Stage 9: Aigle to Châtel (mountains)

Bob Jungels riding on the way to victory on Stage 9 — Bob Jungels slogging his way uphill to stage victory and recovery from long illness

The breakaway stayed away, ultimately in the form of Luxembourger Jungels of AG2R, although some of us may have been cheering, along with most of France, for Pinot whose brave chase eventually fizzled into a fourth place finish, but deservedly collecting the Combativity Consolation Award. Don’t spend it all at once, Thibault.

Meanwhile further back from the French TV director’s focus on the Frenchman, greedy Pog burned off his GC riders for a few more seconds. He either can’t help himself racing every day or he’s making the most of it before his Covid lottery ticket comes up.

Team of the Day

Stage 9 was a high scoring day for most. Best placed team selection was second-place Jonathan CastroViejo for Paul M’s Lo Ve, but Team of the Day was Philippa’s It’s all downhill from here, with Verona 3rd, Pogacar 5th, Vingegaard 6th and G in 7th. Chapeau! But not all good news for the Downhillers because Ruben Guerreiro was a non-starter with Covid and Ben O’Conner looked like he wanted to go home too and lost nearly half an hour.

Team roster for It's all downhill from here, with velopoints scores f#rom Stage 9 — It’s all downhill from here – team roster and scores for Stage 9

Stats du Jour

How is your team doing on the second Rest Day? First up, Philippa’s It’s all downhill from here squad stay ahead in the team time rankings, while Stephen’s Team Ciclominaccia plummet down the chart (as Danny Martinez lost a lot of time on Stage 9):

But despite the melting aspirations of Martinez, Team Ciclominaccia are comfortably ahead in the trophy cabinet with Thin Fat Boys and the Austrian Ostriches in equal second place:

Histogram of jerseys and prizes for minileague teams after Stage 9

Meanwhile the Thin Fat Boys have achieved most top ten finishes, including 10 podiums in 9 days! Martin’s Le Tour for sure and the Downhillers are tied in second.

Top ten stage finishers bar chart after Stage 9

And in the minileague rankings, is your team ascending like Pog on the Planche des Bells Filles, or descending like Bob Jungels from the Col de la Croix?

My favourite quote of the Tour

“I’m just the son of a farmer”
Yves Lampaert, after winning the Stage 1 ITT

Postcard from Switzerland

Swiss postage stamp of 2020 celebrating the UCI Road World Championships

Dimanche 10 juillet. Aigle.

The cuckoo clock woke me early for an quick cycle round the lake. Then back for melted gruyere on my muesli. The stamp is an oddity because it celebrated the World championships which was supposed to start in Aigle a couple of years ago, but was re-scheduled later in Italy due to the pan-demonic situation. The elite road races and ITTs were won by Alaphillippe, Ganna and Anna van der Breggen. Marc Hirschi, Stefan Küng and Marlene Reusser were thereabouts for Switzerland, but with no rainbow jerseys to bring home to the mountains.