Gilbert: A Victorious Favorite

The Progress Report
The opening stage of the 98th Tour de France began at 12.20pm with a 13.5km neutral zone before arriving at the start of the Passage du Gois where an official opening ceremony took place. The official start was at 12.58pm.
There were 198 riders from 22 teams at the sign on this morning. The 191.5km stage from Passage du Gois to Mont des Alouettes had one intermediate sprint – at Avrillé at the 87km mark – and only one categorized climb, the one to the finish just above the town of Les Herbiers. The conditions were fine and warm for the start with a temperature of around 25 degrees Celsius.

Instant Attack
The moment that Christian Prudhomme waved the flag to signal the start of the stage there was a strong attack by several Europcar riders. The peloton allowed a trio to quickly gain an advantage. The successful escapees were Jérémy Roy (FDJ), Perrig Quemeneur (EUR) and Lieuwe Westra (VCD). They built a maximum gain of 6’30” at the 12km mark before riders from Garmin-Cervélo, HTC, Astana and Omega Pharma-Lotto lifted the pace of the peloton. The average speed for the first hour was 42.3km/h. The advantage was held steady at around five minutes for the next hour.
At the 63km mark, Vanendert (OLO) crashed near the head of the peloton and caused a few others to fall. Riders caught up included Arroyo (MOV) and several others but all involved quickly remounted and rejoined the peloton. The average speed for the second hour was 40.1km/h.

Farrar Rules The Intermediate Sprint
With 5km to go before the Avrille sprint, Lampre sent its troops to the front of the peloton that was 4’05” behind the escapees. There was a concerted lead-out by HTC, Omega Pharma and Lampre but it was Farrar who scampered ahead to take fourth place points 2’35” behind Roy’s trio. Five kilometers later, there was a discussion at the front of the peloton between Gilbert (OLO), Tosatto (SBS) and Hushovd (GRM)… in a matter of moments the advantage of the leaders was back up to 4’30”. With about 65km to go, Garmin-Cervélo joined Omega Pharma-Lotto riders at the front to control the pace setting duties while the leaders enjoyed an advantage of 5’15”. The average speed for the third hour was 38.5km/h.
Gerdemann (LEO) was involved in a crash with about 55km to go; it was caused by a Europcar rider. All involved remounted their bikes and rejoined the peloton.
The escape was caught 18km from the finish.

Gilbert Wins… Ahead Of Crash Carnage
Gilbert’s team-mates were on the front of the bunch at the time of capture but were replaced by riders from Europcar, Leopard-Trek and RadioShack. Omega Pharma-Lotto never dropped far behind but they gave the responsibility of the pacesetting to other formations. He may have been the absolute favorite but he never looked like he would be beaten… not only did he win the stage but he gained considerable time on riders who might otherwise have been in the mix had it not been for a crash with 9km to go. That wasn’t the end of the accidents either as there was another significant pile-up with 3km to go.

Contador And Many Others Caught Up In Crashes…
There was a touch of wheels in the middle of the peloton with 9km to go and it caused a ricochet to surge through the bunch and take out all but 27 riders. Many favorites were caught up and no matter what they did they could not close the gap. Alberto Contador, Andy Schleck, Ivan Basso and other big favorites for the overall title tried to limit his losses but he is one of many to finish 1’21” behind the stage winner…
Philippe Gilbert took his first Tour stage win, three years after finishing second in the opening stage. He will wear the yellow jersey in stage two but he also leads the points and climbing classifications.