Half-wheeling

Stage 8 was probably the most difficult stage for this years Tour.

No, it wasn’t because the climbs were long and steep, nor was it because of the crappy weather. The reason was that it was the first mountain stage after virtually racing in the flats. Sometimes the pedaling dynamics can affect the riders transitioning from the flats to the mountains. A lot of good climbers like Haimar Zubeldia (Trek Factory Racing) and contender Jurgen Van den Brock (Lotto) got dropped.

But the top two favorites, were there, present as expected. Instead of anointing them as the top two in Paris in two weeks, I have more  questions than answers as both Alberto Contador and Vincenzo Nibali crossed the line with the Italian, who was in yellow, crossed 3 seconds after the Spaniard.

The last of the three climbs on stage 8 was short, just less than 2 kilometers long. Contadors’ team, Tinkoff-Saxo, has been shepherding the peloton in the penultimate climb so I was expecting some explosion from Contador on the final climb.

But it didn’t happen. Contador just stood on his pedals and grinded it out while Nibali was sitting prettily beside Alberto. In cycling, this is called, “half-wheeling” and this is a way of Nibali, who was in a 4 o’clock position, saying, “Hey, I’m here, beside you and just as strong as you. You’re not that strong!” Talking trash is not just exclusive for the NBA.

For Contador, it’s an irritating position to be in. You can just see enough of your rival who is beside you and trying to read you and you can’t do anything about it. You’re trying hard to drop him but obviously you can’t and you’re afraid that he might counter-attack and drop you.

While I thought that this would go on until they crossed the line, it happened! Contador dropped Nibali in the last 200 meters, gaining three seconds in the process.

So this is what I think now. I think that Contador doesn’t have the usual explosiveness for now and that Nibali is not as strong as he has shown us in the past days. But there’s another two weeks to go and things can happen.

Now this opens for an outsider to take advantage of this personal duel between the two. There are four riders right now who I think could be a dark horse at this point: Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), Andrew Takansky(Garmin), Tejay van Garderen (BMC) and Van den Brock. If both Contador and Nibali continue watching each other like hawks, it might leave an open door for any of the four to get on a breakaway and make a coup d’etat! Wouldn’t that be fantastic!

Finally, Talansky lost some time today after crashing for the second time in two days. Yesterday, Van Garderen also crashed and lost time.