The Australian team certainly send their nine riders over the finish line with greater effect than they do the team-bus, and their average speed was enough to beat the 57.324 km/h set by Lance Armstrong's Discovery Channel team back in 2005. And before you start to panic by drawing a link between that team and their shady past and this Tour, remember that Orica-GreenEdge put their marker in over a 25 kilometre course that was completely flat on a beautiful day on the South coast of France. By comparison the Discovery Channel time was set over a much longer 67.5 kilometre course.
It was a fantastic stage and for me watching it brought back fine memories of being in Nice. I arrived there two years ago to the day on my honeymoon, which left me wondering whether I got married two years too early or the tour arrived two years too late? Wouldn't my wife have been delighted when having rolled into town and upon wondering what the large crowds were all about I informed her that, "What a coincidence, the Tour just so happens to be here also." Nice is a nice city, it's got a fantastic beach and in the old part of town there are some quaint little restaurants squeezed into those little narrow cobbled streets.
It was along the long Promenade that runs the length of the beach that this team-time-trial was run and remembering that wide street I can only imagine how good that would have been for the fans. Get down early and reserve yourself a sunbed on the beach for the day. Go for a dip in the Med, perhaps read your Tour guide or what you can translate of the local paper then amble up off of the sand to the wide boulevard and watch the teams rolling out and back on their hard efforts against the clock. For the riders it must only add to the suffering to watch people relaxing on the beach, swimming in the surf, or perhaps sipping on a cold beer while they push themselves to the brink of exhaustion in chase of those extra few seconds that might benefit the team and their team-leader.
Given that it was only 25 kilometres the time gaps for the most part were tight, but then again the 1 minute, 47 seconds that separated first place Orica-GreenEdge to Argos-Shimano was quite a chunk over such a short distance and highlights if not certain teams' lack of strength, then their lack of interest in this discipline. It's clearly not an area the French teams specialise in because of the 22 teams in the race they managed placings of 15th (FDJ), 17th (Ag2r), 18th (Sojasun), 19th (Europcar) and 20th (Cofidis).
All things said not too many of the big favorites lost a lot of time. Chris Froome was best placed of them after his Sky team came in third, a mere 3 seconds behind Orica-GreenEdge. Nobody will be too concerned about losing a few seconds, though it should be remembered that some Tours have been won and lost by mere seconds. While it's never nice to give someone like Froome any time advantage this early in the race it's not a lot more than would have been won and lost had we had a prologue a few days ago anyway. For what it's worth here is my predicted top ten for this Tour in their current standing relative to one another after four stages:
1. Froome in 12h 47'27"
2. Porte s.t.
3. Contador at 6"
4. Van Den Broeck at 14"
5. Hesjedal s.t.
6. Evans at 23"
7. Van Garderen s.t.
8. Rodriguez at 25"
9. Pinot at 39"
10. Rolland at 1'10"
Only Pierre Rolland has left himself some serious work to do and might now turn to defending his King of the Mountains title all the way to Paris.
Things might get a chance to settle now for a few days with Corsica behind us and the team-time-trial over. Tomorrow the race will depart from Cagnes-sur-Mer for 228.5 kilometres of relatively flat racing to Marseilles. There's a category three climb early to set the early break on their way and a few category four climbs later on that might set up a decisive move, but after three days of waiting the sprinters will be desperate to have their way, especially those who missed out on stage one. Mark Cavendish could well be a safe bet though there's talk that he's suffering from an illness right now and so why not Matt Goss to make it three on the trot for the so-far-so-impressive Orica-GreenEdge? It's been some Tour for them thus far. The bus-gate on stage one, Gerrans yesterday, the team-time-trial and Gerrans into Yellow today. So why not?
Stage 4 result
1. Orica-GreenEdge in 25'56"
2. Omega Pharma Quick Step at 1"
3. Sky at 3"
4. Saxo-Tinkoff at 9"
5. Lotto-Belisol at 17"
6. Garmin-Sharp s.t.
General classification after stage 4
1. Simon Gerrans in 12h 47'24"
2. Daryl Impey s.t.
3. Michael Albasini s.t.
4. Michal Kwiatkowski at 1"
5. Sylvain Chavanel at s.t.
6. Edvald Boasson Hagen at 3"
