Mavi Garcia team car crash
Mavi Garcia (short for Margarita Victoria García Cañellas) was already having a pretty horrendous day on the bike, battling her way back from multiple mechanicals and bike changes (she had at least three picked up in coverage). During one of them, she accidentally took out Australian Alex Manly (BikeExchange-Jayco) and then had to battle back again to get in contention.
Just as she was rejoining a group of chasers, who themselves were about to go on to rejoin the much-reduced peloton, Garcia - presumably not seeing much but stars at this point – tried to drift into the slipstream of the chasers. She however, didn’t allow for the presence of her team car and clipped her back wheel on the bonnet and went down in front of the car. A quick response from the driver, who had their hands off the wheel, presumably after just being passed something from Garcia, saved the incident from being much worse as the car stopped by running her over.
This was a moment that was the most heart-in-mouth of the stage, any cyclist crash that involves a motor vehicle can be easily have grave consequences. Fortunately, Garcia was able to pick herself up quickly and continue on, battered but undefeated, though her tilt at the yellow jersey looks almost as much in tatters as her Spanish national championships jersey after he tumble.
Manly tackled
Garcia was to play the villain role in another significant crash. As she went to swap bikes with a teammate, she laid her machine to one side of the road, while a teammate in the middle of the road hopped of theirs to offer it to the team leader.
Along comes Australian Alex Manly returning from mechanical and with nowhere else to go with most of the road blocked by a race official’s car she went up alongside Garcia, who turned into her path without looking, knocking Manly down onto the gravel.
Manly continued on to the finish and said after the stage that she wasn’t badly injured.
Nobody follows Reusser attack
A different sort of incredulity at this one, that none of big teams thought that Reusser’s move wasn’t immediately dangerous and something to be closed down. Trek Segafredo, Canyon-SRAM and Jumbo-Visma were the biggest teams that missed the boat. At first they missed following the attack that came out of the peloton at a lull in the pace, where riders should be alert for aggression and then they didn’t commit to the chase.
There were attempts to bridge over as the gap blew out, but with a rider of the power and endurance of Reusser the stage was gone if they didn’t immediately commit to the chase.
“When Marlen went, the peloton didn’t react at all,” said Kasia Niewiadoma, leader of Canyon-SRAM in an interview with SBS’ Simon Gerrans. “In the reduced peloton, it felt very passive, I don’t know, maybe we were expecting more or Elisa (Longo Borghini) and I were expecting more.”
“We still expected that Trek or especially Jumbo to try hard to bring Reusser back, then we’d get back together by the climb and try a different scenario or on the descent. But having Alena (Amialiusik) there in the front made it lets just see what others do.”
It’s all well to criticise other teams, but this was a stage Canyon-SRAM wanted to create a situation where Niewiadoma could gain some more time and you felt that they missed an opportunity for a stage win and time on their GC rivals. Tiffany Cromwell wasn’t, by her own admission on the best of days and wasn’t present in the front group and you could tell they missed her presence.
The same indictment can be laid at Trek-Segafredo’s feet, it was a stage that looked perfect for Longo Borghini in her bid for yellow, and Vos ended up winning the bunch sprint, so maybe they as well let a stage go begging.
Full credit to Reusser for her strength but you sense those teams missed a beat when she launched and they were punished for it.
Brown puncture
One rider who likely wouldn’t have been caught out by an attack, at least to my parochial mind, was Grace Brown (FDJ-Suez-Futuroscope) who punctured on the final gravel sector, just before the decisive attack was launched. She consequently was in no place to react to the move and though she thought her race was over she was able to fight her way back into contact with the main bunch.
It’s a big pity for the Australian as that appeared a perfect stage for her, and the manner of victory – a bold solo attack – is straight out of Brown’s playbook. Stage 5 and 6 will be the last opportunity for the Aussie, the final two stages being a bit too climbing heavy for the Aussie with the team’s focus likely to be on Uttrup Ludwig, though Brown would be a threat from a breakaway.
Was this gravel a good idea?
The roads that the peloton rode over weren’t supposed to be newly laid tarmac, but many were surprised just how rough the gravel sections were. This wasn’t so much the Strade Biacnhe of Tuscany, many of the roads were more akin to outback Australia, with riders having to dodge tyre-slicing rocks, many failing and having their races affected adversely by mechanicals that were little more than luck of the draw.
There’s a point where it’s not about testing riders in all conditions so much as putting them in a pachinko machine and seeing how they (literally) fall. Annemiek van Vleuten’s also not a fan.
"I love gravel racing, I love Strade Bianche, but in a stage race, I think it should not be there,” said van Vleuten pre-stage. “Because for the GC contenders it puts a lot of stress. Hopefully, no one will get bad luck today."
As it turned out, Garcia was the worst affected slipping from being in contention for the overall win, to arguably not now, though she’s still an outside shot at the podium at two minutes and 26 seconds down. If as a race organiser you want to run gravel roads then at least ensure the race is run properly.
There were some quite dangerous sections that had jagged half sections of bitumen, the sheer number of motor vehicles was kicking up a choking and blinding cloud of dust for even the lone breakaway rider, and for the second time this race the lead car driver has fallen asleep at the wheel sufficiently for the front of the race nearly run into the back of them when they should be 100-200 metres up the road.
The Tour de France Femmes continues with the longest stage of the race, a whopping 175.6 kilometres over mostly flat terrain. Watch on the SBS SKODA Tour Tracker from 10.15pm AEST or with the SBS and SBS On Demand broadcast starting from 10.30pm AEST.
