Team Sky have slipped, but not fallen. A review of the 'scandal' as I see it

I told myself I wouldn't bother writing about this whole Team Sky mess. Not this close to Christmas. Not with two children under four both hyper and my wife's present still to buy. Yet here I am, rattling away on the keyboard in an attempt to squeeze in some thoughts before Christmas. After that, I'm not sure I'll care enough. But there has been so much outrage that I wanted to give my own perspective to some degree or other.

If you're still reading now then chances are you know the background and the details, so I'll spare you a run down. Suffice to say, it has been an ugly year for Team Sky away from the racing. In fact, on the bike it's been quite memorable. Another Tour victory, and their first Monument win at Liège-Bastogne-Liège. But the year draws to a close with their reputation on the line and a scandal at hand. One in which they have prolonged by failing to present an adequate response.

I must say though, I find it hard to call the whole mess a scandal in the traditional sense of the word. Knowing where the sport has been before, and all that.  An ugly situation for sure, but classified by your own personal perspective of it only. And that's the difference with this one. In the old days it was a full-blown back and white objective doping scandal. This is more a subjective shade of grey; one of ethics and morals and where each individual sees the invisible ethical line in their own mind. With no violation of the rules taking place, where does Sky's failure in ethics sit in proportion to your own standards? Or do you care about some fictional line if they haven't broken the hard line that is the letter of the law? As such the outrage here is subjective to what you think is and isn't wrong from a moral point of view.

2016 season in review: The year of Monument firsts

2016 was the year of Trump, Brexit, Zika, the Rio Olympics, Russians in Syria, terror in Brussles, terror in Nice, Climate change and nuclear deals, Pokemon Go, and Celebrities dying. It was also the year that Peter Sagan won his first monument and retained his world title, and Chris Froome ran up Mont Ventoux on his way to winning a third Tour de France.

I was in tough to pick a name for this years year in review. At first I was going to go with 'the year of the Brits'. I mean, Froome won the Tour again, he was second at the Vuelta and he won an Olympic medal. The British track team dominated those games with some record breaking and historic moments. Geraint Thomas won the Paris-Nice and Team Sky got their first Monument win by way of a non-British rider. But it was the later that got me thinking of another kind of year this was: The year of first time Monument winners. And given that the majority of my focus is around road cycling, I figured that might be more apt.

My new incentive for cycling in autumn

The beginning of autumn is beautiful. The leaves turn brown and when the sun shines through them they glint a golden colour as they hang onto the trees. But then they fall and everything looks and dead. The trees are bare and empty and when the wind blows through them the cold hits you hard and reminds you of winter. Autumn is pretty, but late fall is pretty sad. Nothing left to do but pick up the dead leaves from the ground and prepare for snow next.

Cycling through autumn though can be wonderful. The temperature drops with the leaves but so do the demands on your fitness and training and form. Riding slower and taking in the beautiful colours around you becomes easier at the back end of the cycling season. Until it gets too cold at all and you're spending too much time on a turbo. In a trace like state, starting at the wall in front of you. Going nowhere.

That is it, if you live in a country like Canada. If you don't take off to a training came somewhere warm. If you aren't a professional headed to some exotic training camp. But right now, in autumn, even the professionals ride like us. If only for a month. They're back at home now and riding at a speed we can comprehend and could even ride along with. Enjoy it, I tell myself, before they go south to places warm and I go south to the basement and that turbo.

Living like a pro is easy in October

The professional road racing season is all over now. Riders have either gone home, gone cross-racing, or moved indoor to the track. The next time we will see them will be down under in Australia. Those who have gone home, I like to think, have made the right choice. They get to be normal for a month, eat what they want, enjoy a drink, and be a little lazy. In other words the gap between me and them narrows.

Of course, those who have stayed on their bikes deserve credit to. They continue to entertain. In London last week there was the six day race featuring Mark Cavendish and Bradley Wiggins. They didn't win it, but the crowd went wild anyway. So much for the TUE scandal having an affect on Wiggins' popularity. The media are not amused.

And the cross-season is upon us too. It always makes for great television. I always watch at least a few races and say, one day I must go to Belgium to watch this in person. I say that about a lot of things though and can only add it to my lengthy bucket list.

A unique looking Tour route for 2017

I've said it before, but I'll say it again the annual unveiling of the Tour de France route. It is like being a kid on Christmas morning who gets to see all his presents but can't open them for nine months. Yet it is always worth a good look and we analyse it and make predictions about how it might go. It's a nonsense, but it's fun anyway. For a few moments it feels like it is a little closer to starting than it is.

So what do I make of it? Well here is in a nutshell what I seen when I first took a look. A route that appears closer to a figure of eight than a circuit around France. A course that hits all five major mountain ranges in France. Which incorporates just three summit finishes and only 36km of individual time-trialing, including a 13km opening day race against the clock.

Sagan retains title as the desert winds blow

Never underestimate the ability of great cyclists to put on a great race on any circuit in any conditions in any country in the world. Sunday's elite-men's World Championship road-race proved that. A deserted circuit in the desert, the conditions were baking hot and the country was Qatar. And yet, the race was brilliant.

I was still in bed when the Qatari winds blew and the big-name opportunists split the race to bits. Echelons were the name of the game. The UCI must have been praying for those winds such was the negativity around these championships. Too hot, too remote, nobody watching. Barriers erected to keep stray camels off the course rather than for fans to lean against, or so it felt. A pan flat circuit that seemed made for a bunch sprint.

By the time I tuned in, there was a group of about 30 ahead with a chasing pack behind. The race was on and there was so far still to go. Some big names had made the split while other big names were reeling. This would be one thing in normal racing conditions, but across the desert? For over 250km? It would prove to be relentless. It would leave some broken. Only 53 of the 197 who took the start, finished.

Hemingway and cycling in France

The cycling calendar has gone quite quiet. There was only four major races in Europe this past week. A few of them, I'd never even heard of. I had heard of the four different winners however. John Degenklob won the Sparkassen Münsterland Giro in Germany, Adnaud Demare won the Binche-Chimay-Binche in Belgium, Sam Bennett won the Paris-Bourges in France, and Fernando Gaviria won the Paris-Tours.

I didn't see any of them and haven't got a lot to say about them. My enthusiasm draining a little; in tune with the falling temperatures outside. I'm cycling less too and so are they. The worlds are ahead and there will be plenty to write about in the days ahead. My enthusiasm isn't helped by the ongoing drama encircling Team Sky and Bradley Wiggins. I've more to say about it, but I have no desire to do so just now.

In place of cycling I've been reading more again and just this past month I've taken to Ernest Hemingway. I can't quite believe it took so many years. The first story I went to was actually an audio book. A memoir called A Moveable Feast, published after his death about his early years in Paris. It's no secret that Hemingway was a big fan of cycling and wrote about it in several of his books. That said, I wasn't aware the subject would come up in A Moveable Feast, but I wasn't surprised either. It's only a couple of paragraphs but in it he describes his memories of watching the sport in Paris, on the track. It's a fascinating yet all too brief look at cycling in those times. His descriptions are wonderful. In no time he makes you feel as though you are there and gives you a longing to go immediately to a big track event yourself.

A Colombian monument win

I didn't get to see a lot of Il Lombardia as it is now known, or the Tour of Lombardy as I know it. To tell the truth I forgot it was even on. I was watching the Liverpool match on my television that morning and when it ended I was thinking what to do with the day when I remembered.

The race, I thought. How long is left? Have they crossed the crucial climbs? I couldn't find it on TV and so I was scrambling for a feed on the iPad. The kids were nearby and any use of the iPad was liable to have them circling for a turn themselves. 'Can I watch some princess songs?' I was bracing for that, so I stayed subtle and got the race up, always ready to switch to the phone if required.

There was still 40km left. I was okay. The first main selection had been made but the best action was still ahead. Over the next half hour or so I dipped in and out. I refreshed the feed a couple of times. I made a cup of tea. I even fed the children some breakfast. By the time it was nitty-gritty time, I had settled back in and was ready for the climax.

A word on the Wiggins/Sky TUE 'scandal'

I wanted to ignore it, but I've felt obliged to put something on record. It's not that it isn't important, that it doesn't matter. It does. It's just mind numbing. It's the racing I'd prefer to talk about. Yet I must say something. I will of course skip the who, what, when, where and why's. If you're still reading this come the end of the second paragraph, you'll already know that.

Yes, I am referring to the 'Fancy Bears' hack of athletes private medical data. And in this case the cyclists caught up in it. Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome, and their Therapeutic Use Exceptions (TUEs).

Wiggins was the biggest one. If anything Froome came out looking good...two uses of a TUE, both of which we knew about anyway. He's had none since 2013 and has done the best of his winning since then. At the 2015 Tour, Froome fell ill and should have had a TUE, but refused. He even put out a statement condemning the abuse of the medical exceptions.

Wiggins though...he's in the hot water.

Van Avermaet's revenge in Montreal

It was a 986km round trip to watch 205km of bike racing, but it was worth every metre, as always. This was my fourth year going to the GP Cycliste de Montreal. It has become a bit of a annual tradition (one that I hope to soon include the Quebec race into!) and call me biased, but this race must be one of the finest one-day races on the calendar outside of the five monuments.

It's just a shame in many ways that it clashes with the final day of the Vuelta, as well as the Tour of Britain. It should be a stand alone event to further boost its prestige and give it more viability to those who maybe haven't see it, as the great race it is. Not that the field has suffered as a result of the other races, such is the depth of the talent in world cycling. We had the World champion in Peter Sagan and the Olympic champion in Greg Van Avermaet present. And it was that pair who illuminated the racing in Quebec and here.

If Friday was all about Sagan out sprinting Van Avermaet, then Sunday was the Belgians revenge. Both leave Canada deadlocked with a win and second place each and the fans leave entertained.

Quintana finds a way to shake Froome in the most dramatic of stages

What an incredible week at the Vuelta, accumulating in an extraordinary weekend in which the balance of the race ebbed and flowed before dropping right into the lap of Nairo Quintana, as Chris Froome was finally isolated when Alberto Contador threw all his cards onto the table as he is always apt to do when struggling to make up time by conventional methods.

For several days it seemed though Froome was going to survive what Quintana had been throwing at him and would limit the Colombians lead to around a minute before the stage 19 time-trial in which the Sky rider would then surely overhaul that deficit and set up the first Tour-Vuelta double of the decade.

On Saturday Froome had stayed on the wheel of Quintana in the kind of way the Movistar rider had done to the Sky man the entire Tour de France last month, but managed to lose no time on a grueling finish, one that seen Alejandro Valverde crack and make this Vuelta a two-horse race.

Quintana takes control of Vuelta after a week of jersey swapping

Up to and including today, the Vuelta a España has seen its red leaders jersey change hands seven times between six men. From Peter Kennaugh back on day one to Nairo Quintana today after the Colombian won the first high mountain stage to retake a lead he had coughed up a day go and put time into his closest rivals heading into the first rest day.

Until today this Vuelta had been one of multiple hills, with a handful of short-sharp summit finishes. The kind of steep climbs that suit you one day and punish you the next. The kind that some climbers love and some hate. It seen opportunities for breaks to survive (hence the race leadership changes) and for small chunks of time to be exchanged among the leaders while those left in contention are whittled down daily.

So much so that after this first week and a bit of racing, only a handful were left in contention. Even Alberto Contador found himself minutes adrift to the likes of Chris Froome, Alejandro Valverde and the Colombian pair of Nairo Quintana and Esteban Chaves. Froome looked good one day gaining a few seconds, Valverde would lead the group in a sprint another day, and then Quintana set off and took time on both of them over the weekend. And this was after Quintana himself had looked frail on one of the short hard climbs earlier in the week.

Sagan's MTB saga; and the opening weekend of the Vuelta

I'm not sure what the expectation was for Peter Sagan when he entered the Olympic mountain bike race down in Rio, but a medal was always going to be a big ask. Mountain biking is a niche sport that requires a certain type of rider and for the average road rider, road riding isn't overly beneficial towards it except on the stamina side. Of course, Sagan is no ordinary rider and comes from a mountain bike background and it appears has often gone back to it in his off-seasons, but while the Slovak turned to the mountain bike after finishing the Tour de France, it was still a short time to try and master the event like those doing it year round...those that eventually took the medals.

That said, in the end Sagan didn't lose out on a medal because he wasn't capable, but because of a string of mechanical issues including two punctures. And before he had the first of those flats, Sagan had been in the lead group of four and riding well. He had moved up from last place at the start (gridded according points acquired in the World Cup over the course of the season) to a top three position within thirty seconds. A blistering start and suddenly the possibilities were there.

But even then you could see how smooth the likes of Nino Schurter was through the technical sections by comparison and how Sagan would lose half a wheel on the steepest little ramps. He himself admitted afterwards that he didn't think he could hold on to win a medal, but the fact he was racing in that company before his punctures only highlighted the talent he has. And it would have been nice to have seen him go through the race mechanical issues free to see just how he finished up. I'd like to hope that this isn't the last we'll see of Sagan at top level mountain biking...that perhaps he'll do the World Championships sometime or even a few world cup races if his schedule allows. His team, his sponsors and money might have other ideas of course, but no doubt with a little additional effort towards the sport he could well challenge the best.

Olympic track wraps up as Britain dominate the medals table and "questions" arise

So back to Rio for a moment and a look at how the track finished up. Last time I wrote on Monday we had about a day and a half two go and four gold medals still up for grabs in the men and woman's Kieren and Omnium. Both gripping events.

In the Omnium, Mark Cavendish finally got his Olympic medal, though he had to settle for silver behind Italian (and Team Sky rider on the road) Elia Viviani. Laura Trott took the woman's Omnium gold with an absolute dominant performance in which he finished 1st in the individual pursuit, elimination race and flying lap, 2nd in the scratch race and time-trial, and 7th in the points race.

It was also Trott's fourth Olympic gold. No other British female has won more than two Olympic gold medals. Added to her boyfriend Jason Kenny's haul, after he won gold in a thrilling Keirin, the pair now have ten gold medals in their home between them. Just a few shy of that in the Michael Phelps household!

And speaking of the Keirin: The woman's was won by Elis Ligtlee of the Netherlands but it was the men's final that contained all the drama.

I almost forgot...the Vuelta starts on Saturday

You know something, I was going to wait until Monday before I wrote again and in doing so review everything we've seen at the Olympics so far, but then I remembered the Vuelta a Espana starts this weekend. Yes...and who knew? So a few words on that seem crucial.

It has completely flown under the radar, or perhaps it is I who has simply moved in under a rock with the Olympics being on. It's the only thing that has been on my television each night and it's about the only thing I'm doing any serious reading on during the day. With the track cycling thrilling us and the BMX now underway and the mountain biking still to come this weekend, I completely forgot about the Vuelta.

I think in the back of my mind I knew it was coming up and I think this past weekend I seen something about it starting next weekend, but I kind of left it slip back out of my mind until just now when I was flicking through Twitter and seen that the team presentations were underway. Yes, another Grand Tour is upon us and it gets underway in two days time.

Cancellara wins Olympic time-trial; British take over on the track

Chris Froome couldn't repeat what Bradley Wiggins done four years ago in London by following up a Tour de France victory with an Olympic gold in the individual time-trial. Froome had to settle for third behind Fabian Cancellara, who brings the curtain down on his glittering career in style, with Tom Dumoulin, the pre-race favourite, settling for silver. In the woman's race there was a turn up for the books as American, Kristin Armstrong (no relation!), who has done little racing this year, showed up and beat the controversial Russian, Olga Zabelinskaya to silver, and Anna Van Der Breggen to bronze. The Dutchgirl picked up her second medal of these games on the road after her gold last week in the woman's road race.

Fabian Cancellara will have been a popular winner here in Rio. He's been on one big final season farewell Tour, or so it has seemed though things haven't often gone as planned. His crown of classic king was taken by Peter Sagan when the Slovak beat him at the Tour of Flanders, he was well beaten by younger men like Dumoulin in many of the individual time-trials and perhaps he was beginning to think he'd left it a year too long to say goodbye. Or maybe not. Maybe deep down he knew he had this in him and it was everyone else who had written him off. Despite his pedigree for the race of truth, many didn't feel Cancellara was up to winning a medal, never mind the gold. But he was a force throughout the cross, measuring his effort to perfection and finishing a mighty 47sec ahead of Dumoulin and 1min 2sec ahead of Froome across the rolling 54.6km course.

Armstrong's win was closer on the 29.9km course, finishing just 6sec ahead of Zabelinskaya and 11sec ahead of Van Der Breggen. Canadian Tara Witten was 7th at 35sec.

Two Olympic road races blighted by crashes but thrillers nonetheless in Rio

If the two road races in Rio were not a good advertisement for road cycling to the world, then I don't know what is. Especially the men's race which many are calling the race of the season; a race expected to be contested by the climbers but which was won by a man of the cobbles in Greg Van Avermaet. The woman's race ended in dramatic fashion itself when American Mara Abbott was caught within metres of the line by a group of three from which Anna Van Der Breggen of the Netherlands took the gold medal.

It was a brutal course that incorporated its own sectors of cobbles but also some savage hills but because of what was at stake as well as the reduced team sizes and a ban on race radios, the action came thick and fast and it was hard for the climbing type to control it. UCI, World Tour, Tour de France etc., take note! They didn't know when to react and when to let a move go and come the finish I was left wondering whether Peter Sagan might have regretted his decision to skip it?

But Sagan or not, perhaps nobody was beating Van Avermaet on a day like this. He could soak up the cobble sections, conserve on some of the earlier climbs and then get in moves that other climbers might not have been given the freedom for.

Mollema redeems himself with win at San Sebastian

Bauke Mollema had to be feeling down after the Tour. He came out of the second rest day in second place overall, 1min 47sec behind Chris Froome, and looking strong for a podium position. But a disaster in the Alps seen him drop right out of the top 10 to 11th by Paris, 13min 13sec behind the Sky winner. You wouldn't blame him if his confidence was shot and he fancied a little break from racing.

But that would have been the easy approach. Within six days of Paris, Mollema along with a host of other Tour riders, were back on their bikes in Spain for the Classica San Sebastian, and rather than plod his way around the race or worry about risking a move only to blow up again, Mollema was aggressive and put in the decisive move on the final climb to rid himself of Tony Gallopin, Alejandro Valverde and Joaqium Rodriguez to win solo by 17sec over that group, in that order.

The only other major race of the week came the following day at the Ride London classic were a late solo move from a breakaway group by Geraint Thomas was reeled in by the main bunch in time for Tom Boonen to win the gallop ahead of Mark Renshaw and Michael Matthews.

Le Tour review: Overall standings...alternative standings...predictions review...team of the Tour

Here is a look across all the various final standings of the 2016 Tour de France with a little word on each. From the overall classification to the best French riders and from a review of my questionable pre-Tour predictions to my overall team of the Tour of which there can be no debate! First up though, the yellow jersey...

The Final General Classification:

1. Chris Froome (GBR/Sky) in 89h04'48"
They took out the early summit finish to try and test him more, so what did he do? He took the race by the scruff of the neck by attacking on the descents and in the cross winds, by out gunning his rivals in the time-trials and by running up Mont Ventoux. There's no doubt Froome was the best rider here but unexpectedly, he was also the most entertaining.

2. Romain Bardet (FRA/AGR2 La Mondiale) @ 4'05"
I'd picked him for the top five but didn't think he could soar this high. No pressure goign forward for the young Frenchman, but he showed a lot of maturity in this race, got stronger as it went on and took an excellent stage victory to Saint-Gervais-les-Bains to move onto the podium.

3. Nairo Quintana (COL/Movistar) @ 4'21"
Failed to flatter and rarely left the rear wheel of Froome. By the time he attakced on Mont Ventoux he was already trying to make up time and by the time he went again it was on the final 4th cat. climb just outside Paris and the Tour was long over. Allergies or too long training back in Colombia? Whatever the reason this wasn't the Quintana we expected...and yet, he still made the podium.

André Greipel keeps his streak alive...Chris Froome wins his 3rd Tour de France

They call the final stage into Paris, and the charge up the Champs-Élysées, the sprinters World Championships, and rightly so. It's the most spectacular bunch gallop of the lot and the one that every sprinter wants to win...and one of the most satisfying to win at that. Partly because of where it is and partly because of what race it is, but also because you've survived 21 stages, several mountain ranges and everything else that comes with a Tour de France to earn the right to partake in it.

It's why someone like Mario Cippolini, regarded by many as one of the greatest sprinters of all time, never won here. He couldn't make it through all twenty stages before hand to get the opportunity. Mark Cavendish won four stages this year, but he never made it across the Alps and so he didn't get the chance either.

Cavendish, of course, has been here before however. He won on this wide cobbled boulevard four straight times between 2009 and 2012 and would surely have been the favourite this time had he made it. Instead it was a fourth straight German win, this time by André Greipel, who won it for the second straight year to go with the two won by Marcel Kittel in 2013 and 2014.

Top ten shakeup but Froome avoids trouble

On a stage which finished with a ride over the Col de Joux Plane in the driving rain followed by a tricky descent down into Morzine, the potential there was for all kinds of drama, especially after what we had seen in the rain just twenty-four hours before, but as it was, the mayhem failed to unfold and while the the top ten had a few names drop out and a few new ones come in, the top five remained unchanged as Chris Froome kept his cool, avoided trouble and is now a short procession into Paris away from being crowned a three time winner of the Tour de France.

All the major action was reserved for the battle to win the stage. That is if you discount the anticipation of someone taking a risk on the descent to try and unsettle Froome behind. But up front it was Vincenzo Nibali out looking to take a consolation victory away from a Tour in which he arrived as the Giro d'Italia champion but very much out of form and using the Tour to build his condition ahead of a Gold medal bid in Rio in a few weeks time. He made the last major move on the Joux Plane from a large group of stage hunters, made up of many of the same names we have seen day after day trying to take some glory from this Tour, and it looked to be the winning move by the Shark. That was until the pair of Jon Izagirre and Jarlinson Pantano worked their way back to him in time for the summit.

You may have noticed that up until this point in the Tour that there had been no Italian or Spanish stage winners, a rare sight indeed, and only until yesterday, when Romain Bardet won, were the French also looking for a stage. The globalisation of the peloton had never been clearer. So no shock then to see the Spaniard in Izagirre and the Italian in Nibali trying to put things to rights, with Pantano looking for his second stage of this Tour alone.

Drama hits the Tour as the rain falls, riders fall, the classification implodes, and the French get a win with Bardet moving to 2nd overall

If this was the drama you felt was sorely lacking in this years Tour thus far, then you got it all in spades today. A reminder that the Tour is never over until it reaches Paris, or at least until it gets itself out of the high mountains...especially a mountain range in which the rain decides to descend upon it. It was unfortunate that a lot of the drama came by way of general classification riders crashing, but action packed it was nonetheless and while the rain played a big part, the tactics of Astana to drive the pace all day left me wondering why they had waited until three days to go to turn this kind of race on?

As it was the French got a win. Until today it had been a terrible Tour for the home nation. No winners and nobody seriously contending, or so it seemed. Romain Bardet has quietly gone about his Tour until today, sticking around, marking moves, hanging tight and keeping without touching distance of the podium without really being noticed. Now suddenly the French have a race win and Bardet is up to second overall and from a terrible Tour they are just one disaster day for Chris Froome away from having their man win it!

That may be unlikely but it may not be as unthinkable as it might have been twenty-four hours ago when Froome won the time-trial leaving some to write the Tour off as finished. It was hard not to, but today served to remind us that on days like this anything can happen. Tomorrow is another day of high mountains, tough climbs and dangerous descents and, according to the forecasts, more rain is a certainty.

Froome wins uphill time-trial as battle for podium place grows tighter

Baring a disaster of epic proportions, the battle for the yellow jersey is over. Still, the fight for a place alongside Froome on the podium in Paris has rarely been closer or involved so many riders. In what is becoming a Tour much like 2014 when Vincenzo Nibali ran away with the win and a handful of others fought out for the lower podium spoils, this year we have five men positioned from 2nd to 6th sitting within 1 minute 8 seconds of one another after an uphill time-trial that Froome won and the top six remained unchanged but seen a dramatic tightening of the pack behind the Sky rider. Richie Porte continues his third week surge while the likes of Bauke Mollema and Nairo Quintana are very much on the defensive.

Yesterday I said that after today Chris Froome could be leading the Tour by four minutes. He's not, but he is just eight seconds short of that mark thanks to a mightily impressive ride over the 17km mostly uphill individual time-trial. He timed his effort to perfection, getting stronger as the course went on whereas his rivals slowly faded.

A look at the various time splits gives an idea as to how well Froome measured his effort. At the 6.5km check he trailed the best time of Richie Porte by 23sec, with Porte himself 9sec better off than Dumoulin. By the 10km check it was Dumoulin leading Porte by 9sec with Froome just 1sec further back. 3.5km later at the final check Froome took the lead for the first time, 13sec ahead of Dumoulin with Porte at 22sec. And then on the line, the win for Froome, 21sec ahead of Dumoulin and 33sec ahead of Porte. Another who measured their ride well was Fabio Aru. At each time-check he trailed Porte by 25sec, 14sec and 7sec respectively, and finished on the same time as the Australian.

The waiting game of others pays off for Froome

They waited and they waited and they waited. They waited until the final two kilomtres of the final climb up to the summit at the spectacular Finhaut-Emosson before a serious move was made. By then we already had a stage winner in Ilnur Zakarin, the best of the days large break that had taken so long to form but from which so many common names for such moves in this years Tour finally got away. They waited because they couldn't go before or because they didn't want to risk going before? It was hard to say in the moment, but wait they did, and by the time Richie Porte sprung clear the gains were only ever going to be minimal but what became clear was why they were waiting. Chris Froome must have been delighted.

The pace was high all day and that probably played into it, but the stage was made for an early move. For Astana or Movistar or BMC to throw caution to the wind and try to isolate Froome from as many of his men as they could and not wait until the final climb were the pace might limit them. It's easier to say than to do, and perhaps nobody had the legs to try something like that, the finish perhaps alluded to it. So as it was they waited over two third category climbs, a long valley road and then the first category Col de la Forclaz at 13km and 7.9%, content to sit in the wheels of Sky...and wait.

When they hit the final climb of the day, a brutal 10.4km grind at 8.4% with long sections coming in at over 10%, Astana did move to the front but only to set a tempo. They burned one match after another until suddenly Fabio Aru was on his own, and with it Team Sky slowly retook the front line and continued their pace setting with a thank you very much to Astana for doing some of the heavy lifting.

A quiet rest day is how it should be

How strange it must be for everyone on the Tour to have such tranquility on the rest days? It's been going that way the past few years but more so this year than ever before has there been a distinct lack of gossip and controversy and despite what some suckers for such stuff might tell you, it can only be a good thing and a sign of the times of where the sport is at.

Once upon a time a rest day at the Tour couldn't come or go without a scandal, and usually a doping scandal at that. A top rider testing positive; a collection of riders being caught. The press would scramble, rumours would swirl and the fallout with threaten to overshadow what was going on in the race itself.

In more recent years with the number of actual positive tests going down the scandal pages (or twitter accounts as it has morphed into) have been filled with speculation, accusation and innuendo. Whomever happens to be wearing the yellow jersey at the time of either rest day -- and more so the second rest day because that is often the man in yellow who might well keep it until Paris -- is hit with a barrage of questions about his stance on doping and whether he himself might be doping.

Sagan by a tire width

Peter Sagan completed his 100th Tour de France stage today and in it he took his 7th Tour de France stage win. The numbers don't sound spectacular by his lofty standards, but when you remember how closely he is marked and how often others turn to him to close gaps, it's incredible to learn that in those 100 races, he has finished in the top ten on 52 occasions, and of those, 33 were podium positions.

Yes, since 2012 when he entered his first Tour (and he's won the green jersey every year), Sagan is finishing in the top ten of a stage every other time he races at the Tour and a third of the time he's in the top three. Can you imagine the numbers if just half those podium places had gone another way and he'd won them as, if you remember long and hard, he probably deserved to do? He could already be two-thirds of the way towards catching the spectacular total of wins by Mark Cavendish who himself is just four away from the all-time record of 34 held by Eddy Merckx.

There's a lot of 'what if's' in that last paragraph, but those hard statistics up top are incredible in themselves. And when you consider a pure climber and often takes those days off, what does that do to his strike rate for top 10s or podium placings in stages not raced in the high mountains? There is definitely a feeling of 'if only' within me that wishes he could climb the big mountains that little bit better.

More to this stage than the lack of fight for yellow

Many criticised today's stage because back in the general classification group there was little in the way of action and the sharp end of the overall standings tonight remains much as it was this morning, with the exception of Tejay Van Garderen, but those critical only looked at the GC angle because up front it was full of action and a damn good watch.

A large group went clear early and various pretenders to the stage win took their turn going up the road before falling away in a yo-yo of action. At one stage Tom Dumoulin had set off on a bid for his third stage win and was being chased down by Vincenzo Niabli but when I came back from making myself a cup of tea, the pair were out the back and it was someone else -- Serge Pauwels or Ilnur Zakarin or Julian Alaphilippe -- bidding for glory.

But all of them fell away. Legs for Pauwels, descending for Zakarin, and a crash or mechanical not caught on camera for Alaphilippe. And then it looked like Rafal Majka had timed it right. Sweeping up points throughout the day the Polish climber had led over the mighty Grand Colombier (which I was shocked to learn had only been used in the Tour for the first time in 2012. Anyone know why it took so long? There's four roads up and one of them, the hardest they say, is still yet to be used) and the Lacets du Grand Colombier to take a commanding lead in the King of the Mountains classification.

Like the rest before him, however, Majka hadn't quite done enough and a mighty descent into the finishing town of Culoz by Jarlinson Pantano, in which he made up 23 seconds, brought the Colombian rider across to Majka and set up a two man sprint for the stage. The Colombian with the bit between his teeth was too strong and took the win for IAM cycling who will disband as a team at the end of the season.

So plenty to enjoy as the general classification took a day off.

Dumoulin destroys field; Froome destroys rivals

Tom Dumoulin had clearly targeted this one, though with a stage win already in the bag you had to wonder if someone else might step up. It wasn't to be though and the Dutchman proved himself the nailed on favourite for the Olympic time-trial next month by putting over a minute into his nearest rival and as much as 2min 5sec into Olympic rival Tony Martin and a huge 3min 15sec into Fabian Cancellara.

The nearest rival in question was Chris Froome, who with a lot on the line went all in, ending speculation that he might be tired or his legs sore after a daring attack with Peter Sagan two days ago before the mayhem on Ventoux yesterday in which he had to run part of the mountain.

After yesterday's stage the race jury sat down for the better part of an hour to decide how best to sort it out and in the end they gave Froome the same time as Bauke Mollema, who had been with him at the time of the crash but who had been least affected. Had they not, Froome would have lost 1min 40sec on the day to Mollema and 1min 21sec to the likes of Adam Yates, Alejandro Valverde and Nairo Quintana and he would have started this morning 53sec in arears of Yates, 46sec behind Quintana and 44sec down on Mollema.

By the time he had negotiated the 37.5km rolling individual time-trial course from Bourg-Saint-Andeol to Le Caverne de Pont d'Arc, Froome had put 51sec into Mollema, 1min 45sec into Valverde, 1min 58sec into Yates and a full 2min 5sec into Quintana. The upshot to the overall standings today had they been as they were on the line yesterday would have still seen Froome emerge from the days time-trial with the yellow jersey back on his shoulders, albeit just 7sec better off than Mollema rather than the 1min 47sec he now finds himself ahead by. But Quintana, who is now 2min 59sec down overall and with his Tour in tatters, would still have found himself 1min 19sec back.

Mayhem on Ventoux as the yellow jersey loses bike and has to run

Where do I even start? It was a day in which so much happened but only one thing stood out. A moment that will burn deep into Tour folklore. The sight of Chris Froome, with the yellow jersey on his back, surrounded by fans, running up Mont Ventoux. His bicycle nowhere to be seen, his Tour in tatters as chaos reigned in the final kilometres of a stunning stage.

I can only imagine what was going through the minds of those at the side of the road as Froome came running past? What was going through the minds of the Team Sky management, behind in the team car, as Froome told them through the radio that his bike had broke and that he had set off on foot in a desperate bid to limit his losses?

The rules state that you must cross the line with your bike. They do not appear to mention covering a portion of the course without your bike. Not that there is ever a time in which you'd prefer to do this. As such I also wonder what was going through the mind of Chris Froome? Especially when his rivals passed him, when he looked behind to see a sea of people and no team car. Many cyclists would have slammed their bike into the ground and stood at the side of the road waving their hands in frustration. But with no idea how long he might be standing there, Froome reacted as a champion should, as someone so focused on the task at hand might. Always thinking he figured the only logical move was to get as far up the mountain as he could. Wait for a team mate to come to him, or neutral service, or maybe even the team car. What if he'd reached the line before any of this? Did he know the rule? He ran for what seemed like a few hundred metres. It was one of the most surreal things I've ever seen in cycling. And I thought I'd seen it all in this sport.

Froome joins Sagan to ignite the stage

Words like spontaneous, entertaining and opportunist are often associated with a rider like Peter Sagan, but not so much with the Team Sky leader, Chris Froome. For a long time Froome has been associated with being robotic like, unwilling to ride on instinct, but one who watches his power meter and sticks exclusively to the team plan, often talking with the team car through his radio. Well, not anymore...not after he linked up with Sagan today to rip the race to bits.

The 2016 Tour de France is showing us a new side to Chris Froome...or perhaps one that has always been there but has never had to come out. But with his rivals thinking that they were going to see the same old Chris Froome at this Tour, one who would hide behind his black and blue Sky team mates before exposing himself in the high mountains to make his move on yellow, Froome has changed tact and caught them napping when they least expected him to move.

Firstly with that downhill attack on stage 8 and then today in the cross-winds, on the road to Montpellier, bridging across to a surge by Sagan to form a four man move that included Sagan's team-mate Maciej Bodnar and Froome's team-mate Geraint Thomas. Sagan created the move as you might have expected, but Froome's daring to go with it said a lot about the way he wants to race this Tour. Once again his opponents were caught behind and losing time.

Review of the first week...Cav is back...British cycling 5 out of 8...and Froome CAN descend

So the 2016 Tour de France is a week old, or eight stages to be precise, and I've returned from a wonderful holiday. I tried hard to avoid technology over the week, and while I did well for the most part, I couldn't ignore the Tour entirely. I allowed myself the final 5km of some of the opening weeks stages to stream on my phone before returning home to catch the weekends stages on the television.

What I seen for the most part was a week for sprinters that was a throwback to that of the 1990s intersected with solo stage wins and a passing around of the yellow jersey to several worthy first timers as British riders took five wins in eight days ending up with Chris Froome in yellow, Mark Cavendish in green, Adam Yates in white and elsewhere Andy Murray winning Wimbledon and Lewis Hamilton the British Grand Prix. Not a bad way to get over the hurt of the European Championships!

With regards to the Tour, the week began with the return to glory of Mark Cavendish in which he took his first yellow jersey by winning the first of three stages over the opening six days to move into second all-time ahead of Bernard Hinault and behind Eddy Merckx. A first yellow jersey for Peter Sagan followed as he too took a stage win before Marcel Kittel got in on the act. The Four solo wins played in and around the sprinters fun and came first through Greg Van Avermaet (who also took his first yellow jersey and did so by a margain of more than five minutes), then through Steve Cummings (with a brilliant attack over the Col d'Aspin to stick a middle finger up to the British Olympic selectors), next via Tom Dumoulin (on the first summit finish of this years tour at Andorra Arcalis with his arms aloft as the rain and hail belted down upon the mountain), and finally by Chris Froome (who caught his rivals napping with an attack over the Peyresourde and a blitzing descent down to the finish to win the stage and take yellow).

Pre-Tour musings and predictions

The days leading into the Tour are spectacular for debate, surmising, and predicting and of course this year is no different. Not with Chris Froome going for three; with Nairo Quintana another year older, another year wiser and on a course that should suit him; with Alberto Contador out for one last bid for glory; with Giro champion Vincenzo Nibali showing up -- allegedly to help Fabio Aru -- who himself is still searching for his form; and with a handful of French riders seemingly on the cusp of breaking through to potentially win a Tour. And that's only scratching at the surface. There's all the other jersey's, the sprint battles, Sagan watch, the time-trials, Cancellara's last Tour, the individual stage battles as the GC gets whittled down as the rest turn to single day glory, and others who might fancy their chances for a top five finish, if not a podium placing.

There's little point me getting into all of that though...I'd probably be wrong with much of it as a Tour in hindsight so brutally exposes ones pre-race thoughts each year, and besides there's a stack of good guides for sale, not to mention podcasts, online previews, apps and that ever faithful pre-Tour information centre: Twitter.

Still, I do feel obliged to stick my neck out and predict a top ten plus the winner of the other jerseys to see how I go. I did quite well when I predicted the Giro outcome in May, so don't quite take this with a grain of salt...but don't go rushing off to your bookie with this list as any kind of form guide either.

Missing (part of) the Tour

The Tour de France starts this Saturday and, as it is every year, it is one of the most hotly anticipated editions of the race in its history...or since last year. It's hard to believe it's almost here again. Maybe it's just me but it doesn't seem that long ago that I was lamenting the end of the 2015 edition, wondering what I was going to do with my time? As ever I found something to do, clearly, and so here we are again. And maybe it is also just me in feeling as though this Tour has just sneaked up on us. Perhaps it's the ongoing European Championships in France, or Brexit, or the fact I will miss a lot of the first week.

Yes as France becomes the epicenter of sport this July, I'll be headed into the wilderness for a weeks holiday with the family. As a result my typical in depth Tour musings will become a little less frequent as I endeavor to stay as far away from technology as I can realistically allow...though completely aware that I will check in at least once a day to read a race report, analyse the results and maybe even catch the last 10km of each stage.

I have to admit though, I'm too excited for this holiday that I haven't allowed myself to become too concerned with missing the opening week of the Tour. Last years opening week was epic and while anything can happen, a quick glance at the opening week leaves me hopeful that I won't miss too much, in the early part at least.

Next up: The Tour de France

The final warm up races ahead of the Tour de France concluded this weekend with Miguel Ángel López winning the Tour de Suisse and Nairo Quintana the Route du Sud. The later was as expected, though López winning in Switzerland may have come as a bit of a surprise to those who expected the winner to come from the likes of Warren Barguil, Tejay Van Garderen, Rui Costa, Simon Spilak or Geraint Thomas.

Each of them except for Thomas finished in the top ten with Barguil on the lowest podium position behind Ion Izagirre. Thomas lost big time on the final day and dropped out of the top 10 finishing 17th, twelve and a half minutes down on López. What that means for the Sky riders form ahead of the Tour where he will be expected to be the right hand man of Chris Froome remains to be seen, though there's still time for that form to round into shape.

Nairo Quintana's performance at the Route Du Sud proves he's very much on form and he's my pick this year to win the Tour. Sure Froome is looking good after his win at the Dauphine, but there's something about Quintana's approach this year that gives off the impression that he's throwing everything at it and given how strong he was last year after a difficult first week, there's certainly reason to believe he'll have gotten better still twelve months on, especially with a first week that isn't as challenging than of that in 2015.

Froome shows he's still the man to beat with commanding Dauphiné victory

This time last week we were wondering about the form of Chris Froome in this the final preparation race ahead of the Tour de France. The Sky rider had been beaten by his rival Alberto Contador in the uphill prologue of the Criterium du Dauphiné with former team-mate Richie Porte even finishing in front of him.

Fast forward a week and it is clear that any fears as to his form were unfounded. Froome bounced back in style winning the first big mountain stage of three over the final three days of racing to seize the yellow jersey before taking more time from his nearest rivals a day later and marking them tight on the final stage that seen him wrap up the overall victory ahead of Romain Bardet and Daniel Martin with Porte and Contador back in 4th and 5th respectively.

Following that prologue win by Contador, stage victories on flat to rolling roads were taken by Nacer Bouhanni, Jesus Herrada, Fabio Aru (in a superb opportunists move to attack late and hold off a charging peloton in an attempt to take something from his race after losing a heap of time in previous stages) and Edvald Boasson Hagen, while the GC remained largely untouched as the contenders kept their powder dry for the three mountain stages.

And as he likes to do, Froome struck on the first of those three stages to Vaujany. He left Contador for dead and only Porte could remain close as Froome took the stage and a 7sec lead over Porte with Contador dropping to third at 27sec. Only Froome's former lieutenant Porte was of a serious threat.

Attention turns towards the Tour

After almost a week to allow the dust to settle on a fantastic Giro d'Italia, thoughts slowly began to turn towards the next Grand Tour of the season: The Tour de France. And with it comes some week long stage racing to fine tune those who consider themselves favourites as each looks to lay down a psychological marker on his rivals or perhaps see how much work he still has to do.

The first of these is the Critérium du Dauphiné and it's already underway. Two stages in now and you would have to say already, it's advantage Alberto Contador. The Spaniard won the opening up-hill prologue in spectacular fashion putting 13sec into Chris Froome over the 3.9km, 9.7% average gradient climb. Richie Porte only lost 6sec, but others lost a lot more: Mikel Landa, 44sec; Thibaut Pinot, 52sec; Fabio Aru, 1min 8sec.

I'd expect Froome to start to come good later in the week and you'd certainly expect better from Aru. Contador looks sharp though, skinnier than in many years and surely desperate for one last crowning glory in July. Froome might hope that the Tinkoff rider is peaking a month too soon, but the fact is, Contador knows what he is doing. There's some huge climbing stages in this race towards the later part of this week however and that's where we'll truly see each pretender to win the Tour's form.

Giro look back

Shark attack...the rise of Dutch cycling...new Luxembourger on the block...predictions review...plus other lists and thoughts

It was a good Giro, though when again, most of them are. The organisation clearly hoped that the race would come down to the Alps in the final few days, and so it proved to be. But they were a little lucky too for going into those Alpine stages the Giro seemed won and done by Steven Kruijswijk only for his crash to throw the whole thing wide open again. With so many key stages packed into the later part of the race it meant for wide open results in the early going but with the acceptance that there may not be any major shake ups. Indeed, it took about half of the race to whittle the GC contention down to a handful of riders and even that was due to the likes of Tom Dumoulin, Ryder Hesjedal and Mikel Landa abandoning the race. Still, the pink jersey changed hands eight different times among eight different riders and with 17 different stage winners over the 21 stages, we can't say we didn't have variety. Throw all that in with the story of Nibali and what was wrong with him before the story of his superb comeback and there was plenty to talk about and discuss across the three weeks.

I'm not going to sit and review the race in depth here. I wrote about it almost every day and those articles will stand up as my review of each stage as it is. I tended to write in the hours after each stage, sometimes a day later, and my memory was fresher then than it is now and so more details were covered. What follows here is a generic overview of the race, some thoughts on Nibali's achievement and the usual reaction to it on the likes of social media, a word on Kruijswijk, a look at how the other jersey's played out, how the Italians done, where each man to wear pink finished up, and a dreaded review of my predictions!\

Controversial sprint to end fantastic Giro won by Nibali

The Giro rolled into Turin today, the final act of the three week show piece. No threats to the pink jersey today, this one was for stage hunters, or sprinters more like...what's left of them. Gone are the Kittels and Greipels and so it was over to the secondary men to step out from their shadow and grab a little glory on the final day. Call it a watered down version of the final day of the Tour de France in Paris if you like. Some might say the Giro as a whole is a watered down version of the Tour, and that might be true in the sense that there was no Chris Froome, Alberto Contador, Nairo Quintana, Peter Sagan or Mark Cavendish, but it certainly isn't the case with regards to entertainment, good racing and edge of the seat action.

That isn't to say the Tour isn't all of that too, but the Giro certainly offers a race of its own that is just as worthy. It's for no reason beyond that of sponsor obligations, name status and perhaps prize money that some of those names I've just mentioned prefer to focus on the Tour more often than not (Contador and Quintana, the past two winners of the Giro respectively, being a slight exception).

Anyway, I digress. The stage indeed came down to a sprint with Giancomo Nizzolo finally getting his way, or so he thought. About half an hour after crossing the line with his arms aloft and yelling out in relief, the Italian was disqualified for changing his line and his victory handed to German Nikias Arndt.

All that was left was the pomp and ceremony and the presentation of that beautiful trophy to Nibali. An Italian winner...they certainly love that, and given how he went about fighting back in the Alps when it might have been easier for him to say he wasn't feeling right and abandon the race earlier in the week, you have to admire him. Some will maintain that Steven Kruijwijk deserved this Giro victory, but in a three week Grand Tour, the man who wears the race leaders jersey over the line on the final stage, tends to be the deserving winner.  It's not always the strongest who wins, but the one that negotiates the course the fastest. And that was Vincenzo Nibali.

Nibali cracks Chaves, grabs pink and wins the Giro

Vincenzo Nibali has won the Giro d'Italia. 4th place and almost five minutes behind overall on Saturday morning, he goes to bed on Sunday night with the pink jersey hanging in his hotel room closet and a lead over Esteban Chaves of almost a minute. Steven Kruijswijk, the man who looked nailed on to win this race as they rode towards the Alps, comes out of them two days later, off the podium. Shades of fellow countryman Tom Dumoulin's late collapse at the Vuelta last year, also at the hands of an Italian on the Astana team.

Let's get the niceties of the stage result out of the way first: Rein Taaramae took the victory. He got into the early break before shedding his fellow contenders and rode in alone, 52sec ahead of Colombian John Atapuma and 1min 17sec up on American Joe Dombrowski. A day for so nears yet so fars for the Colombians.

And it was the so near yet so far of Esteban Chaves that stood out the most. Stage 20 was the final mountain stage of this Giro and the Colle Della Lombarda its final major climb and for Chaves it proved a day too many; a ridge too far.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the Alps...

We should all know by now never to concede the outcome of a Grand Tour when there are mountain passes still to come. Not when there's a Shark in the peloton itching to find his form and take a bite out of this race. He is leaving it late, but Vincenzo Nibali has waited until the highest mountains of this years race to find his form and launch his attack. He went into the Alps with a place on the podium in question; he now has one day to find 44sec and pull off an incredible come back victory.

So what happened? How on earth did Steven Kruijswijk not see it through considering he had a 3min lead on second place Esteban Chaves and 4min 43sec on Nibali? Can the Colombian, Chaves, with the feel of the pink jersey upon his shoulders really pull it off? Today was into the climbs with high altitude, made for a man like Chaves; it is also the long climbs that surely Kruijswijk could defend on and see it out?

But cometh the hour, cometh the shark. It was a day of high drama, massive excitement and brilliant bike racing in every sense of the word. And there's more tomrrow.

Transition to the Alps: Silver lining for IAM...Mugging by Etixx

Two transitional stages as they are better known did little to affect the general classification except to stir them up with every turn of the pedals taking them closer to the Alps and the final two big mountain stages of this Giro that will once and for all confirm whether Steven Kruijswijk can indeed become and Grand Tour winner.

Both stages though were quite exciting in their own right. Stage 17 was a sprinters day and as such the early part of the day held nothing to write about except for the break that went clear and which was eventually swept up, albeit a lot closer to the line than the chasing pack might have hoped. And yet, a sprinter didn't win. Perhaps the difficulty with which the early escape was brought back served to remind us that not many pure sprinters were left and of those that where, they were riding for teams full of men with tired legs. The upshot to that was Filippo Pozzato darting out of the pack in a bid for glory with a kilometre to go only for Roger Kluge to respond by jumping across and then past the veteran Italian to hold off the sprinters by a handful of lengths for the win.

You wait years for someone to try one of them final flying-kilo efforts to upset the sprinters only for two to come along at once.

Kruijswijk gets stronger...Nibali cracks...Valverde marks an anniversary

It was a long weekend here in Canada and as such I spent a lot of time out on my bike than near a computer writing about the Giro. I did however get to watch most of the two stages either side of the rest day, both of which served to change the pattern of the race a lot since I last wrote on Saturday.

Even then we were looking at a three horse race between the leader Steven Kruijswijk, his nearest rival Vincenzo Nibali and the Colombian Esteban Chaves. The likes of Movistar's Alejandro Valverde and Andrey Amador, as well as Rafal Majka of Tinkoff were more than three minutes adrift with their hopes fading fast. The big question was whether Kruijswijk could hold his superb form over a couple of difficult days, with Niblai surely set to step up his game, and how the rest might go about trying to wear him down?

Today, with Sunday's mountain time-trial and a leg busting short-mountain stage to shake the riders awake after a day off, completed, Kruijswijk appears a man in complete control, leading Chaves by 3min. Nibali on the other hand has capitulated and now sits a distant 4th at 4min 43sec behind the Dutchman.

So what changed?

A Dutchman back in pink as a Colombian contender takes the stage

Day-by day, climb-by-climb, one-by-one the contenders for this Giro d'Italia have fallen by the wayside as the number with the potential to win dropped from double figures, to half a dozen to five, four and today perhaps just three as the race entered the Dolomites and the general classification was turned upon its head.

It was a 210km epic from Alpago to Corvara, crossing six climbs in total, five of which had an altitude of more than 2,000 metres for a collective 5,000 plus metres of total altitude gain by the riders who spent upward of six hours in the saddle.

And by the time all was said and done we had a Colombian stage winner in Esteban Chaves, another Dutchman in the pink jersey in Steven Kruijswijk, an Italian hanging on for grim death in Vincenzo Nibali, and the likes of Alejandro Valverde, Andrey Amador, Rafal Majka, Ilnur Zakarin and Rigoberto Uran all in real trouble.

Jungles loses pink to Amador...Sky salvage some pride

The big story today was at the top of the general classification as Bob Jungels was finally exposed on one of the final climbs and despite his best efforts to time-trial his way back across to his rival Andrey Amador, it proved to be in vain as the Movistar rider became the first man from Costa Rica to pull on a race leaders jersey at a Grand Tour. They'll be dancing on the streets of San Jose tonight.

That last climb had also caught Amador out, but not as much and he had descended like a demon to get back on and complete his dream. His large group of 14 was led home by Vincenzo Nibali in third place on the stage, who took enough bonus seconds to leapfrog Alejandro Valverde into third place overall by two seconds. Up ahead of them on the stage was Giovanni Visconti and 43sec further ahead of him was team Sky's Mikel Nieve who had salvaged a little pride for Team Sky who seen their GC ambitions vanish when their other Mikel -- Landa -- abounded earlier in the week.

It had been a rough Giro for Team Sky before today. With all their eggs in the Landa basket for the overall title, it left Sebastian Henao as their best placed man overall some thirteen and a half minutes adrift when that basket dropped and the eggs cracked.

So Greipel hasn't abandoned after all...well, he has now

As of this morning, for reasons I don't quite know, I was under the assumption that Andre Greipel had already abandoned the Giro. Which was surprising to me given the profile of today's stage with not a single rise on the road. If ever there was a day designed for the fast men, then this was it. As a result of my assumption I was trying to think on who might win the days gallop now that Marcel Kittel and Greipel had gone home.

But he hadn't, and no wonder. Imagine though my surprise when I did tune in with just two kilometres to go, with that Italian commentary again, and all I could hear was the name Greipel and all I could see was the Lotto-Soudal team moving up towards the front. The big man was still very much a part of this race and he was going for his third stage win of the race. There was never going to be any doubt.

Caleb Ewan made more of a fist of it than anyone else managed in Greipel's previous two wins, but even he came up a few lengths short, though partly because he had to check his sprint when he decided to come over Greipel's right shoulder and realised there was no room between the German and the barriers. Would Ewan have won had he gone the other way? We'll never know, but now that Greipel is indeed bowing out of the race ahead of the terrain that will never suit him, to rest and recover for other targets over the summer, perhaps Ewan will get his chance on one of the few remaining flat stages.

There was no change in the overall.

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Over in at the Tour of California, yesterday, Peter Sagan won yet again. No longer in contention to win the overall classification, Sagan is sweeping up all other stages beyond that of the queen stage that he lost big time on a few days ago. Stage 5 is underway as I write this, so we'll see what it brings.

Ulissi wins again but Jungels remins king of the Giro

So much for that being a sprinters day on what looked on the profile like a pan-flat stage with a couple of little bumps near the end. Turns out those hilly were harder than they looked and enough to shake virtually everyone not in GC contention from the final shootout for the stage win.

Vincenzo Nibali turned up the pressure on the descent of one of those hills and split it up nicely. For a moment it looked like himself, Alejandro Valverde and Esteban Chaves might take time on everyone else with 15km to go, but the leading duo on GC -- Bob Jungels and Andrey Amador -- soon bridged across...and then attacked. It was an attempt by Amador to take the jersey from Jungels, but the young Etixx - Quick Step rider had more in his legs than they thought and it was soon about the two putting time into the rest with Jungels looking the strongest of the two. With 4.5km remaining Diego Ulissi, he of one stage win to his name in his Giro being quickly dominated by Italian stage winners, sprinted across the small but holding gap to join the attack and set up the potential three man sprint and with the Italian then present it should have been obvious who would win the stage.

The gap held and Ulissi took the win, sprinting around Jungels who was more focused on keeping the chasing group at bay with a huge effort in the final kilometre that resulted in him finishing third of the three. The result gave the Luxembourgian four bonus seconds, though his lead of the Giro was reduced by 2sec with Amador finishing in front of him and gaining 6sec overall. Still the limited bunch that contained the other GC contenders trailed in behind Giacomo Nizzolo at 13sec thus improving Jungels advantage over the likes of Nibali and Valverde by 17sec.

Youth springs forth with stage win and race leadership change on stage 10

It was a good day for youth on day that seen another Italian winner, a change in the race lead, a conflict between team-mates, Tom Dumoulin losing time, and the abandonment of Mikel Landa after falling ill over night. The stage winner was 21 year old Giulio Ciccone, who became the third different Italian stage winner at this Giro and the race leader is now 23 year old Bob Jungles, who became the first rider from Luxembourg to pull on the pink jersey since the great Charly Gaul in 1959.

It's been a mighty impressive Giro for the Italians. On top of having Gianluca Brambilla in pink for a few days, they now have three stage wins from three different riders, and none of them have been sucked up via bunch sprints either. Indeed, if you remove the sprint stages and the two individual time-trials from the equation, Italians have now won three of the four remaining stages thus far.

And it was fitting that it should be this way for I had to stream the final 15-20km in Italian. I had no idea what they were saying other than the mention of riders names, but there was little doubt that they were enjoying what they were seeing. No let up in the shouting and yelling that gave the impression that I was watching the most dramatic race of all time.

Notes from rest day 2, Giro 2016 edition

A pretty decent first week of racing with a little bit of everything and a general classification that is still completely wide open heading towards the mountains. You cannot really ask for much more than that and so I suppose, with a kind heart, those fine athletes deserve a day of rest! Still, there's plenty to muse about both at the Giro and beyond.

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Kittel abandons

Let's start with the German sprinter who lit up the first two road stages in the Neterlands with mighty victories in which nobody else came close. On stage four he arrived in Italy for the first time in his Giro racing career but only lasted a further five stages before failing to take the start at yesterday's time-trial. As a result Kittel leaves the Giro with his record intact of having won four career Giro stages without ever having won the race on Italian soil.

Maybe it was the weather he didn't fancy yesterday or maybe he's satisfied with his two early victories and will now rest up and turn his ambitions to stage wins at Le Tour in July. Still, with Andre Greipel in the assendency it would have been nice to see them go head-to-head a few more times, and perhaps even fight out the red points jersey all the way to a conclusion. Stages 11 and 12 coming up this week look ideal for the sprinter so it's a surprise he didn't hang around a few more days.

Dumoulin fails to gain as contenders remain close

If you'd have told me on Saturday morning that come Sunday night after the conclusion of the long individual time-trial that Tom Dumoulin would be sitting almost one minute off the overall lead and behind the likes of Vincenzo Nibali and Alejandro Valverde, I'd have thought you were nuts. Saturday didn't look exceptionally tough on paper and Sunday's TT was tailor made for the big Dutchman.

As it is in reality, Dumoulin has had a weekend to forgot. An implosion on Saturday clearly left his legs too tired to recover on time for Sunday and while he still bettered the time of his main rivals, he did only finish 15th and is left with his GC ambitions hanging by a thread with all the major climbing stages still to come.

Indeed it would appear that Dumoulin may now decide to lose time in a bid to later win a stage, especially now that the time-trial stage he had hoped to win for himself has come and gone. Perhaps he was right after all when he told us that he wasn't in this GC race for the long haul but to try retain the jersey for as long as he could before accepting his fate, and that he hadn't trained at altitude unlike the others. Maybe he wasn't bluffing. Of course, he remains with a minute of the overall lead and closer still to the men expected to compete for the overall glory, but the mountains are their terrain and Dumoulin looked shaky on that climb on Saturday.

The weather was awful too for the TT, but not that it could be used as any excuse. Sure the surprise winning time of Primoz Roglic was set on dry roads, but others who faced the same conditions put time into Dumoulin while the climbing sort he must have hoped to bury today, did not lose anywhere near what we thought they might.

Dumoulin cracks as Italians sweep the podium and take pink

So maybe Tom Dumoulin was right after all. Maybe he doesn't have designs for the overall classification of this Giro d'Italia and maybe he didn't train at altitude like the rest; not that today's stage was at altitude or even near the high mountains but, you know, climbing legs and all that. And maybe his goal was a few days in pink up through the first long time-trial before resigning himself. That goal took a big hit today though it still remains a possibility should he show his true colours against the clock tomorrow, but it would appear the reality is that when the going gets steep, Dumoulin isn't ready to challenge the climbers.

That said, you'd also be a fool to write Dumoulin off as anyone who watched him in last years Vuelta will attest. He could very well be back in pink tomorrow with some time to play with and he could yet begin to find some climbing legs. Just todays ago, it is worth remembering, he put the likes of Nibali and Landa on the back foot. But, today was a tough one.

He surrendered his pink race leaders jersey to the impressive Gianluca Brambilla who on the roads of Tuscany threw back reminders to this years Strade Bianche and his talents on this kind of terrain when he came third. This time he took the win when he escaped from a large group that had gone clear earlier in the day. The group was full of names suited to this kind of stage: rolling roads with quite a large dusty, gravel climb near the finish before a drop down into Arezzo.

Greipel makes it three straight for Lotto-Soudal

Two days ago Andre Greipel made up for lost ground on sprint rival Marcel Kittel by winning his sprint by as many lengths as the impressive Kittel had in his two combined. Which was no mean feat given how dominant Kittel had been. Today, on the 211km stage seven from Sulmona to Foligno, Greipel won again and in doing so matched Kittel for race wins at this Giro and moved into the red jersey as points leader ahead of his fellow countryman, 119 to 106.

Greipel's two sprint victories came without Kittel present however (the first had Kittel missing after being dropped on prior climbs, the second seen Kittel puncture with 5km to go), but his wins sandwiched the win of his team-mate Tim Wellens on stage 6 and thus made it three wins in-a-row for the likeable Lotto-Soudal team.

They may not lead the overall team competition (they're only 16th, 14min 58sec behind Astana), but they now have Greipel in the points and Wellens in the King of the Mountains jerseys. Clearly the target for Lotto is stage wins in this Giro, and they're getting it done. You get the impression there is more wins in Greipel and certainly Wellens and that still leaves names like Adam Hansen, Lars Bak, Jurgen Roelandts and Jelle Vanendert who can all win a Grand Tour stage.

No major changes overall though Ryder Hesjedal lost a handful of seconds yet again when he was caught in a late split that cost him 9sec. It also caught out Orica GreenEdge's GC hopeful, Esteban Chaves as well as Michele Scarponi.

Some answers, but more questions as Wellens wins, Dumoulin gains and Nibali struggles

I said yesterday that the first summit finish of any Grand Tour is exciting because it starts to give you some answers on how the race going forward might unfold, what I failed to mention was that often a whole set of new questions arise in the place of those answers. Today's stage was no different.

We got answers like: Tom Dumoulin has his climbing legs, Vincenzo Nibali has yet to peak and that this first Grand tour stage win by Tim Wellens will not be his only Grand Tour stage win for a young rider who appears to have a real gift for picking off race wins following his victory at the GP Cycliste de Montreal last year and stage of Paris-Nice this spring.

But while Wellens' victory was perfectly played and a fine performance, all eyes were on the men several minutes further down the road, racing hard, not in a bid to catch him, but to try hurt one another. And the winner proved to be Dumoulin, but the questions that arose:


Can Nibali come good? Is Landa in trouble? Will Nibali's team-mate Jakob Fuglsang, who finished second to Wellens and who is now second overall, willing to assume the team lead and race the Italian? Is Ilnur Zakarin, third on the stage and now third overall, a GC contender to win this race? Is Dumoulin bluffing by continuing to claim he isn't in the GC hunt for the long haul? And, is the race leading Dutchman likely to put another couple of minutes into his rivals come Sunday's time-trial?

And that in many ways is the joy of Grand Tours. The answers you get on one stage coinciding with the questions that are also thrown up. And the better the Grand Tour the more questions you find yourself asking for longer in to the race.

Here comes the first big test...

I do love the first mountain top finish of any Grand Tour. You really get the sense that you're moving from the unknown towards some answers as to how the race is going to unfold; to what form certain contenders have, and who is no longer in contention. Until now everyone who has desires to win this Giro have played their cards close to their chest, though when the roads point up, especially with a finishing line at the top, there's nowhere to hide and a riders form is duely exposed.

As things stand less than one minute separates the top 23 in general classification, but you can bet it won't be like that tonight. All the main GC contenders are within that 23, except perhaps for Ryder Hesjedal who sits 27th at 1min 17sec, and as a result there is so much to play for.

With so many hard stages to come there is the possibility that many will look to keep their powder dry. Follow the moves but not expose themselves too much. But one or two will feel good enough to test the waters and it only takes one or two to break a finish like this one wide open.

Greipel does a Kittel, and then some...

When Marcel Kittel won stages two and three of this years Giro he did so by what appeared to be a combined length of about eight lengths. His chief rival and fellow countryman, Andre Greipel was well beaten, finishing 15th and 4th respectively. Until today that was, when the next sprint stage presented itself, though not before enough short little climbs eliminated Kittel from contention, and Greipel, duly delivered with a sprint victory that ought to have come with a time gap as he put a fair ten lengths between himself and Arnaud Demare in second.

If there were a sprint competition for wins by lengths then I'd reckon Greipel on this sprint alone had taken the lead back from Kittel.

It was a statement of intent by the Lotto-Soudal rider who must have been feeling a little pressure to show his own turn of speed, and a reminder of his abilities to navigate the smaller hills that catch some of the other pure sprinters out. It now means he has won at least one stage from every Grand Tour he has entered dating back to the 2008 Giro. A fantastic level of consistency.

While I'm OK with bunch sprints being limited to a handful of stages in Grand Tours, I do hope we get at least another opportunity for one and with it a proper elbow-to-elbow battle between the two big Germans. Kittel appears to have the edge when he is there, but Greipel will have felt a surge of confidence with that performance today.

Ulissi makes it three in-a-row while Dumoulin moves back into pink

Back on Italian soil after three stages and already an Italian winner in Diego Ulissi, though it was not all doom and gloom for the Dutch, who waved goodbye to the Giro on Sunday, as Tom Dumoulin retrieved his pink jersey again from Marcel Kittel who had used time-bonuses and two stage wins to leap frog his former team-mate on the weekend.

The stage was 200km in length and reminded me a little bit of a mini Milan-San Remo what with those tough little hills on the run-in before a fast descent into the finishing town of Praia a Mare on the coast, and it didn't disappoint.

As usual the early break went clear and, as usual, they were swept up when the days racing reached the business end of the stage, but it only resulted in more attacks going with riders conscious of the kind of run in and aware that the sprinters teams would not be the ones in pursuit. Indeed, Marcel Kittel in the pink jersey was having a rough go of it. Dropped at one stage he got back on but would eventually lose contact on the final climbs and roll into Praia a Mare 8min 10sec down, and well out of pink. Still, he got to enjoy it for one day on the roads of Italy, the first time he has rode the Giro in its home country despite four career stage wins to his name.

525km of bike routes for Toronto is a huge step forward

As someone who has cycled on the streets of Toronto before, though granted not in the downtown core, it was great to see this article in the Toronto Star this morning:

A 10-year plan to invest in the build of '525km of new bike lanes, cycle tracks, trails and other routes that, if built, would create the kind of connected network Toronto's bike advocates have long pushed for', including infrastructure on eight of Toronto's busiest streets.

I for one would welcome that, as should anyone with a forward thinking attitude towards the city, and not just those who ride their bikes at present.

Of course, some people will object and while the one Councillor quoted in the article, Stephen Holyday, is far a dissenting voice, his quote did express what I think is a view among many:

“I hold a very high test for any time there’s an attempt to take out a live lane of traffic. We live in a very congested city as it is,” said Holyday, who sits on the public works committee.

“Often you are inconveniencing the majority for the desires of the minority, if the ridership is low.”

The thing I'd say to that is that the city is very congested in its downtown core because too many people are driving and that ridership is low because too many people don't feel safe in riding. If you build these cycle networks you may encourage more people to leave their car and home and ride on Toronto's streets.

It can only be a good thing.

Kittel is prolific in Giro stages held outside Italy; moves into pink ahead of Dumoulin

The only difference between this years opening weekend of the Giro in the Netherlands and the opening weekend in Belfast two years ago is that they began with a team-time-trial rather than an individual TT, and that the weather was better for the Dutch. Other than that it was the Marcel Kittel show once again as the Etixx Quick Step rider took both flat stages ahead of the Giro's return to Italy and in doing so has now won four career Giro stages without ever having raced on Italian soil given he abandoned after his second win into Dublin in 2014. I assume he has every intention of taking the plane to Italy this time around?

Other than that the race has been largely uneventful. The crowds were big but the drama short and none of the big favourites were seriously tested beyond that of the 9.8km time-trial. Tom Dumoulin won that on home soil by a fraction of a second and thus with it he took the first pink jersey, though he lost it yesterday when Kittel took his second stage win and enough collective bonus time to make good on a solid time-trial of his own to jump into pink.

Fabian Cancellara had hoped to spoil the Dutch party but had taken ill on the Thursday and had to settle for an 8th place finish 14sec behind Dumoulin. He still was clearly struggling a day later when he came in 1min 51sec down on Kittel and again on Sunday when he finished 6min 3sec back. Cancellara will hope to battle through and recover in time for the 40.5km time-trial on stage 9 from which he'll be on of the favourites for the stage win. Snatching pink for a few days is now a lost ambition.

The biggest loser of the main contenders was probably Mikel Landa of Sky who conceded 40sec to Dumoulin, or perhaps more crucially, 21sec to Vincenzo Nibali who was likely best of the rest as far as the favourites are concerned.

Last gasp Giro d'Italia preview

I guess I've taken my eye of the cycling ball over the last week because while I knew the Giro was getting underway this weekend, I thought it started tomorrow, so imagine my surprise to be sitting on the bus this morning, reading the sports new on my phone and seeing something about a live blog for the opening time-trial of the 2016 Giro d'Italia. Yes, it's already underway, though just a glorified prologue at 9.8km in Apeldoorn in the Netherlands.

Which means I can pin together some quick 'pre' Giro musings without feeling like I've got some inside knowledge off the back of a result. Shy of someone crashing out of completely falling apart over the 9.8km course, there will be no implications to the overall classification and the sprinters will be keeping their powder dry for another day. Indeed the only real question that may be answered by the time I publish this is whether Fabian Cancellara has pulled on his first pink jersey as race leader by winning the TT? Answers at the bottom...

So quick look at the route: Three days in the Netherlands, one for Cancellara, two for the sprinters, before a glorified rest day/travel day (much like the Giro when it came to Northern Ireland a few years ago) as the race relocates to the south of Italy and begins in earnest with a couple of lumpy stages that might still suit the sprinters but will allow for a breakaway to perhaps survive before the first summit finish on stage 6. Then we'll be down to the nitty-gritty and have an early idea of who isn't in contention for general classification contention.

A rough week for British Cycling

What a week for British Cycling? From an alleged sexism and bullying scandal against their Olympic program boss Shane Sutton that has seen the hard nosed Australian resign his post, to a positive drug test for Orica GreenEdge's young British star Simon Yates that has thrown his reputation into doubt despite claims by the team of an administration error, to the Tour of Romandie were Ben Swift was taken to hospital following a crash and Chris Froome struggled in the GC following a mechanical incident on stage one that left him behind.

It certainly kept the British sports writers busy and perhaps gave British cycling more dirty linen on the sports pages than they might have hoped for, especially in a week that seen two million spectators line the roads to watch the Tour de Yorkshire pass by; a race won in the end by a Frenchman, Thomas Voeckler, but which seen Simon's brother Adam Yates finish third overall, while at Romandie, Froome bounced back with a stage win.

The Sutton scandal, or as every scandal likes to be known in today's world: Sutton-gate, or British-Cycling-Sexism-Gate, got underway in earnest on April 23 when British track rider Jess Varnish made the allegations of sexism against Sutton, claiming that upon being dropped from the Olympic program she was told by Sutton that she was too old, too fat and that she should go "have a baby". The pressure only mounted three days later when British cycling legend's Victoria Pendleton and Nicole Cooke both made claims of sexism within the British Cycling structure and although Sutton denied any wrong doing he was suspended by British Cycling a day later when they launched an independent review into the claims and soon resigned his post.

King of Spring 2016

On the right hand side of the site I've been running a league table throughout spring to track the most consistent rider of the one-day spring classics or, as I've come to call it, the King of Spring. The points format mirrors that of Formula One with 25 points for a win, 18 for second, 15 for third and then 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2 and 1 down to tenth.

14 World Tour or 1.HC races across spring starting with the Omloop Het Niewsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne at the end of February, moving to Italy for Strade Bianche and Milan-San Remo, then into Flanders for the cobbled classics of Dwars Door Vlaanderen, E3 Harelbeke, Gent-Wevelgem, Tour of Flanders and Scheldeprijs and rounding out the cobble season with Paris-Roubaix. Then it's into the hillier spring classics as racing transitions from Flanders to the Ardennes with Brabantse Pijl, Amstel Gold (not technically Ardennes), La Flèche Wallonne and finally Liège–Bastogne–Liège. Four Monuments in total though the points structure remains the same for all races regardless of their UCI ranking.

And now we're done. So who won? Well I doubt you'll be surprised but here's a look at the top ten in the table (including each riders biggest results). 83 riders in total scored points, the same as last year when Alexander Kristoff won and one more than 2014 when Niki Terpstra came out on top.

Wout Poels first Monument for Sky in the snow at Liège

Who would have thought that the first man to bring Sky their long awaited Monument victory would be Wout Poels at Liège-Bastogne-Liège? That isn't meant to be a slight on Poels, a fine rider who really shone bright for Chris Froome on Alpe d'Huez last year and who has had a solid start to this season, including a 4th place finish at Flèche Wallonne just a few days ago. So perhaps we shouldn't be surprised, but the money being thrown about on who might do it first must surely have been going on someone like Michal Kwiatkowski. In many ways he was brought in to break the duck.

Still, Kwiatkowski ended up shining brighter on the cobbled classics than the hillier ones in which many felt suited him best and it was Poels who emerged from the sleet and snow and rain on a friged cold day in the Ardennes to out manoeuver his three late breakaway companions to win it on the line.

It was far from an epic race, but held in epic conditions. Not quite Hinault in '80 but snowing nonetheless. The kind we always long for in the spring Monuments and which the riders dread. The challenge for them increases imeasurably as they fight to keep warm, to stay upright and to stop their legs from freezing up when they look to them to respond. The challenge for those of us watching on television increase a little as we fight to see which rider is which as rain capes cover numbers.

Tro Bro Léon to the Ardennes classics

The Tro Bro Léon really should be a bigger race than it is, it has everything the road cycling fan loves about a classics race -- especially following hot on the heels of Paris-Rouabix -- and yet it remains on the fringes of fame, out there on the Brittany coast, lashing around in the wind, the farm tracks and cobbled roads that many don't seem to notice. And maybe in some way that's for the best; it's kind of cool that this funky race flies a little under the radar.

That said I am sure the organisors would love for its appeal to grow and there is no doubt in recent years it has. It was formed in 1984 but only last year did I really learn what it was. Being held the weekend after Paris-Roubaix kind of hurts its hopes for larger appeal; the classics men have had a long spring and Rouabaix kind of wraps all that up. If Tro Bro Léon were held a few weeks before, it would surely attract a more elite field of names.

If you didn't know by now, Tro Bro Léon is a race in the Paris-Roubaix mold but held out in Brittany. The Hell of the West it is known to some or Le Petit Paris-Roubaix. It includes 24 sectors of drit, cobblestones and gravel roads while also hugging the wind swept coast roads of Brittany. There is two prizes up for grabs: The winner of the race gets a trophy, the top Breton finisher gets a live piglet!

Hell of a race at the Hell of the North

What a race it was. And we shouldn't be surprised really. Not when the name is Paris-Roubaix and 200 bicycles are racing across a 257.5km course in Northern France of which 52.8km feature 27 sectors of tight cobbled and dirt covered farm roads. If they tried to invent this race in 2006 rather than 1896, nobody would go for it. And yet, the drama was unending. Few races are carried live on television from gun to flag for a reason, even the big mountain stages of the Tour de France see the peloton amble over the first two or three cols before starting to make moves with the action unfolding on the final climb. But not Paris-Roubaix; not yesterday.

They say the ones in which the rain falls and the wind blows and the riders come home caked in mud are the best. That is true as a spectacle, but yesterday proved a dry race in the dust can be just as thrilling. We had the sight of 257.5km of attacks, crashes, surges, splits in the field, panic, pursuits, selections, more attacking and finally a sprint for glory in the Roubaix velodrome.

By the time the race reached the Forest of Aranberg with 95.5km still remaining, we had seen numerous failed attacks, one that had thus far succeeded and a crucial crash that split the chasing bunch in two creating three distinct groups on the road. And most crucial of all, Peter Sagan and Fabian Cancellara, two pre-race favourites set to duke this one out after last weeks epic battle at the Tour of Flanders, were in the third group on the road and in real trouble. Especially considering the groups in front contained other contenders, one of whom was the great Tom Boonen. The upshot was, with so long still to race, a mighty pursuit across Northern France

The key to winning at Roubaix, beyond all such attributes of power, experience, control, nerve, timing, bike handling and brute strength -- all of which you must contain in abundance -- is little bits of luck to avoid the unexpected crashes or mechanical mishaps. Sagan and Cancellara fell foul to the former, both from the crash that split the field early, and for Cancellara in a crash of his own, just as the gap to those in front was beginning to come down, that left him out of contention. That Peter Sagan didn't come down as well was a major testament to his attribute of bike handling, something we're so familiar with. But isolated so far from the finish and with the pressure only ramping up as the two groups ahead merged, he would find the gaps too large to close.

The Cobbled classics season ends but the Ardennes is still to come

Sunday's Paris-Roubaix brought with it the end to the cobbled classic season, but what a run of races it was. We probably say that every year but I think I watched more intently this year than in any previous season and no time felt wasted. Eight major races in total and I watched them all, and throughout I kept a little league table on the sidebar of this site that I've now updated and completed. More on that below.

From the the Omloop Het Niewsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne in late February, followed by a slight break in proceedings as riders and teams accessed their form ahead of the quick succession of Flandrian races in late March and early April up to Flanders and Scheldeprijs, before Paris-Roubaix in early April brought us to the climax. There was high drama throughout spring that built to a crescendo for the Monuments of Flanders and Roubaix. New hero's were made, new Monument men crowned and some old hero's said goodbye. And, sadly, there was tragedy with the death of young Belgian rider Antoine Demoitié at Gent-Wevelgem.

Demoitié's death naturally left a shadow over further racing, not to mention the awful terrorist attacks on Belgian soil in the days leading into Flanders, but the riders done their best to keep spirits up and put on a show for the fans throughout, and nobody can say they failed us.

We had the good early form of Greg Van Avermaet (winning at Omloop), followed by an injury at Flanders; the continued rise of young Belgian hopeful Tiesj Benoot before he himself crashed out of the Flandrian epic; the attempt by Fabian Cancellara to go out in style with one last big win but which fell short, though through no shortage of panache; wins for two other new Belgian hopefuls: Jesper Stuyven (Kuurne) and Jens Debusschere (Dwars Door); Michal Kwiatkowski out dueling Peter Sagan in a two-up sprint (E3); Sagan bouncing back (Gent-Wevelgem) to round into perfrect form for his first Monument win in brilliant style (Ronde Van Vlaanderen); Tom Boonen coming oh-so-close to making it five Paris-Rouabix wins only to be beaten on the line by the popular veteran Mat Hayman.

Monument Man, Peter Sagan

It's always right after those moments in which we foolishly begin to question Peter Sagan, like after Michal Kwiatkowski beat him last week at the E3 Harelbeke, and in the lead up to last years World Championships when he had a barron spell of multiple second place finishes, that the Slovakian superstar steps up and reminds us just how brilliant he is.

Yesterday was one of those days. It was a beautiful, powerful, intelligent solo victory. Dawning his rainbow stripes he rode the strongest riders on the planet off his wheel to become the King of Flanders and to become a Monument Man at last.

And it came about after yet another move that seen himself and Kwiatkowski move clear of a narrowing field of strong men and bridge across to what was left of the days early break; a move that now also contained Sep Vanmarcke who himself had earlier bridged. Vanmarke was by now the major Belgian hope after a disasterous day that seen both Greg Van Avermaet and Tiesj Benoot crash out.

The Sagan-Kwiatkowski move set the likes of Fabian Cancellara into a panic, and had the likes of myself in a state of deja-vu and wondering whether Kwiatkowski would attack on the Kwaremont or Paterberg or indeed go for another sprint against Sagan just like at E3?

Yet when it came to the nitty-gritty of a Monument classic, with well over 220km in the legs, it was Sagan who forged ahead. After the race the 26 year old, previously without a Monument victory to his name and with questions starting to linger, said that "Nobody wants to work with me, so it's always better to drop everybody".

The stragegy of a genius.

Ronde Van Vlaanderen preview

This weekend is to the Belgian people what Super Bowl Sunday is to the Americans or what FA Cup Final day to the English. Their entire cycling year revolves around the Tour of Flanders and just by winning it you can write your name into legend, regardless of what you do the rest of the season. And especially if you're a Belgian because winning this race is akin to winning the Tour de France in the eyes of the Flandrians.

It's an epic race that really needs no introduction here. We've all heard the stories. Merckx riding solo for 73km to win by more than five and a half minutes in '69; Vanderaerden in that storm of '85 in which only 24 riders finished; or Jesper Sibby falling on the famous Koppenberg and being run over by an officials car in '87, the same year Claude Criquielion became the only French-speaking Belgian to win the Ronde. Indeed, following that Skibby incident, the Koppenberg was kept off the race route for 15 years, but thankfully is a part of the spectacle once more.

If you're reading this you've probably been following the build up over the past few days, or indeed watching the recent races that by comparison can only be described as warm up events on many of the same roads. You're probably also wishing right about now that you weren't reading this, but rather in Belgium, in a pub or cafe perhaps, soaking up the atmosphere and getting ready to go stand at the side of the road and watch the race on one of its famous cobbled climbs.

The all-round talented Michal Kwiatkowski

"What a talent Kwiatkowski is. Younger than Sagan by several months, the Polish phenom has proven himself capable in single day races as well as Grand Tours and must surely be seen as the finest young talent in the sport right now."

I wrote that paragraph in the days after Michal Kwiatkowski's World Championship victory back in September 2014. His mega-talent was evident then and he's done little to disappoint since. A consistent performer across an entire season, Kwiatkowski has shown an ability to finish high up in Grand Tours, week long stage races, hilly classics in the Ardennes, and cobbled classics in Flanders.

This past winter Kwiatkowski moved to Team Sky and many wondered what this would mean for his rounded ability under the strict stewardship of the Sky machine, but he hasn't disappointed. High placings in early season Spanish races, three top 10s at the Tirreno-Adriatico, a superb attack at Milan-San Remo, and then over the Easter long weekend a superb victory on the cobbled roads of Flanders in the E3 Harelbeke in a two-up sprint against the much hyped Peter Sagan. The pair got clear on a climb with 30km left, worked together to distance a pack of select favourites and contested a sprint in which Kwiatkowski comfortably won when he caught Sagan napping in the lead-out position.