It was another day of shuffling the overall order on stage 5 of the Tour de France Femmes as the race roved over the hills of the Beaujolais region, with some clawing their way up the standings while others, like Cédrine Kerbaol, paid the price.
The EF Education-Oatly rider had worked her way up from ninth after the opening day, to sixth on stage 2, and then up to third after a powerful showing in the stage 4 time trial. However, by the end of the 140km stage from Mâcon to Belleville-en-Beaujolais, Kerbaol was right back where she started.
It was not one of the big mountain days but with eight categorised climbs and 2,840m of vertical gain it also wasn't ever going to be a walk in the park. Throw in a charged GC battle and the fuse was lit.
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"The race was as expected and we got Noemi [Rüegg] and Mags [Magdeleine Vallieres] in that breakaway, and we still had riders around Cédrine," said EF Education-Oatly sports director Daniel Foder. "Then on the second-to-last climb of the day, there was a big split, and unfortunately, Cédrine didn't have the legs to follow the best."
That split came on the category three Col de Durbize, with around 30km of racing still to go and also the category 2 Mont Brouilly still ahead. Once the gap was opened up the GC contenders out front, including race leader Marlen Reusser (Movistar), Demi Vollering (FDJ United-SUEZ) and Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM) made the most of the advantage they had carved out on rivals like Kerbaol, Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Visma-Lease a Bike), Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team L'IMAD) and Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime).
EF Education-Oatly, of course, worked to try and close the gap for Kerbaol, with both Rüegg and Vallieres falling back from the front and assisting in the pursuit, but in the end she took one of the biggest hits of the day from among the top contenders after crossing the line in 17th place, 2:35 back on stage winner Vollering.
Kerbaol, fresh from a second place overall at the Tour de Suisse and with two top ten GC finishes and a stage win across the last two editions of the Tour de France Femmes, was far from the only casualty. Compatriot Ferrand-Prévot and Van der Breggen also paid the price as they finished alongside Kerbaol.
Still, the slide from a podium spot right down to ninth, with a deficit of 3:41, was a harsh blow that unravelled some of the progress from a perfectly played opening half of the Tour de France Femmes from the team and Kerbaol.
“I think everybody's disappointed, of course, because everybody did really well, but we also know that with Cédrine everything can turn around really quickly. If this was our bad day, then it's maybe not so bad," said Foder in a team release.
"We still have a couple of very exciting stages coming up, so I think it's about resetting. Everybody is still committed to doing the work, and we still believe that we can turn it around, and the race is not over yet.”
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