Lance Armstrong showed that he had one big Tour de France performance left in him when he animated what was otherwise a dull days racing on Stage 16, despite the magnificence of the profile of the 200km slog from Bagneres-de-Luchon to Pau. In the end Armstrong's brekaway survived, but he could only finish 6th behind Frenchman Pierrick Fedrigo, who won the final sprint to the line from Sandy Casar and Ruben Plaza. There was no change to the overall classification with all the GC contenders finishing together in the main group.
And so it was The Queen stage of this years Tour that Armstrong chose to give us his last hurrah, starting and then igniting the early breaks until he and a group of 9 other riders were finally let free on the HC climb of the Col du Tourmalet. The break maintained their advantage onto the final HC climb of the day, the Col d'Aubisque (peaking some 60km from the finish), and it was this climb that Armstrong chose to attack. He initially reduced the break from 10 to 5, but was then himself put under pressure by a series of blistering attacks from San Sebastien winner Carlos Barredo. Initially only Ferdigo could match the Spainard but by the top of the climb Armstrong, Plaza, and Daminao Cunego had all come back together for the descent. However, rather than trying to work together, Barredo was itching to go it alone, and some 45km from the finish, just as the break hit the flatlands he commenced a solo attack. Suprisingly his comapnions let him go and at one stage his lead grew to 45 seconds and it looked as if he would take the day. However, the break finally got its chase sorted over the last 10km, and with Chirstophe Moreau powering them on they tragically reeled in the brave Barredo (who deserved the win) right under the flamme rouge. That left it down to a sprint, and as seems to be the pattern of this years Tour a Frenchman won it, with Fedrigo having too much for his countrymen Casar with Plaza in third. Armstrong tried to come from well back in the sprint and while he got out in time and momentarily looked as if he might challenge for the win, his 38 year old legs simply did not have the power and he faded to finish 6th. Still it was a brave and courageous effort from the 7 time winner who has certainly given us something to remember him by at this years race.
Sadly, on a stage that deserved better, the break was the story of the day as the race resembled more of transitional stage than the Queen stage of the Pyrenees. With 60km from the top of the Aubisque to the finish (absolutely shithouse planning by the director no matter what he claims the stage was trying to emulate) none of the big guns had any incentive to attack as they would not have been able to defend any advantage gained in to Pau. As a result, rather than the battle royal we should have got over some of the famous climbs of the Pyrenees, what we in fact saw was merely a precession of the elite bunch over one climb before moving on to the next. The result was tepid racing and the main bunch finally rolled in to town almost 7 minutes behind the stagewinner. The sad thing is that every Tour fan and his dog could have told Christian Prudhomme (the race director) that this is exactly what was going to happen with so many dead kilometres between the final peak and the finishing line. While Prudhomme should be given credit for including the cobbles in the race this year, the planning of today's stage was poor. At least he has included the final epic mountain finish to the summit of the Tourmalet before the final time trial so we are guaranteed to see fire works on Thursday night. But today, there was no change to either of the time classifications with Alberto Contador holding the Yellow and Andy Schleck holding on the White Jersey by unchanged margins.
One thing is exciting is the battle for the minor jersey's none of which are really yet to be decided. Anthony Charteau would have thought he had wrapt up the King of the Mountains classification after he got into the break and finished in the top 2 over the first two cat-1 climbs of the day. However, he was dropped on the Tourmalet, and after Christophe Moureau joined the break he rode magnificently to crest both the HC Tourmalet and Aubisque in first position. This puts Moreau within striking distance of Charteau, who holds the Polka Dot Jersey by 23 points with three big mountains left to contest on Thursday night. To win, Moreau will have to finish in the top 3 on a couple of these mountains and hope Charteau does not garner any points, a possibility if he can get into the likely early break. Honestly though if Charteau manages to hang on after picking up a hell of a lot of cheap mountain points early on he will have to go down as one of the all time worst winners of the Polka Dot Jersey in my book.
The farce that was the racing of the peleton today was highlighted by the fact that the Green Jersey changed hands on the most epic of mountain stages! The main bunch were so disinterested that Thor Hushovd of all riders managed to stay with them for the entire stage and as a result had no real rivals for the sprint for 10th place when the peleton came into town. 10th was enough to gain 6 points which was plenty more than he needed to overcome his current deficit to Alessandro Pettachi. Hushovd regains the green jersey in this yo-yo battle amongs the sprinters and now has a 4 point lead over Pettachi. It looks to be a battle between those two with Cavendish probably just too far back (as he was at this stage last year), 29 points behind in third.
Yellow Jersey - Alberto Contador
Green Jersey - Thor Hushovd
Polka Dot Jersey - Anthony Charteau
White Jersey - Andy Schleck
Tonight's stage - Tonight sees the second rest day and many riders (and Australian late night TV fans) will be getting some much needed R&R before the battle resumes with the monumental climb to the Tourmalet on Thursday night. Unlike last night - I can guarantee that this one will be a cracker!
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