Tour de France: Majka wins in Risoul

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Rafal Majka, at one time publicly reluctant to even ride the Tour de France, made the suffering worth his while, claiming his first professional victory on the queen stage to Risoul with a daring solo effort. It was the first stage win for Tinkoff-Saxo, giving the team its first highlight after suffering the loss of captain Alberto Contador.

The Tinkoff-Saxo rider had been part of an early escape group, and pulled away from the remnants of that group with 10km to go. Majka had to push himself past his limits to hold off the charge of race leader Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), who had attacked with 3km to go from the select chasing group, and Jean-Christophe Peraud (AG2R-La Mondiale), who had gone with him.

Majka's presence in the Tour de France was a mere stroke of luck, as he was a last-minute substitution for Roman Kreuziger, who found himself under scrutiny for irregular biological passport values. The Polish rider finished 6th overall in the Giro d’Italia, and came into the race still fatigued from May, but clearly has come around.

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"This is the first victory of my career," Majka said. "I am always second and third, and today I knew I needed to attack, because if I didn't attack they would only beat me in the final. I needed to fight and I won.

"I think my form is coming up. After the Giro I had a good rest and now my form is going up and I feel good for the next stage."

Nibali may have pulled back on the throttle a bit to allow Majka the win, and therefore gain the friendship of Tinkoff-Saxo. He was once again isolated on the final climb, and had to rely on his own strength to keep his main rivals at a distance.

His powers proved sufficient to further distance Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), who was unable to match Nibali’s final attack and lost 1:24 on the day.

Behind Nibali, the battle for the podium continued, as Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) sought to overtake Romain Bardet (AG2R-La Mondiale), while Tejay van Garderen (BMC) was forced to go on the offensive to limit his time losses to Peraud, who began the stage just 26 seconds behind him on the general classification.

In the end, Pinot and Bardet fought out the sprint to the line, with the FDJ rider pipping Bardet for fourth on the stage, while the American was unable to respond and lost four seconds to the Frenchmen.

Valverde held onto his second place overall, but Bardet closed to within 13 seconds of him, with Pinot in fourth place, 16 seconds further back. Van Garderen is now just shy of one minute behind an overall podium spot.

"An incredible job today from my team," said Bardet, whose AG2R squad set a blistering pace into the final climb, isolating most of the GC contenders from their teams. "Maybe we weren't going 100 per cent in the first days, but we are taking every opportunity that we can. I knew the Col d’Izoard really well and my teammates were really strong. We did a fantastic descent. Unfortunately, it didn't work but we did a great last climb and I was able to control my opponents so Jean-Christophe could go.

"I got some time back on some of my top 10 rivals even Valverde."

How it unfolded

Sunshine and high temperatures were again on tap as the field departed from Grenoble, famed more for its winter sports. The climbing started almost immediately, and so did the attacks.

A huge group got away, but by the time the 20km marker was passed, things had settled down to a 17-man group, which contained some big names and, as expected, polka dot jersey holder Joaquim Rodríguez (Katusha) who was looking to regain the lead in that classification. He was joined by Geraint Thomas and Mikel Nieve (Sky), Steven Kruijswijk (Belkin), Cyril Gautier (Europcar), Nicolas Roche and Majka (Tinkoff-Saxo), Peter Sagan and Alessandro de Marchi (Cannondale), Amaël Moinard (BMC), Jose Serpa (Lampre-Merida), Nicolas Edet and Rein Taaramae (Cofidis), Jesus Herrada (Movistar), Simon Yates (Orica-GreenEdge), Christophe Riblon (AG2R-La Mondiale), and Albert Timmer (Giant-Shimano).

The group pulled away slowly but steadily and hit the foot of the first climb with a gap of about four minutes. Along the way, Sagan helped himself to more green jersey points at La Paute (Bourg d'Oisans), 40km into the stage, before the bunch began the grind up the 2058m high Col de Lautaret, a 34km climb with an average gradient of 3.9 percent.

The group built up their lead on the long and grinding ascent, with the Astana-led peloton hitting the top roughly five minutes later. Rodriguez took the maximum mountain points, with Tinkoff-Saxo's Majka and Roche taking the next points.

NetApp-Endura moved to the front of the peloton to help with the chasing work on the descent, eager to protect Leopold König's tenth place overall. The gap dropped dramatically, falling to two and half minutes as they hit the bottom of the descent.

But, as the saying goes, "after the mountain is before the mountain", and there was barely time for a quick snack from the feed zone before the riders started uphill again. This time they faced the race’s second hors categorie climb, the Col d'Izoard.

At 2360m, the Izoard is the highest point of this year's Tour de France. The 19km long climb has an average gradient of 6.9 percent, with a maximum of 8.9 percent. It proved to be too much for Timmer and Sagan, who both dropped out of the lead group early on the climb.

Those behind didn't have much more luck. The peloton shredded on the climb, as NetApp continued to push the pace at the head of the pack.

Rodriguez, eager to claim the HC points, led the breakaway up the final kilometers. Thomas spent a lot of time at the head of the group as well, setting up a pace which helped to drop rider after rider.

Back in the field, AG2R La Mondiale, around Roman Bardet, third overall, moved in to help with the lead work as well, as the group grew continuously smaller.

As the summit approached, Rodriguez moved to the front of the leading group ahead of Majka, taking the points as the breakaway was whittled to 10 riders. The Nibali group came through around three minutes later.

The yellow jersey group flew down the descent, and blew apart even more under pressure of Bardet, who sought to put pressure on Pinot, who is the less confident descender of the two rivals. His move split the lead group, with Nibali and Valverde firmly entrenched.

Dries Devenyns of Giant-Shimano crashed on the descent, and had to be taken to hospital.

BMC and Lotto Belisol worked together to catch back up to the Nibali group, and with 23km to go, contact was again established.

After the long, sinuous descent, there was no place to go but up. The closing climb, the category 1 ascent to Risoul, covered the final 19km of the stage, with an average gradient of 6 percent and a maximum of 8.7 percent.

The Nibali group which had gotten larger again, cut the gap to the breakaway to less than a minute. With 10 km to go, De Marchi attacked out of the lead group, followed only by Serpa. The latter was soon dropped and Majka moved up to take his place, with Rodriguez only a few seconds back, and the Nibali group still getting closer.

But Majka was soon alone in the lead, as the gap back to the Nibali group slowly grew again. The young Pole built his lead over Rodriguez, as Peraud and Rolland tried unsuccessfully to attack out of the Nibali group.

Right under the 4km marker, Nibali put in one of his patented attacks. Only Peraud could go with him, and the duo distanced the other contenders. Valverde tried to follow but failed, and was soon caught by the Tejay van Garderen-led chase group.

Surprisingly distanced by the quartet of the BMC rider, Pinot, Bardet and Frank Schlek, Valverde saw his podium place slipping away as he ground his way up the final kilometers, but he fought hard enough to hang on to second overall, barely.

Nibali again drove his way to the finish as smoothly as possible, but this time he was unable to catch the rider up front. His jersey wide open and flapping, Majka crossed the finish line, the effort clearly showing, with just 24 seconds to spare.

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