procycling

Stage 2

The weather was (mostly?) dry today. Yet it must have been cold because everyone kept long clothes all day. The stage was not shortened; the race rules had plans for an alternate finish line half-way into the final climb in case of bad weather but it wasn't needed.

Scenario: as always, a breakaway of 6 (?) turned into 5 when I started watching. The base work in the peloton was shared between Ineos, Decathlon, Roubaix and St-Michel.

In several occasions, splits were created, mainly caused by accelerations by Decathlon; Roubaix was seen in numbers in the front groups too. But they all failed sooner or later.

The breakaway was caught when the final climb started.

As the climb was starting, we could get re-acquainted with the good old Ineos mountain train (Decathlon teammates had apparently been worn out by the accelerations they made before that). Miles after miles, it was a succession of drops from the back of the peloton.

Then as the group was down to, what?, 6 riders?, less?, Rodriguez (🇪🇸 Ineos) attacked. Only Ricitello (🇺🇸 Décathlon) could follow, not without difficulties. Behind was A. Paret-Peintre (🇫🇷 Décathlon).

The Ineos teammates who had lead the peloton before stepping aside recovered after a couple of minutes, and they started taking over the other competitors who had clung to the leaders longer. Thereby, Rivera (🇨🇴 Ineos) caught Paret-Peintre🇫🇷 up, and there were 2 Ineos-Décathlon duos ahead, with a gap of 10-20 seconds between both.

Ahead, Rodriguez🇪🇸 seemed to slow down as Ricitello🇺🇸 wouldn't relay. with 500 m to go, the second pair lead by Paret-Peintre🇫🇷 was almost catching up with the first one. But they didn't.

In a strange atmosphere of snow falling from the tree because of the wind (and the helicopter) in the sunshine, Ricitello🇺🇸 launched the sprint and won. He couldn't have won if the final couple of hundred metres hadn't been a festival of hard curves, surprising after 13 km of good mountain road. Rodriguez🇪🇸 may also have won if he had tried to distance the American in the climb, but after his initial attack, he didn't try anything and just pulled the American until the sprint.

Behind, Rivera🇨🇴 finished 3^rd^ as he had just been following Paret-Peintre🇫🇷 for several miles.

G. Martin (🇫🇷 FDJ) was dropped when there were still a dozen of riders in the peloton. He finished only 13^th^ at more than 1 minute behind Unibet's Christophersen...

The best rider from FDJ was actually Daumas🇫🇷 who belongs to their Conti devo team, he stayed longer in the group and finished at a good 7^th^ place with Champoussin (🇫🇷 Astana) and the very vitamined August (🇺🇸 Ineos).

Breuillard (🇫🇷 Total) resisted a long time with the best, he finished 9^th^.

The unfortunate Mariault (🇫🇷 CIC) came 10^th^ but he deserved better as he took the wrong way (car exit) in the nasty final part!

For Cofidis, Meehan🇮🇪 stayed relatively long, but finished a bit far, 16^th^ at 2 minutes. S. Carr🇬🇧 was as useless as usual, dropped once or twice before the climb and finishing at 15 mn.

EF doesn't show much this year. Their best man today is Leonard🇨🇦, 19^th^ at 2mn30... I think that the best performance of the teams they line up on small races this year is yesterday's 3^rd^ place... (and they did quite a number of those small races).