Tour de France 2018

Not the closest of Tours, but TDF 2018 was definitely one of the better ones from the last couple of years. Geraint Thomas winning, Sagan doing his usual antics and the battle for the podium made this year a great race.

The race started in the Vendee region, and the first stage was manic. When I saw that Richie Porte had crashed, I felt gutted for him, but then Quintana had a mechanical, Froome crashed and Porte’s crash didn’t seem as bad anymore. I prayed Team Sky didn’t dominate the TTT and be miles in front before the mountains, but this didn’t happen as BMC won.

The next GC action was on Stage 6 up Mur de Bretagne. However, this mainly happened at the back of the race instead of the front. Two of my favourite riders, Bardet and Dumoulin, both lost time, though I was delighted when Dan Martin won the stage. Stage 8 was interesting, as Groenewegen took the stage, but Greipel and Gaviria were DQ. I felt bad for Greipel as in my opinion he didn’t do anything wrong, it was Gaviria who caused the trouble.

Stage 9, the big one, cobbles for everyone. Porte crashed again, didn’t continue again, and his raced ended on stage 9, again. I was really disappointed for him, he looked on good form, he was high up on GC and this could have been the Tour for him. The cobbles were a bit odd, as the front group consisted of GC riders with the occasional classics specialist thrown in. Tom Dumoulin attacked, Bardet punctured about a million times, with the last one being just a few km from the finish. Mikel Landa crashed badly, and I thought that he wasn’t going to continue, but he and a few teammates started the pursuit back. Perhaps the most jaw-dropping moment of the entire tour came when Bardet and Landa lost just 7 seconds, a remarkable comeback.

Finally the mountains began on Stage 10, but no GC impact whatsoever. Stage 11 was the first summit finish, and Valverde attacked early. Dumoulin attacked on the decent and caught and dropped Valverde on the climb. Thomas then attacked and all the domestiques of cycling cheered him on. He passed Dumoulin and won the stage, but Chris Froome ended up towing Dumoulin to the line, the first Team Sky drama. Alpe d’Huez was next, and Steven Kruijswijk was the solo attacker this time. Quintana disappointed for the 3rd year in a row, and it was down to the 5 best. Nibali was brought down after getting tangled in a camera strap, and his race was over due to lack of crowd control. Thomas destroyed everybody else in the sprint to take his 2nd stage and become the favourite to win the overall.

Stage 13 was a bit dull compared to the 2 previously, and we saw Peter Sagan win his 3rd stage. His main sprint rivals were all out of the race due to the mountains, and he just had to make it to Paris to win his 6th green jersey. Stage 14 was one of only 2 which I watched live, and I got 2 races for the price of one on the steep hill at Mende. The entire French nation sighed when Bardet was dropped, and Dumoulin, Froome and Thomas showed that they are the strongest riders in the race. Stage 15 wasn’t too exciting, but the tactical finish from the break did make for an interesting finale.

Stage 16 was disappointing, with all the GC riders saving themselves. The two crashes were spectacular, Gilbert flying over a wall and Yates sliding out on a decent. Alaphilipe tried to wait for Yates, which was a nice gesture, but his DS told him that he was mental. Stage 17 was a special one, but the moto gridding system did nothing for the race. I was impressed with Quintana’s solo ride up the climb to win, and Roglic’s ride. Once Froome was dropped Roglic realised that he could finish on the podium so shot off the mountain, ending the day less than 15 seconds behind Froome on GC. Thomas dropped everybody for the 3rd Summit Finish in a row to nearly secure his yellow jersey.

After all that effort the previous day, Quintana managed to crash on Stage 18. While he lost no time, that ended his race completely. Stage 19 was the final mountain stage, and one last challenge for Thomas (not including the TT). Dumoulin tried to attack but Thomas was too strong, and then the race was between Roglic and Froome. Froome was dropped twice before rejoining on the first few bends of the decent. Roglic showed determination by not giving up, and gave everybody a tutorial on how to descend, by taking the stage with a reasonable advantage, which got him into 3rd overall. Roglic then faltered on Stage 20, the Time-Trial, and Froome moved up into 3rd. Not sure how the timing system didn’t manage to get who won the stage instantly, and it took a while before Tom Dumoulin was confirmed to have beaten Chris Froome.

Thomas won the Tour and gave us the least rehearsed speech in history where he nearly forgot to thank his wife. Thomas is the most popular winner for a few years, and has showed that a domestique can win the Tour if given the opportunity. If it had been Froome in yellow with a comfortable advantage then it wouldn’t have been nearly as exciting. This was the most exciting tour since 2015 in my opinion, and before that 2011.