Right then, that’s all from me. A superbly judged solo break from Patrick Konrad brought him his first Tour de France stage win, but it was a day when nothing changed in the GC standings. Here’s Jeremy Whittle’s report. Bye!
Patrick Konrad of the Bora Hansgrohe team took a solo victory in the second Pyrenean stage of this year’s Tour de France, from Pas de la Casa to Saint-Gaudens.
The Austrian rider broke clear of his breakaway companions, four kilometres from the summit of the stage’s steepest climb, the Col de Portet d’Aspet, to seal his first Tour stage win three days after he finished second, on stage 14 to Quillan, and five days after his team mate Nils Pollitt won in Nimes.
Although Konrad was pursued by a group of nine riders in the closing kilometres, the Austrian national road race champion, who finished eighth in last year’s Giro d’Italia, held on to seal the biggest win of his career.
Much more here:
Here’s William Fotheringham’s preview of tomorrow’s stage, 178.4km from Muret to Sant-Lary-Soulan:
The first of two mountain-top finishes that should decide the race. There’s a lengthy, flattish preamble where a large break should gain several minutes – in recent years these have involved as many as 30 riders – while the final 50kms includes a daunting trio of passes, culminating in the hardest finish of the Tour, the super-steep 10 miles to the Col de Portet. López, Roglic and Pogacar will be the main men here, and the stage win should go to the best climber out of the break – a rider like Gaudu.
Tadej Pogacar talks about the late attack that peeled off the front of the peloton. “I don’t know what happened at the end. I just followed the wheels,” he says. “I’ve no idea what we were doing.” As for tomorrow, he says “I’m not worried, but it’s going to be a really hard day.” If anyone wants to eat into his lead, they’d better het their knives and forks out.
The first 10 across the line in today’s stage were:
- Konrad
- Colbrelli
- Matthews
- Périchon
- Bonnamour
- Aranburu
- Skujins
- Bakelants
- Gaudu
Mark Cavendish has finished the stage, well within the cutoff.
Patrick Konrad is chuffed:
It’s my first stage win. I’m really speachless. This victory is of course for my family, my friends, for all my believers, and also for BORA-Hansgrohe. They always gave me trust, they told me to fight for it. It came really in the right moment. To win a stage here makes me really proud.
I was already three times in the break, and I was always waiting really until the final, and it was always not the best decision, because [other people] went really early, and I said to myself, ‘OK, when I come one more time in this situation I am the guy.’ I gave it a try, and I’m really happy I had the legs and made it until the finish.
When I passed the 1km line, I saw the uphill part and thought, ‘Agh, this could be painful again.’ But there was time to celebrate. I really believed in it with 500m to go. I’m super, super happy, and I think I can really enjoy this moment now.
Pogacar has now finished the stage, lead safely protected.
It looks like 16 people have followed Geschke in a breakaway group, but unfortunately for fans of intrigue and upset, all of the GC top 10 riders are in it.
Updated
Simon Geschke and Guillaume Martin of Cofidis try to break clear of the yellow jersey group, and as it responds the group is tugged loose. Potential for some late-breaking interest here!
“Very strange stage,” says Bradley Wiggins. “There’s not many stages like that where you get a chance to take it to Pogacar, but there was nothing. Let’s hope tomorrow’s better than today was.”
The yellow jersey group is still 8.5km away from the finish line, and in no apparent hurry to get there.
Over the last kilometre or so Pierre-Luc Périchon pulls clear of the chasers in search of second place, but he’s overhauled on the line and both Sonny Colbrelli and Michael Matthews cross it before him!
Patrick Konrad wins stage 16!
Patrick Konrad wraps up his first grand tour stage victory! The last 600m is a solo celebration for the Austrian 29-year-old, whose solo breakaway started with about 35km to go, and was never hauled in.
1.5km to go: This will be BORA-hansgrohe’s second stage win on this year’s Tour. Only Mark Cavendish’s Deceuninck-QuickStep have won more.
3km to go: Konrad’s lead is just below a minute. If he stays on his bike he wins the stage.
4.5km to go: This is Konrad’s stage, that’s been clear for a while and getting clearer. “Matthews wants the finish points to enable him to take green jersey off Cavendish tomorrow (or day after),” notes Steve Green.
6.8km to go: Gaudu launches himself off the front of the chasing group, but he can’t sustain the effort. Konrad meanwhile is over the top of the Cote d’Aspret-Sarrat, and it’s all downhill from here.
7km to go: Konrad is stretching his lead, even though he’s hit the meat of the Cote d’Aspret-Sarrat and nobody else quite has.
8km to go: Pogacar and his entire band of UAE teammates are at the front of the peloton, pretty happy with the way this is going. His lead does not look likely to be remotely threatened today.
10km to go: Konrad’s lead isn’t shrinking significantly. It’s 1min 3sec as I type, but there’s a group of nine behind him who are looking hungry.
13km to go: Gaudu and Colbrelli appear to have been caught by seven others, including Michael Matthews and Jan Bakelants. They are a minute and six seconds behind Konrad.
15km to go: “It appears to me that there’s some Thrilling Heroics happening,” writes MalicousA, “and Gaudu could very well be reaching into The Bag and getting Proper Ready to do this.” Well I for one am completely up for seeing what thrilling heroics David Gaudu has in The Bag.
16km to go: Konrad leads by a minute now. If he can handle the Côte d’Aspret-Sarrat, the stage could well be his.
18km to go: Patrick Konrad has a 40sec gap at the front, with Gaudu and Colbrelli behind him.
19km to go: Next up is the day’s final climb, the category four Côte d’Aspret-Sarrat, the smallest categorised climb of this year’s Tour.
21km to go: The peloton has just gone over the top of the Col de Portet d’Aspet, about 12km behind the leaders.
24km to go: A memorable image from the last time the Tour visited Saint-Guadens, where today’s stage finishes.
29km to go: Another damp descent follows. Gaudu and Colbrelli might have to wait until the gradient eases before they really start eating into Konrad’s lead.
33km to go: Konrad goes over the top of the Col de Portet-d’Aspet. Behind him, there’s all sorts going on, but Sonny Colbrelli and David Gaudu have attacked and are about 25 seconds back.
35km to go: Patrick Konrad has set off on his own!
🇦🇹 @PatricKonrad goes solo!
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 13, 2021
🇦🇹 Patrick Konrad s'en va seul ! Le champion d'Autriche attaque et lâche ses compagnons d'échappée !#TDF2021 pic.twitter.com/mCP9vvmH4b
39km to go: They are through Orgibet, and about 6km from the top of the climb. Here’s a handy visualisation:
🔎 The riders are now tackling the climb up the Col de Portet-d'Aspet. Discover its 3D profile.
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 13, 2021
🔎 Les leaders s'attaquent à l'ascension au Col de Portet-d'Aspet. Découvrez le profil 3D de l'ascension.#TDF2021 pic.twitter.com/BYKGoXzUtk
43km to go: They are now on their way up the Col du Portet d’Aspet. Here’s a William Fotheringham article from 2005 on the climb and it’s unhappy history:
A little further down, where there is space between the cliff face and the stream, stands the large marble memorial to the 1992 Olympic champion Fabio Casartelli, who crashed here on July 18 1995 and died of massive head injuries. Every day on the Tour there are accidents; most are banal. This was a reminder that the margins between life and death on the race are very narrow indeed.
The Tour has a small number of holy places and the Portet d’Aspet is one of them. Cycling fans come here to pay tribute, leaving their offerings - those hats, bottles and flowers - as they do at the Tom Simpson memorial on the Mont Ventoux and the statue of Fausto Coppi on the Col d’Izoard. These are places of pilgrimage: the Tour’s noble dead serve as a symbol for the sacrifices and suffering of all who have attempted the world’s greatest bike race.
Much more here:
53km to go: They are speeding down this descent, and will soon be on their way up another thing, the Portet d’Aspet. They’re about to reach a place called Orgibet, which sounds a lot like an online gambling company but is in fact a village of some 200 inhabitants.
65km to go: Patrick Konrad was first over the hill, and there’s now another tricky descent to deal with. Full point allocation as follows:
- Patrick Konrad, 10 pts
- Bakelants, 8 pts
- Doubey, 6 pts
- Colbrelli, 4 pts
- Bonnamour, 2 pts
- Gaudu, 1 pt
69km to go: The leaders are only 15 seconds away from the chasers, and between them there are 12 riders, with the peloton nearly seven minutes behind.
70km to go: “Just found a clip of Sir Brad on the motorbike following the race,” writes Gary Naylor. “Looks pretty relaxed.” Awesome footage this, with a pleasingly prominent beret, heartily recommended.
73km to go: Its all a bit strung out at the front now: the leading trio of Bakelants, Doubey and Jensen; Patrick Konrad who is on his own trying to catch them up and about 15sec behind; and then a 10-man group 40 seconds back of whom the big name is David Gaudu. The peloton is about five minutes behind them.
76km to go: Up the Col de la Core they go. This climb has now featured in seven Tours: once each in the 1980s, 1990s, 2010s and now the 2020s, and not for precisely a decade. There were also three visits on the spin in 2002, 2003, 2004. Quite what happened to make it so popular in the early noughties I’ve no idea.
Updated
80km to go: Full results of the intermediate sprint:
- Jan Bakelants, 20 pts
- Doubey, 17 pts
- Juul Jensen, 15 pts
- Matthews, 13 pts
- Colbrelli, 11 pts
- Bonnamour, 10 pts
- Cosnefroy, 9 pts
- Konrad, 8 pts
- Périchon, 7 pts
- Rota, 6 pts
- Skujins, 5 pts
- Wright, 4 pts
- Gaudu, 3 pts
- Aranburu, 2 pts
- Stake Laengen, 1 pt
Colbrelli moves to fourth in the green jersey standings on 170, but still 109 away from Mark Cavendish’s 279.
80km to go: “Lots of riders have just stopped for a wee,” says Bradley Wiggins on EuroSport, who is on the back of a motorbike so he can brings us these on-the-ground insights.
82km to go: Just outside Oust lies the Château de Mirabat, a ruined castle that’s so old it was already a ruin 700 years ago.
84km to go: Points in the bank for Bakelants, who is followed over the finish line by Doubey and then Bakelants.
87km to go: Three riders have set off at the front now, namely Fabien Doubey, Chris Juul-Jensen and Jan Bakelants.
96km to go: They are about 3km from Aleu, and 10km from the day’s intermediate sprint, to Vic d’Oust. Incidentally, if you ever find yourself competing in the pétanque at the Aleu festival, you must apparently be very wary of playing near the lime tree in the schoolyard, because the roots can play havoc with your roll.
100km to go: The riders will soon go through Castet d’Aleu, a hamlet on the outskirts of Aleu, which sounds like an interesting place. “The village is famous for its festival,” explains French Wikipedia. “The high points of these three days are in particular the pétanque competitions, the egg race and the onion soup.”
105km to go: The peloton has caught the leaders, so it’s back to square one, albeit a square one that’s about 70km closer to the finish than the first one.
113km to go: Aurélien Paret-Peintre was the best of the rest over the Pass of Pass, and pickets the one leftover climbing point. They’re now descending again, in light rainfall and on very wet roads.
114.5km to go: And over they go, with Cattaneo leading them and Asgreen ahead of Kwiatkowski.
115km to go: There are now three riders at the front, Asgreen having been caught by Kwiatkowski and Cattaneo. They’re just 1km from the top, and one of them will be first.
119km to go: They’ve gone at this pretty quickly: the Tour gives timings for each stage based on three possible speeds, and the fastest they envisaged would see them reach the top of the Col de Port at 2.46pm local/1.46pm GMT. I think they’re going to beat that by a couple of minutes. As a result a few riders are struggling, including Chris Froome who has just be dropped.
121km to go: About 6km from the top of the climb, and Asgreen’s lead is shrinking. Michal Kwiatkowski and Mattia Cattaneo are chasing, and 30sec behind.
126km to go: Asgreen’s lead is 1min 37sec, and the two people trying to catch him have given up and been sucked back into the peloton.
@Simon_Burnton re Asgreen’s lockdown project. Did he seek help from Tee Jay van Gardener-en. I’ll show meself out.
— JimD (@jamesjimdavi) July 13, 2021
130km to go: They’re very much in the lower foothills of the Col de Port. Col is French for pass, whereas Port is Occitan for, er, pass. So Col de Port = pass of pass. It is, according to the first hit I got in a popular search engine, “one of the easiest ‘big’ climbs in the French Pyrenees”.
134km to go: On their way up the Col de Port, which they will be very shortly, they’re going to pass through the village of Saurat. On its official website, Saurat has the following warning for its residents today:
Par ailleurs, il est indispensable de maîtriser tous vos animaux (chien, chat, poule, âne etc.) le mardi 13 juillet de 8h à 18h. En cas de divagation d’un animal vous appartenant, votre responsabilité est fortement engagée.
They are, in brief, being asked to control their animals, “dog, cat, chicken, donkey etc”. Saurat also has a storytelling festival to look forward to later this month.
141km to go: A couple of riders have had enough of Asgreen getting all the attention, and set off after him. They are Casper Pedersen and Jasper Stuyven. All three have names that end in -en, which may or may not be relevant.
151km to go: Asgreen is now a full minute ahead of everyone else. He a three-time time trial champion of Denmark, don’t you know. Here he is talking about his lockdown life: “I’ve seen people taking up various hobbies, like painting, baking bread or learning new languages. We started a big project at home: renovating our garden. So yes, that kept us very busy. There hasn’t been a lack of things to do, let’s put it like that.” Asgreen-fingered, you could say.
158km to go: Asgreen has stretched his lead past 20 seconds, despite the fact that wet roads are forcing riders to hold back a little on their descent.
165km to go: Kasper Asgreen has set off on his own. The gap is short, and nobody seems very concerned about it.
169km to go: And they’re off! There’s some 35km of downhill to start the stage, before they get stuck into the first of the day’s climbs.
Leg-warmers duly abandoned, they’re back under way.
Everybody stops, a few hundred metres from the start, and the riders strip off some of their warmer clothes they’ve had on for the rollout.
Just 3km from the start of the stage, just enough time to ready Jeremy’s report on yesterday’s stage, won by Sepp Kuss:
Jeremy Whittle has spoken to Tao Geoghegan Hart, winner of last year’s Giro d’Italia, about his “unlucky but also really lucky” debut Tour experience:
The rollout has begun, and there is about 15km of it remaining before the actual racing gets under way.
Hello world!
The rest of the Tour looks like this: three more Pyrenean stages, starting with today’s, of which the last two have mountain-top finishes and at least one hors-categorie climb. Then a long, sprinter-friendly rush from Mourenx to Libourne on Friday, a time trial to wine-growing hotspot Saint-Émilion on Saturday, and the final roll into Paris.
Whether any of this will give anyone the opportunity to overhaul Tadej Pogacar, five minutes clear of his closest challenger at the top of the GC standings, remains to be seen, but the very likely answer is that it doesn’t. However, there’s plenty of potential for fun, starting with today’s stage, plump as it is with breakaway potential. Let’s see what it has to throw at us, shall we?
William Fotheringham’s stage-by-stage guide to this year’s tour had the following to say about this one:
Stage 16, Tuesday 13 July, Pas de la Case – Saint-Gaudens 169km
Five days of climbing in the Pyrenees is almost unprecedented for the Tour, and each is very different: today involves shorter, steep ascents, with the main sort-out likely to come on the Col de la Core before the final shootout on the Portet-d’Aspet. By this point in the race, each day’s breakaway will include many of the same riders, with teams getting increasingly panicked if they haven’t yet won a stage. The overall contenders will want this to be a controlled stage, but these roads are eminently suitable for skirmishing involving the likes of Alaphilippe or Daniel Martin of Ireland.
