CYCLING: THOSE WITH a love of French cookery would note that the dessert called Flamed Norwegian, which we call Baked Alaska, has a strong element of Creme Anglaise. That pretty much sums up Edvald Boasson Hagen: born not far from Lillehammer, tuned up in Manchester by the Team Sky trainers. But whatever flame burns in the apple-cheeked Norwegian, it is definitely internal. He is stolid to the point of being impenetrable.
When Dave Brailsford put together his initial Team Sky roster, “Haagen-Dazs” was on his shopping list, because he is the classic example of the cyclist who, as the old cliche has it, lets his legs do the talking. Boasson Hagen’s legs tell a simple story: he is good at sprinting, time trialling, stage races and one-day races, while his climbing ability remains untapped. “He has massive ability, massive talent,” Brailsford said. “He is so tenacious, he just never gives up. But that is what road racing is all about. You keep knocking on the door, you keep on trying and eventually you get it.”
Last year, in contrast, Boasson Hagen’s Tour never quite worked out. He did not look at his ease in the rough-and-tumble of the flatter finishes, although Sky worked hard to lead him out, particularly later on in the race once Bradley Wiggins had faltered.
While not on the scale of the Breton butchery of the day before, and not quite apocalypse in the Pays d’Auge, this was some way short of being Paradise in Normandy, as one early roadside flag claimed. As the peloton sped across the Falaise gap, site of a decisive tank battle in the Normandy campaign, a strong side wind proved too much for some of those who had fallen or merely overreached themselves in the past few days.
The stage followed a set pattern: an escape early on given a certain amount of leeway, before being roped in within sight of the finish. It was hoped the allocation of a stack of green-jersey points to a single intermediate sprint might change the way the Tour’s flat stages are run off, but it has been business as usual, with the sprinters content to scrap for minor placings at the super sprint.
The excitement has come at the stage finishes thanks to the fact three of these have been on hills tough enough to split the field. Yesterday, although the climb from the centre of Lisieux to the finish was short, it was hard enough to bring Alberto Contador to the front. He thought about making a move, then thought better of it, but it showed he is looking for every opportunity.
The profile looked flat but it was “French flat” as the riders call it: the roads were deceptively tough, climbing and descending, at one stage going through an area hilly enough to be known as the Suisse Normande. On the descent after Livarot, Radioshack’s big fromage Levi Leipheimer lost control and slid for several yards along the top of a metal guard rail before piling on to the tarmac. Leipheimer lost a minute at the finish but no major injuries were reported.
Only 62 riders remained in the main body of the field after they had belted past the basilica, but all the team leaders were in the lead group, apart from Leipheimer and Mark Cavendish. This was not a finish for Le Cav, due to the steepness of the climb and the lack of any chance to recover afterwards. Instead, his HTC team delegated the sprinting job to the Australian Matt Goss, winner of the Milan-San Remo Classic in March.
His green-jersey challenge is fluctuating with every stage, but the proliferation of hilly finishes is favouring two men: the current leader Philippe Gilbert, and the Spaniard Jose Joaquin Rojas, who is only one point behind. They can score in the hillier finishes as well, and are 50 and 49 points respectively ahead of Cavendish, who can glean points in the flat sprints, but is losing them in spadefuls on finishes such as yesterday’s.
Today the race heads south, first by car for a transfer to Le Mans, from whence the Tourmen begin pedalling towards the Massif Central, reached tomorrow. In Winston Churchill’s words, it is not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning, as this is the last stage in the opening phase on flatter roads. There is no ranked climb today; the next such stage is on July 24th when the race enters Paris.
While yesterday’s finish in Lisieux now has a little place in British cycling history as the first stage won by a British pro team, the town of Chateauroux is worth more than a footnote. On July 9th, 2008, at a finish identical to that of Cavendish began his incredible run of Tour success there. It is hard not to see history repeating itself.
Guardian Service
