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Bourg-Saint-Andéol
177 km
Tuesday 8 June
1. Juan José Haedo (Saxo Bank)
2. Martin Reimer (Cervélo)
3. Grega Bole (Lampre)
4. Sébastien Chavanel (Française des Jeux)
5. Roger Kluge (Milram)
Alberto Contador keeps the yellow jersey.
Haedo (Saxo Bank) wins the bunch sprint.
Boasson Hagen pulls the sprint for Thomas with 1km to go.
Delaplace tries his luck but the peloton comes close.
The Astana team rides at the first part of the bunch. Contador wants to stay out of trouble.
The five breakaway riders have 42 seconds lead with 5.5km to go. Bonnafond looks behind him to see if the peloton is close. The escapees keep giving it all.
The most active teams are Quick Step (for Stauff?), Liquigas (for Bennati), Française des Jeux (for Chavanel?), Saxo Bank (for Haedo) and Sky (for Boasson Hagen or Thomas?). The gap is only 53 seconds with 8.2km to go.
With 12km to go, Calzati (Sky) and Rasch (Cervélo) put the hammer down in front of the bunch for their sprinters.
The finishing line is a straight road with a brand new surface. The riders will face a significant head wind.
With 15km to go, the breakaway riders have 2.28 lead.
At the 20km to go mark, the gap is exactly 3 minutes.
With 23 km to go, more teams become active at the head of the peloton: Liquigas, Française des Jeux, Milram and Sky... with Saxo Bank who has done most of the work so far.
With 35km to go, the gap decreases slowly: it’s 3.25.
South African climber John-Lee Augustyn was doubtful about his form at the start of the Dauphiné. He resumed racing in Evian-les-Bains after being sidelined because of a knee injury and a visa problem. But the recruit of Team Sky is reassured as he looked at ease in the col du Benas and rides well at the head of the bunch.
With 50 kilometres to go, the peloton is 3.43 behind the 5-men breakaway group.
Results and time gaps at the col de Benas:
1. Tankink, 10 points
2. Bonnafond, 9 points
3. Isasi, 8 points
4. Augé, 7 points
5. Delaplace, 6 points
6. Gautier, 5 points, at 3.50
Two riders from Sky, John-Lee Augustyn and Nicolas Portal, speed up at the head of the peloton in the climb.
Bram Tankink outsprints Guillaume Bonnafond at the col du Benas. The Dutchman will wear the polka dot jersey tomorrow.
With 1km to go to the top of the col du Benas, the peloton led by Saxo Bank is 4.30 behind the five breakaway riders.
The weather is getting better as the riders progress towards the finish. It’s clearing up on the road and at the finish as well.
Two riders of Saxo Bank lead the pack in the climb of col du Benas with Milram ready to help. The gap is 4.50 at km 118.5. Lequatre (RadioShack) and Pasamontes (Caisse d’Epargne) crash at the back with apparently no consequences.
In the third hour, the breakaway riders have covered 36.2 kilometres. The average speed since the start in Annonay is 39km/h.
Breton fighter Cyril Gautier would love to wear the polka dot jersey tonight. With one category 2 climb to go, he still leads the king of the mountains classification with 15 points, followed by Bonnafond and Tankink who have 13 points each, and Isasi with 10. A category 2 climb allocates 10, 9, 8, 7, 6 and 5 points to the first six riders respectively.
It’s 5.35 at km 108.
Result of the second intermediate sprint in Privas:
1. Stéphane Augé, 3 points
2. Tankink, 2 points
3. Isasi, 1 point
Results and time gaps at the KOM of Moulin-à-Vent at km 102:
1. Tankink, 10 points
2. Bonnafond, 9 points
3. Isasi, 8 points
4. Delaplace, 7 points
5. Augé, 6 points
6. Gautier, 5 points, at 5.15
Peloton at 5.40
At the second category climb of Moulin-à-Vent, Bram Tankink passed in first position, preceding Bonnafond, Isasi, Delaplace and Augé.
The time difference between the breakaway and the bunch is back to 6 minutes at km 95.
The time gap is 5.15 at km 91.
Marco Marzano who finished the 3-week long Giro d’Italia last week has pulled out in the feed zone.
At half way into the race, the peloton has a deficit of exactly six minutes at the entrance of the feed zone of Le Moulinon (km 88.5).
Two Saxo Bank riders are taking the commands of the pack now. The gap remains 6.10.
The breakaway riders have covered 40.6 kilometres in the second hour of racing. It makes an average speed of 40.4km/h so far.
With Milram, the Bbox Bouygues Telecom team is the most active at the head of the peloton where approximately fifteen riders precede the Astana team. Yellow jersey Alberto Contador stays safely in the first part of the bunch in order to avoid crashes more likely to happen at the back.
The gap is stabilised just above six minutes. It’s 6.10 at km 74. One rider from Milram is noticed in the first position of the bunch.
Result of the first intermediate sprint in Le Cheylard (km 63.5):
1. Delaplace, 3 points
2. Augé, 2 points
3. Tankink, 1 point
At the col des Nonières the riders of the Dauphiné are using the same road scheduled for stage 12 from Bourg-de-Péage to Mende in the coming Tour de France. Alberto Contador and many other cyclists in action today will ride their bike from Lamastre to Le Cheylard again on July 16.
Guillaume Bonnafond won the sprint for the king of the mountains competition at col des Nonières. It was strongly contested.
1. Bonnafond, 4 points
2. Tankink, 3 points
3. Isasi, 2 points
4. Delaplace, 1 point
It starts raining again as the breakaway group sees the mark of the 50 kilometres covered. The temperature is 18°C. At the finish in Bourg-Saint-Andéol, it’s cloudy but it doesn’t rain.
Jean-Christophe Péraud (Omega Pharma-Lotto) has crashed again today at km 45 but got back on and rejoined the peloton. Yesterday he bumped into a Katusha team car and looked badly injured. However, the Olympic silver medallist for mountain biking finished in the first group and continued racing today but luck is obviously not on his side.
At km 43, a new time gap indicates a decrease of advantage for the escapees: 7.20.
Today’s stage started in Annonay like the one of Paris-Nice won by Jérémy Roy in Vallon-Pont d’Arc last year. The course was very similar too. "These roads are exhausting", said to letour.fr the Frenchman who is not currently competing in the Dauphiné. "The breakaway group has good chances to make it till the end. On this course, it’s very difficult for teams to bring it back, especially today as Alberto Contador won’t defend his jersey. There aren’t many teams likely to do it. I’ve watched yesterday’s stage and I didn’t understand why Garmin-Transitions pulled."
At km 35.5, the bunch was timed 8.10 behind the breakaway group.
In the first hour of racing, the breakaway has covered 40.2 kilometres.
At the entrance of Arlebosc (km 30), the five breakaway riders are 6.50 ahead of the peloton.
Tankink (Rabobank), Bonnafond (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Augé (Cofidis), Isasi (Euskaltel) and Delaplace (Saur-Sojasun) have a lead of 3.50 at km 25.
Samuel Dumoulin was one of the victims of the last crash yesterday but he’s fine today. "He only has bruises mostly on his two legs", Cofidis’ directeur sportif Francis Vanlondersele told letour.fr, adding that his protégé feared the rain today. The road is wet, indeed.
New time gap: 1.20 at km 22.
The gap between the five escapees and the bunch is 45 seconds at km 20.
The advantage of the five escapees moves up to 30 seconds. The bunch is led by the Astana team almost complete.
Tankink (Rabobank), Bonnafond (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Augé (Cofidis), Isasi (Euskaltel) and Delaplace (Saur-Sojasun) go clear and enjoy an advantage of 10 seconds at km 17.
Local daily newspaper Le Dauphiné describes today’s stage: “It’s hilly at about half way. The stage is entirely held in the province of Ardèche. The roads aren’t insurmountable for the sprinters who have a unique occasion to shine on the shores of the Rhône river. It remains to be seen which teams will take the command of the bunch and gear up for a bunch gallop. Lampre would be wrong to not play Bole’s card again while Liquigas will probably try and position Bennati in the best conditions. But the terrain favours attackers once again.”
Cyril Gautier becomes the new leader of the king of the mountain price.
Result of the first mountain price at km 11:
1. Marco Bandiera (Katusha), 3 points
2. Cyril Gautier (Bbox), 2 points
3. Egoi Martinez (Euskaltel), 1 point
Benoît Vaugrenard (FDJ) tries again with Egoi Martinez (Euskaltel).
The escapee ends at km 10 because of a strong reaction from the peloton.
At km 7, at the initiative of Benoît Vaugrenard (Française des Jeux), a group of four is formed in the climb of Saint-Jeure-d’Ay with Sebastian Langeveld (Rabobank), Staf Scheirlinckx (Omega Pharma-Lotto) and Dominique Rollin (Cervélo) who made the long break yesterday already.
The leading trio is rejoined in the kilometre 2 of the stage.
In the first kilometre of racing, Stéphane Augé (Cofidis) is the first rider on the attack. He’s quickly rejoined by Alan Perez (Euskaltel) and Aleksej Saramotins (HTC-Columbia).
Km 11: Côte de Saint-Jeure-d’Ay, category 4 (2.1km at 5.8%)
Km 54: Col des Nonières, cat. 3 (4.7 km at 4%)
Km 102: Col du Moulin-à-Vent, cat. 2 (10.5km at 4%)
Km 124.5: Col du Benas (10.6km at 4.8%)
Two intermediate sprints will be contested today in Le Cheylard (km 63.5) and Privas (km 109.5)
171 riders are cruising in the neutral zone, ready to start stage 2. It rains in Annonay.
There are four non-starters as a consequence of yesterday’s crashes: Paul Martens who was 7th on GC and Dennis Van Winden (Rabobank), Mauro Finetto (Liquigas-Doimo) who was last on GC and Haimar Zubeldia (RadioShack). The latter has a broken wrist. His participation to the Tour de France is in danger.
Race leader Alberto Contador (Astana) is in yellow for the second consecutive day. Geraint Thomas (Sky) has the green jersey of the points classification. Matthieu Ladagnous (Française des Jeux) wears the polka dot jersey.
Welcome to the live coverage of stage 2 of the 62nd Criterium du Dauphiné from Annonay to Bourg-Saint-Andéol (177km).
