British climber Adam Yates has moved into the race lead as a bizarre day at the Tour de France ended in a predicted bunch sprint.
Yates sat second overall heading into stage five, but has been catapulted into the yellow jersey following a time penalty given to former race leader Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck – Quick Step).
Slovenian sprinter Luka Mezgec got up for sixth place in the final, handing the 32-year-old his first top-10 stage finish on his Tour debut.
No Break
It was an unusual start to the stage with no reaction coming from the peloton as the flag dropped. With the day destined for a sprint finish and a strong headwind, no rider seemed willing to force a breakaway attempt, resulting in an unfamiliar sight as the pack rolled along at a leisurely pace without a breakaway ahead.
The tempo was eventually increased with around 50km to go, with teams wary of the approaching technical roads as they passed through several towns. The speed then dropped again as the race passed over the first of the category four climbs, before the threat of strong winds sparked the peloton to life.
A headwind turned quickly into a crosswind inside the final 10km, but despite some short-lived echelons appearing, little damaged was caused as the focus turned to the looming sprint finish.
Sprint Ahead
Kiwi Jack Bauer and South African Daryl Impey were the men to guide Mezgec into position in the finale, with Impey dropping his teammate off on the wheel of Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo-Visma) inside the final kilometre.
Cees Bol (Team Sunweb) was the first to open up the sprint, causing a reaction from Van Aert, Mezgec followed, but was unable to match the speed of the Belgian, who sprinted to victory.
Unexpected Yellow
An uneventful stage looked to have passed without drama until news filtered through of Alaphilippe’s sanction for an unauthorised feed inside the final 20km. The penalty for the Frenchman puts Yates top of the general classification by three seconds heading into stage six.
Yates becomes the third rider in GreenEDGE Cycling’s history to pull on the maillot jaune after Impey and Simon Gerrans, who both wore the jersey for two days each in 2013.
Adam Yates:
“It was really calm day, I mean there was no breakaway and we just cruised for the first 100km or so and then it got pretty nervous there in the final, there was a little bit of wind towards the end, a little bit of crosswinds.
“It’s not the way I imagined taking the jersey, I’m not even sure what’s happened to Julian, I heard he got a time penalty for taking a feed late or something.
“I don’t think any rider would want to take yellow under these circumstances, I’d prefer to take it with my legs rather than the result of a time penalty. I didn’t even find out until I was in the bus and showered. I feel bad for him.”
“Tomorrow I was looking to try and take the jersey anyway, so I guess we’ll just try and go in with the same tactic, try and win the stage and see what happens.”
Luka Mezgec
“We knew it [the finish] was going to harder and more technical, as a team we like that. The boys did a great job, just in the last three kilometres I wasn’t efficient enough, I had to brake too many times, I lost the position and had to make it up again, just that unnecessary loss of speed.
“But then with one and half kilometres to go I knew I had to do a big effort to come back when I saw Daryl and Jack on the front. I knew it was crucial to be in position with one kilometre to go, I did that. But that finished my legs off.
“But anyway, it was good to be up there, with just a little bit smoother ride from my side into the final and I can do more.”
Matt White (Head Sports Director):
“I cannot remember a stage with no breakaway at all. We said from the start that this is not a normal Tour de France, it’s been a very, very aggressive first week, but normally the local teams and invited teams are always interested in putting someone up the road. There was none of that today and it was a pretty calm stage until the last hour of racing when nerves, wind and going into certain towns amped up the anxiety and the pace was very fast coming into the finish.
“The boys did a good job of putting Luka into position, he had to make a couple of efforts in the lead up to that final kilometre and a half, which he paid for a little bit and the bigger sprinters just got the best of him. The boys gave him every opportunity and it was a good effort.
“We were probably about five minutes from the bus leaving, all the boys had showered and changed. Then my phone rang from the organisers of the Tour de France and told me that Adam Yates was in the yellow jersey, and I asked why. They didn’t go into too much details, they said Alaphilippe received a 20 second time penalty.
“Nobody likes to take the jersey that way, but at the end of the day we had a tactic coming here to go after the yellow jersey, and if weren’t in second place someone else would have got it. So, the moves that Adam made in the first days, the way the guys have been riding to protect Adam in this first week have enabled us to benefit from the bad luck of someone breaking the rules.”
Tour de France Stage 5 – Results:
1. Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo-Visma) 4:21:22
2. Cees Bol (Team Sunweb) ST
3. Sam Bennett (Deceuninck – Quick Step) ST
4. Luka Mezgec (Mitchelton-SCOTT) ST
Tour de France – General Classification:
1. Adam Yates (Mitchelton-SCOTT) 22:28:30
2. Primoz Roglic (Team Jumbo-Visma) +0:03
3. Tadej Pogacar (UAE-Team Emirates) +0:07
