Today's result brings up a very interesting prospect for the rest of the week. Will we have the rare pleasure of seeing the yellow jersey sprinting for points, or even sacrificing himself to help lead out his teammate Tyler Farrar? Tomorrow's stage will certainly come down to a field sprint, and with no time bonuses available Hushovd will remain in the yellow jersey for the time being. But Thor is a very real contender to be in the green jersey in Paris, and he would also like to help Farrar rack up a few stage wins or a mess of points on the very flat finishes like tomorrow's.
I've seen some discussion about heavy crosswinds affecting the field tomorrow, and a well-organized team certainly can fracture the peloton if that is the case. The film Chasing Legends provided excellent documentation of HTC-Highroad pulling this off in spectacular fashion on the way to Mark Cavendish's win in Stage 3 of the 2009 Tour. I don't think that we'll see anything that dramatic tomorrow because the course just isn't difficult enough, but there will be several big crashes.
About four kilometers before the intermediate sprint the course takes a sharp right-left-right chicane and a few riders will likely go down, particularly with the fast pace that will be set by teams jockeying to get their man into the green jersey. letour.fr fails to provide a detail map of the finish, but from the stage overview it appears that there are some nasty corners as the course enters Redon six kilometers from the finish. A crash there could really hurt a GC contender's chances, so the peloton will be especially nervous and probably suffer a massive pileup.
The only climb of the day is actually a bridge 56 km from the finish. With only one point available for a Category 4 climb, the first rider across here will be tied in the KoM competition with Philippe Gilbert by virtue of his win on the small hill at the finish of Stage 1. I would imagine that the tiebreaker is based on GC, but in any event nobody is likely to contest it very hard. Probably a Belgian will be the first up it. Those bitches love bridges.
Garmin-Cervelo will try to ride their rush from Sunday and get the stage win and green jersey for Tyler Farrar. Everyone likes to see an American win on the Fourth of July and tomorrow would be no exception. The amount of help he gets from Thor Hushovd may ultimately determine whether he can succeed. Farrar rode to the front of the peloton at the intermediate sprint of Stage 1 thanks to an absolutely fantastic leadout from Julian Dean, but the rest of his train was extremely suspect. He definitely has the legs to sprint with the best, but if team strategy dictates that Hushovd keep the yellow jersey safe I think that Farrar will be caught out more often than not.
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