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Tour de France 2012 Stage 1

Live coverage of stage 1 at the 99th edition of the Tour de France

Peter Sagan won stage 1 of the Tour de France Sunday in Seraing, Belgium. Sagan (Liquigas-Cannondale) went away on the finish climb with overall leader Fabian Cancellara (RadioShack-Nissan) and stomped away on the finish straight for his first Tour win.

Edvald Boasson Hagen (Sky) was third.

All three finished on same time with the chase group and Cancellara maintained his seven-second lead in GC over Bradley Wiggins (Sky).

"I would like to thank all of my teammates for this victory this afternoon... Vincenzo Nibali looked after me in the run-in to the finish and put me in a good place," said Sagan. "The finish today was extremely difficult."

Cancellara said attacking on the final climb was the best way to defend his <em>maillot jaune</em> and repay his teammates for a full day of work on the front of the peloton.

"I said in the end to myself, probably attacking is the best defense," said Cancellara. "When I saw (Sylvain) Chavanel was attacking with Albasini, I just went up steady. When the cobblestones came, that's my thing, and I attacked."

As he did at Milan-San Remo in March, Cancellara lost out to a rider that couldn't come around him until the final moment of the stage.

Six up the road
After a protest stopped the peloton momentarily in the neutral zone, the racing got underway immediately.
With 55km covered thus far, here's the situation on the road:

A breakaway of six riders jumped away from the gun. They have a 4:50 advantage. The escapees are Michael Morkov (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank), Maxime Bouet (Ag2r La Mondial), Pablo Urtasun (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Anthony Delaplace (Saur-Sojasun), Yohann Gene (Europcar), Nicolas Edet (Cofidis).

Yellow jersey Fabian Cancellara is tucked into the peloton with his RadioShack-Nissan squad, as are Bradley Wiggins (Sky) and Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma-Quick Step).Brian HolcombeJul 1, 2012 at 6:04 AM
The top prize the escapees were hunting was clear early on as Mørkøv and Urtasun split the single point on offer at each of the stage's first two Cat. 4 climbs, the Côte de Cokaifragne and Côte de Francorchamps. Mørkøv, Urtasun and Bouet looked the strongest of the six escapees all day. The Dane took top honors, however, at the next two climbs, the Côte de Lierneux and the Côte de Barvaux in fierce sprints against the Basque Euskaltel rider.

Meanwhile, back in the bunch, RadioShack patrolled the front all day. 

“We had to do it, because with this finish, nobody wanted to take responsibility of this the race," RadioShack director Alain Gallopin told VeloNews. "With the yellow jersey, we have to do it.”

The break built a maximum advantage just shy of five minutes, but with the stage halfway gone, RadioShack's Jens Voigt and Yaroslav Popovych turned up the chase for Cancellara. They dropped the gap to 1:08 with 32km remaining and after a lull — and two crashes around 25km to go — Lotto-Belisol, BMC Racing and Orica-GreenEdge took to the front.

Caught in the first crash were one of Sky's top domestiques, Michael Rogers, and Vladimir Karpets (Movistar), among a few others. The second crash involved roughly 12 riders, with Thomas Voeckler (Europcar) among those caught out. A long, straight run through an open field and left-to-right crosswinds heading into Seraing appeared as though it would keep the crash-delayed riders, now echeloned from the left gutter across the road, from rejoining the peloton, but the chasers jumped on-board on the outskirts of the finish town.

Lotto was full-gas at the front with sprinter André Greipel leading three teammates over the top of the breakaway with 8km to go. The German led the catch after Bouet tried a last-ditch effort to earn the most aggressive rider's prize, and the bunch was set for a run-in at the Côte de Seraing finish climb.
Here's the profile for the final 5km. Our stage preview is here: velonews.competitor.com
by Brian Holcombe on Jul 1, 2012 at 9:11 AM
Behind the Lotto train, George Hincapie brought BMC Racing teammate Cadel Evans up the left side of the strung-out bunch, with Sagan in-tow. Hincapie dropped them off a few wheels from the front just in time for a series of left- and right-hand corners leading to the ramp.

Chavanel, then Cancellara, then Sagan
Orica took control onto the base of the 2.4km, partially cobbled climb with Stuart O'Grady, Michael Albsasini, Matt Goss and Simon Gerrans there. But Sylvain Chavanel, just seven seconds behind Cancellara after a surprise third-place ride in Saturday's prologue, launched around the left side of the Aussie train as the road steepened 2km from the line.

Albasini and Cancellara jumped out in pursuit of Chavanel and the Swiss laid down a brutal acceleration that only Sagan could follow. 

"I tried to attack in the steepest part of the climb," said Chavanel. "I knew that it was more or less impossible to wait for the end for the sprint. Guys like Boasson Hagen and Sagan are better than me in a finish like that. So I tried to attack a bit early. When Cancellara jumped on my wheel and attacked, I thought maybe someone else could take the wheel of Cancellara. So I stopped a little bit, but when I started again the race was away."

Resplendent in yellow, Cancellara led the young Slovak champion onto the lower-angle upper reaches of the climb and, much like at Milan-San Remo in March, it was the RadioShack man pulling a Liquigas rider toward the finish. Then it was Nibali. Today it was Sagan, the winner of nine stages between May's Amgen Tour of California and June's Tour de Suisse.

"I waited to see if I could attack and I wanted to hold on because I knew it was a long finish," said Sagan. "I couldn't ride with Cancellara. I know he's very strong."

Evans tried to match the pace on the climb, but could not.

“It was very intense,” said Evans. “It was a short, sharp finish to a relatively calm day.

“I tried (to follow the attacks), but they are specialists on these kinds of finishes. I had to think of my GC as well.”

As Cancellara looked back constantly at Sagan, Boasson Hagen shot up from the chase in his yellow helmet signifying Sky's lead in the teams classification. He closed an eight-plus-second gap on the cobbled upper reaches of the climb. The trio came onto the finishing straight together, the yellow jersey on the front, the yellow helmet on the back.

Boasson Hagen stood to gain a second on Tejay van Garderen (BMC Racing) and steal the best young rider's white jersey. Sagan was in it for the finish and the green points jersey. But Cancellara, in yellow, was out for more time to pad his overall lead and the pace-making fell on his shoulders.

Cancellara stood and opened the sprint on the right barriers, the chase group, which included Wiggins, Evans and van Garderen, bearing down on the leaders. Sagan opened it up inside 100 meters, shot out to the left, and won easily. 

"I'm very happy, especially after yesterday's incident at the prologue," said Sagan, who unclipped a pedal in the opener and lost any chance at repeating his Tour de Suisse prologue win late last month. 

The Slovak will wear the green points jersey on Monday, on loan from Cancellara, who will again be in yellow. Some good advice before the stage on Sunday had Sagan on alert for the Swiss on the finish climb.

"Before the race today I spoke with my team coach and manager, and they said I had to look out for only one rider: Cancellara.

"He had a great prologue, and that showed he's got good condition. Also, this stage suited him."

Sagan got one over on Cancellara today. And when the race jury awarded the same time to the chase group, it meant Cancellara's effort was essentially for naught — other that the honor of attacking in yellow.

"This play of poker is maybe where I lost in the end, but I think I won a lot of confidence and that's really important," he said.

"I thought attacking would be the best defense and 500 meters from the line I wasn't going to slow down. If I go for something, I go all the way. I'm not going to give up, that's not me.
  
"Maybe Sagan, eight years from now, will do the same thing."

Local hero Philippe Gilbert (BMC), winner of all three Ardennes classics in 2011, topped the chase group sprint for fourth, with Rabobank's Bauke Mollema fifth. 

Overall contenders Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), Robert Gesink (Rabobank) and Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin-Sharp) finished sixth, seventh and ninth, respectively. Sky's GC backup, Chris Froome lost more than a minute and plummeted down the standings.

“Froomey was unlucky to puncture just at the wrong moment as we hit the waterfront along the river," said Sky director Sean Yates. "It was lined out going 70K an hour. Richie (Porte) waited along with Christian (Knees). By the time they came back to the convoy, riders were getting shelled. It was not possible to get back on. Riders were all over the place."

Valverde was caught in the second late crash with teammate Rui Costa — making it four Movistar riders to go down in the final 10km — but chased back on in time to blaze up the finish climb.

“After three years without riding the Tour, I barely remembered how dangerous this race is during the first week, with much more tension than any other," said Valverde. "We rode at the front for almost all day, but we suffered a couple of crashes in the finale and we had to put a feet a feet on the ground at the second one. We did a huge effort to come back in and we made it just before the climb."

Also losing time on the stage were Americans Levi Leipheimer (Omega Pharma), who dropped 17 seconds after being caught in traffic behind the peloton on the finish climb.

"The final was dangerous and we were riding very fast," said Leipheimer. "Mayby at 3km to go, just before the climb, we were a little bit too far from the head of the bunch. The I passed a lot of riders on the climb, but it was impossible to catch the first part of the group. In any case, the legs are good and my priority in this first part of the Tour is to stay safe and out of trouble."

Tomorrow's stage
The 99th Tour de France continues Monday with the 207.5km second stage, from Vise to Tournai. It should be a day for the pure sprinters, as Sagan will face off with the likes of world champion Mark Cavendish (Sky), André Greipel (Omega Pharma-Lotto), Marcel Kittel (Argos-Shimano), Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Sharp) and more.

The Tour will honor the late Wouter Weylandt, whose last win before his death in the 2011 Giro d'Italia took place in Tournai during the 2010 Circuit Franco-Belge.
See our stage preview here: velonews.competitor.com
by Brian Holcombe on Jul 1, 2012 at 10:02 AM

Agence France Presse contributed to this report.
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