints.
Plus Philipsen’s leadout train is falling apart. Alpecin-Deceuninck and Astana (Mark Cavendish’s team) both lost two riders on Stage 12. Intermarché is still rolling with a full eight-man team, and Girmay’s last leadout man, Mike Teunissen,1 just ripped off a Hall of Fame leadout to deliver Girmay to the line from like 15 riders back with less than a kilometer to go. Plus Fabio Jakobsen DNF’d on that stage, and less competition generally favors Girmay, who doesn’t actually have to beat Philipsen the rest of the way—he just has to keep it close. And then there’s the possibility that Philipsen, with his shorthanded team, gets OTL’d in the 2,000-meter-plus mountains in Week 3.
At this point, it looks like an overwhelming likelihood that we’re going to see the first African winner of a grand tour points classification, and the best overall performance for any Black rider in a major men’s road race. Which is cool as hell.
The points classification being all but wrapped up this early in the race is an artifact of how devilishly difficult the back half of the race is going to be. I haven’t heard about a rear end with this much climbing since the last time I listened to “Wobble” by V.I.C.2
The real nasty shit doesn’t start until after the rest day, and therefore after the next newsletter, but Saturday and Sunday are both going to be tough. Stage 14 has two outside-category climbs—including the Col du Tourmalet—bookending the second-category Hourquette d’Ancizan. Stage 14 goes up the Col de Peyresourde right off the hop, the first of four first-category peaks, before a summit finish on Plateau de Beille, an outside-category climb.
As an aside, EF went hog wild in the breakaway on Stage 11, with Richard Carapaz pulling for Ben Healy as two of the last three riders standing. It didn’t work because UAE was pulling so hard to set up a Pogačar attack and caught the break with like 30 kilometers left.
But I think it’s the right idea, and if EF tries it again on Stage 15, with the Peyresourde right at the start and two other cat-1 climbs in the first 65 kilometers, the break is going to get an absolute bucketload of time and should be able to stay away. If EF does the exact same thing I like their chances of getting a stage win for either Carapaz or Healy3 on Stage 15.
We’re also passing through two elite Tour de France place names this weekend: the Tourmalet on Saturday and Bagnères-de-Luchon on Sunday.
I said this earlier in the season—I think during the UAE Tour—that it’s a good thing that a sport as obsessed with geography as cycling has its biggest race in France, because French is an incredible language for place names.
Top 10 Tour de France Place Names:
10) Col du Tourmalet
9) La Planche des Belles Filles4
8) Luz-Ardiden
7) Prat d'Albis
6) Hautacam
5) Col de la Croix de Fer
4) Col de Joux Plane
3) Plateau des Glières
2) Puy de Dôme
1) Bagnères-de-Bigorre
Leave a comment with your favorite Tour de France place name.
On a more serious note, I’m starting to wonder if Tadej Pogačar has missed his chance to win the Tour de France.