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Inside the Tour – Verbier: the mini Alpe d’Huez

by John Wilcockson

• July 18, 2009
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By John Wilcockson

Although Sunday’s stage 15 from Pontarlier in France to Verbier in Switzerland is 207.5km long, the first 200km is almost irrelevant in the context of who will wear the yellow jersey into Monday’s rest day — unless something totally unexpected happens before the leaders reach the climb to the finish.

It is possible that Columbia-HTC, Garmin-Slipstream, Saxo Bank or Liquigas will try to challenge Team Astana’s apparent lock on the Tour by placing one of their two GC contenders into an earlier break; but, to date, whenever there’s been a hint of a challenge, Astana team boss Johan Bruyneel has simply told his guys to raise the tempo.

That tactic may be more difficult now that Astana’s Levi Leipheimer is on his way back to his California home with a broken wrist, because when the pace on the climbs reaches warp point the only worker left with team leaders Lance Armstrong and Alberto Contador has been Andreas Klöden. So, to challenge Astana, the other top teams may have to sacrifice one of its contenders.

But none of the teams will want to risk that on Sunday because the five climbs preceding the Verbier finale are not tough enough to shed the other Astana men who can ride hard on the hills: Yaroslav Popovych, Sergio Paulinho and Haimar Zubeldia. And it will be those riders who are most likely to be setting the pace on the 17km of gradual uphill that leads to the foot of the Verbier ascent.

Even then, the steep part of this finishing climb — being used in the Tour for the first time — is just 7km long. This is roughly half the length of “old faithful” L’Alpe d’Huez, which is not included in this year’s course. Also different is that Verbier’s 15 switchbacks come much more frequently than the 21 on the Alpe: an average of every 533 meters, rather than every 642 meters,

More frequent corners and shorter straightaways should favor Contador because he can accelerate out of turns faster than the other top-contenders: Armstrong, Tony Martin (Columbia-HTC), Christian Vande Velde (Garmin), Andy and Fränk Schleck (Saxo Bank), Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas), Carlos Sastre (Cervélo) and Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto).

And we have yet to see how Garmin’s “untested” Brad Wiggins can perform in this elevated company, or whether he will simply work for teammate Vande Velde in the expected battle to the Verbier summit.

On paper, this Swiss climb is not especially difficult. It’s a well-engineered road up to a ski resort with no kilometer steeper than 8.5 percent. Without ultra-sharp pitches, it will be difficult for Contador to shed the competition, especially as riders like Sastre, Evans and the Schlecks need to make attacks themselves to get back in the yellow jersey stakes.

Chances are that Armstrong — who impressed everyone with his climbing strength on Friday’s steeper Platzerwasel climb — will be able to follow any accelerations that he deems necessary to follow. If that’s the case, then the day could end with Contador in yellow, but still only two seconds ahead of the seven-time Tour champion.

On the other hand, it’s feasible that Armstrong will follow an attack by another contenders and get to the finish line more than two seconds ahead of Contador — and then the Texan would take yellow for the 84th time in his storied career.

But, barring any extreme circumstance, it’s certain that Sunday will be the eighth — and final — day for Rinaldo Nocentini’s run in the yellow jersey.

Follow John’s twitter at twitter.com/johnwilcockson. His latest book, “Lance: The Making of the World’s Greatest Champion,” is available at www.velogear.com.