Tear gas in riders’ eyes. A farmers’ protest blocking the road. Two key crashes on dangerous descents.
The only thing lacking from the wild 16th stage of the Tour de France on Tuesday was a shakeup in the overall standings.
Frenchman Julian Alaphilippe took advantage of his downhill skills to win the first of three mountainous legs in the Pyrenees, which was briefly interrupted when police used tear gas to disperse a farmers’ protest that had blocked the road with bales of hay.
Photo: AFP
The overall standings were unchanged. Geraint Thomas in the yellow jersey, second-placed Chris Froome and third-placed Tom Dumoulin all crossed together nearly nine minutes behind.
The farmers’ protest occurred 30km into the 218km leg from Carcassonne to Bagneres-de-Luchon.
Thomas, Froome, world champion Peter Sagan and other riders were treated with eye drops due to the tear gas amid a 15-minute delay.
“I just felt my throat and nose were burning, eyes were burning afterward, but I think quite a lot of riders were in a similar situation,” Froome said. “Thankfully the effect didn’t last long.”
The small group of farmers from the Aude Department were protesting a planned reduction of EU funding, French authorities said.
“We are not going to lock the riders in a stadium or a tennis court,” Tour director Christian Prudhomme said. “People should not block the road, no matter what causes they are fighting for.”
Thomas remained 1 minute, 39 seconds ahead of four-time champion Froome, with Dumoulin 1 minute, 50 seconds back.
Alaphilippe took the lead when Adam Yates crashed on a technical descent in the finale.
“I knew the finale was tricky,” Alaphilippe said. “I was sad for [Yates], but it could have happened to me, too, because I took a lot of risks.”
Belgian rider Philippe Gilbert was leading when he crashed earlier in the stage while descending from the Col de Portet-d’Aspet, hitting a wall and flipping off his bike spectacularly, but avoiding major injury.
It was the same descent where Italian rider Fabio Casartelli died during the 1995 Tour.
“I thought I was broken everywhere, but I ended up more or less OK,” Gilbert said.
However, Quick-Step later said that Gilbert, a former world champion, was withdrawing from the Tour with a fracture on his left kneecap.
“This isn’t how I wanted to finish my Tour and leaving it like this really hurts,” Gilbert said.
Yates led Alaphilippe by 20 seconds at the top of the Col du Portillon climb 10km from the finish, but lost control with 6km to go, falling to the pavement on a left turn and sliding across the road.
“You never know what’s coming up on some of these corners,” Yates said. “There was a bit of downforce or something and I came down, that’s all there is to it.
“Morale’s pretty damaged right now. When you come so close to winning a stage of the Tour, it’s pretty devastating,” Yates added.
The race yesterday was to remain in the Pyrenees for what was expected to be the most challenging stage of the Tour, a 65km leg from Bagneres-de Luchon to Saint-Lary-Soulan Col du Portet that features three grueling climbs, including an uphill finish.
“It’s going to be massively decisive,” Thomas said. “That last climb is possibly the toughest climb in the Tour — 16km, 2,200m [altitude]. There’s definitely going to be some splits.”
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