nap, superstition and Mount Fuji

• Today’s stage: Vierzon – Le Creusot, 249.1 kilometers

Here is the longest stage of this 108^e edition of the Tour de France: it is in fact six to six-thirty in the saddle that await the 177 riders on the seventh day. A 249.1 km river stage between Vierzon (Cher) and Le Creusot (Saône-et-Loire), and a length that we had not seen on the Grande Boucle for twenty-one years.

If the “nap guide” can prove to be of great use this Friday, crossing the Cher, the Nièvre and the Saône-et-Loire, however, does not promise to be easy. After a start of the course animated by the only intermediate sprint at kilometer 115, in Saint-Benin-d’Azy, the peloton will switch to the Morvan. In the second part of the route, five bumps and 3,000 meters of vertical drop – including the unprecedented signal from Uchon (5.7 kilometers at 5.7% with passages at 18%), 18 kilometers from the finish – should wring out runners.

With an average of 13.1% in the last kilometer, the rugged finish can serve as a launching pad for the puncheurs, who are well off at the start of the Tour. Climbers and contenders for victory in Paris will prefer to save themselves before measuring themselves in the mountainous terrain of Grand-Bornand (Haute-Savoie) on Saturday. But beware of backpackers, who could take advantage of the wait-and-see attitude of the leaders to pull the chestnuts out of the fire.

• The rider to follow: Soren Kragh Andersen

Revelation of the 2020 Tour, during which he had won two stage victories concluded alone, the Danish adventurer could once again use his flair to emerge at the opportune moment. Seventeenth in the individual time trial on Wednesday, the leader of the DSM (ex-Sunweb) was hungry for more. Excellent rider, Soren Kragh Andersen had shown during his first victory on the Tour, in Lyon, in 2020, that he knew just as well to swallow the bumps as to resist the packs of sprinters.

This Friday, the German team might want to replay the scenario of the fourteenth stage by throwing the same banderilla, Tiesj Benoot, in the Signal d’Uchon. If Soren Kragh Andersen finds the endurance that allows him to go beyond six hours of effort, he could well take back the Belgian in the last few hundred meters of the coast. In the Morvan, the Dane, aged 26, will therefore be monitored. Coming back from behind in rough terrain will be less easy than in Lyon or Champagnole (Jura). But cunning, the young adventurer has proven that there is no shortage.

• The detour of the Tour: Tadej Pogacar and Primoz Roglic selected for the Olympic Games

If they look at each other like faience on the roads of the Tour de France, it is under the same white, blue and red banner that Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) and Tadej Pogacar (UAE Emirates) will try to hang the medal. gold at the Olympic Games this summer (July 23 to August 8, 2021). Six days after the arrival of the Grande Boucle at the Champs-Elysées, the two Slovenes will compete online race at the Tokyo Games, July 24, on the slopes of Mount Fuji. A steep 230-kilometer route with nearly 5,000 meters of ascent, made for climbers of their ilk.

Despite the stratospheric performance of the young 22-year-old Slovenian in the first individual time trial – Pogacar relegated his senior to 44 seconds on Wednesday – it is the runner-up of the 2020 Tour, Primoz Roglic, who will also be lined up in this race. disciplined. A double chance to be adorned with gold, therefore, for the former ski jumper.

“Don’t say Merckx’s name, I want to win the next one”

Taken by the Deceuninck-Quick Step train, the returning Mark Cavendish crushed the pedals – and the competition – to clinch, Thursday 1^er July, his second victory on the Tour 2021 after that of Fougères on Tuesday – his third at Châteauroux.

After five years of famine and a three-year absence on the Grande Boucle, the Briton, selected at the last moment by the Belgian team to replace the outgoing green jersey, Sam Bennett, signs the 32^e victory of his career and comes back to two lengths of the record of Eddy Merckx. At 36, the “Cav” is off to a good start to bring the green jersey back to Paris for a second time, but it should not be too publicized: the beefy is apparently superstitious.

Carlos Barbero’s masks are back. For his first Tour de France, the sprinter of Qhubeka Assos splashes fans of his laughing eyes and ingenuity. As during the Tour of Spain, this trained engineer wears a personalized Covid-19 mask before each stage. “Life: 95%; difficulty: easy, flat, fast, fun ” : in a few words and a gauge inspired by video games (100% filled before the start of the Tour), Carlos Barbero is profiling the day to come. And take the opportunity to send messages to the public. “Please respect us”, had written the Spaniard on his second mask, the day after the fall of a large part of the peloton caused by the sign of a spectator on the inaugural stage, Saturday, June 26, in Brittany.