Tour de France Stage 9 2021-07-04

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Event
Tour de France Stage 9

Date
Sun 4th July 2021 (UTC)
Sun 4th July 2021 (Local)

Timestamp
2021-07-04T10:55:00

Time

10:55:00 UTC (12:55:00 Local)

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League
UCI World Tour

Season
2021

Round
23

Status

Location

Video Highlights

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Description

Born on the 4th of July, like Tom Cruise in the Oliver Stone movie. A festive date for Americans, whose riders and teams will want the stars and stripes to fly. The task is going to be complicated because we find ourselves with another mountainous altimetry: with two ports of the second category, another two of the first category and one of hors catégorie. Hold on, curves are coming.

Reports

Result List

01	Ben O'Connor	4h 26' 43"
02	Mattia Cattaneo	+ 5' 07"
03	Sonny Colbrelli	+ 5' 34"

Result Description
The second day in the Alps took the riders from Cluses to the race's first mountaintop finish at Tignes. Tignes was supposed to be visited in 2019 as the finish of Stage 19, but the stage was cut short due to avalanche and landslides near Val-d'Isère on the ascent to Tignes. The first 19 kilometres (12 mi) of the stage were flat before the riders reached the second-category climb of Côte de Domancy. The intermediate sprint took place after 32.7 kilometres (20.3 mi), a few kilometres before the riders climbed the first-category Col des Saisies. Following a long descent, the riders tackled the first hors catégorie climb of the race, the Col du Pré, at 12.6 kilometres (7.8 mi) long with an average gradient of 7.7 per cent. Immediately after cresting the top and a short descent, the riders reached the second-category climb of Cormet de Roselend. After another long descent and a short flat section, the riders took on the final climb of the day, the first-category Monteé de Tignes, at 21 kilometres (13 mi) long with an average gradient of 5.6 per cent. The riders crested the top with 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) to go before a short flat section to the finish line.

Before the start of the stage, Primož Roglič (Team Jumbo–Visma) abandoned the race due to his injuries while Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin–Fenix) also abandoned as he prepared for the Olympics. At the start of the stage, Harry Sweeny (Lotto–Soudal) and Davide Ballerini (Deceuninck–Quick-Step) kicked off the attacks in the first few kilometres. The pair built a lead of around 40 seconds before being caught at the top of Côte de Domancy, where Pierre Latour (Team TotalEnergies) took maximum points. Several riders would attempt to attack again; chief among them were Sonny Colbrelli (Team Bahrain Victorious) and Michael Matthews (Team BikeExchange) as they attempted to take the points at the intermediate sprint. Soon, a 41-man group went away before the race reached the intermediate sprint. At the sprint itself, Colbrelli outsprinted Matthews, with the latter moving to within 38 points of Mark Cavendish's (Deceuninck–Quick-Step) lead in the points classification. On the Col des Saisies, the break split as several riders attacked. Mountains classification leader Wout Poels (Team Bahrain Victorious) soon attacked off the front as he attempted to extend his lead. Nairo Quintana (Arkéa–Samsic), Ben O'Connor (AG2R Citroën Team), Sergio Higuita (EF Education–Nippo), and Michael Woods (Israel Start-Up Nation) formed a chase group behind Poels, with Quintana bridging up to Poels near the top. Poels eventually took maximum points ahead of Quintana, with the latter accelerating on the descent while the peloton crested the top at six minutes behind. As the break reached the foot of Col du Pré, Quintana was joined by Woods, Higuita, O'Connor, and Lucas Hamilton (Team BikeExchange), while Poels was briefly distanced before eventually rejoining up front.

Near the top of Col du Pré, Poels was once again dropped from the lead group with Hamilton also getting dropped soon afterwards. 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) from the top, Quintana accelerated off the front, with Woods the only other rider to follow him. However, Woods was unable to follow his pace, eventually dropping to a chase group with Higuita and O'Connor. Quintana took maximum points at the top of the Pré to take the virtual lead in the king of the mountains classification while Higuita took second. Higuita soon reached Quintana up front, with O'Connor rejoining them shortly afterwards. Quintana took maximum points at the top of Cormet de Roselend to extend his lead in the mountains classification. On the descent, Higuita briefly took off the front and distancing both Quintana and O'Connor, but both riders would eventually make their way back to Higuita at the foot of Monteé de Tignes. O'Connor proceeded to drop both Higuita and Quintana, eventually soloing to the stage win by more than five minutes. Mattia Cattaneo (Deceuninck–Quick-Step) finished second on the day after Higuita and Quintana struggled for the rest of the stage. Colbrelli ended up finishing third.

In the GC group, UAE Team Emirates controlled for much of the day. At the climb of Col du Pré, Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo–Visma), second place in the GC, was dropped. At one point, the peloton was more than nine minutes behind O'Connor, who started the day 8' 13" behind race leader, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates), and thus O'Connor temporarily became the virtual race leader. At the bottom of Monteé de Tignes, there were still three UAE Team Emirates riders surrounding Pogačar. Halfway through the climb, Ineos Grenadiers started to pace in the peloton as they set up their leader, Richard Carapaz. With around 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) to the top of the climb, Carapaz attacked, with Pogačar immediately responding. Shortly afterwards, Pogačar accelerated himself, dropping all his rivals. Pogačar finished sixth on the stage, six minutes behind O'Connor and 32 seconds ahead of a group containing Carapaz, Jonas Vingegaard (Team Jumbo–Visma), Enric Mas (Movistar Team), and Rigoberto Urán (EF Education–Nippo). Wilco Kelderman (Bora–Hansgrohe) lost an additional 13 seconds to the Carapaz group while David Gaudu (Groupama–FDJ) and Alexey Lutsenko (Astana–Premier Tech) each lost more than a minute and a half to Pogačar. Additionally, seven riders missed the time cut, including sprinters Arnaud Démare (Groupama–FDJ) and Bryan Coquard (B&B Hotels p/b KTM), and as such they were eliminated from the race. Nic Dlamini (Team Qhubeka NextHash), the first Black South African to ride the Tour de France, was also among those to miss the time cut; after crashing hard early on in the stage, Dlamini fought through his injuries and eventually finished around 85 minutes behind O'Connor.

In the general classification, Pogačar kept the maillot jaune and extended his lead, now at a margin of two minutes over O'Connor, who moved up to second by virtue of his time gains. Urán moved up to third at more than five minutes behind Pogačar, while Vingegaard and Carapaz rounded out the top five. Mas, Kelderman, Lutsenko, and Gaudu shipped even more time but remained in the top ten. Guillaume Martin (Cofidis), another rider who benefited from being the break, moved up to ninth, at more than seven minutes in arrears.

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