Team Ineos close ranks ahead of decisive Tour de France stages with Geraint Thomas insisting he remains in 'good shape'
Team Ineos denied that it was the end of an era, insisting they were in “good shape” ahead of the decisive final stages of the most exciting Tour de France in decades.
After an enthralling two weeks of racing, six riders from five different teams have realistic hopes of riding into Paris on Sunday wearing the maillot jaune. And with two Frenchman - race leader Julian Alaphilippe [Deceuninck-QuickStep] and fourth placed Thibaut Pinot [Groupama-FDJ] - among that number, the whole of France has been gripped by Tour fever.
Home hopes have been raised by the fact that Team Ineos have not been nearly as dominant as in previous years when they were racing as Team Sky. Geraint Thomas and Egan Bernal still sit second and fifth in the general classification, but the British squad have not controlled the race, with Thomas and Bernal frequently left short of helpers on the final climbs in stages, something which would have been unheard of when Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome were stomping all over French hopes.
Thomas has also had a serious wobble. The Welshman cracked on the Tourmalet on Saturday, and was then distanced by Pinot on the final climb in Foix on Sunday, losing a total of 1min41sec to the Frenchman over the weekend.
On both days, Bernal looked to be Ineos’s strongest climber, meaning the British team are not only having to fend off their rivals who can smell blood in the water, they are having to fend off speculation regarding their team tactics.
Sir Dave Brailsford insisted, however, that he was having “brilliant fun” even if the race was proving “challenging”.
“I think we’re the only team with two riders high up in the GC and I think we have to adapt to the situation,” said the Ineos team principal at Monday's rest day press conference in Nimes, where temperatures nudged 40C. “I don’t think there’s a single tactic that you can just go ‘We’ll deploy that’. I think you adapt as the days evolve, minute by minute nearly.”
Brailsford claimed the reason Ineos have not had numbers at the front, as they have in the past, was because the Tour had been raced differently this year with Alaphilippe in yellow. Teams are trying to take the race on earlier, he said, often on the penultimate climb.
But he added that, while Michal Kwiatkowski and Gianni Moscon may have been slightly below par, he expected everyone, Wout Poels in particular, to rally in the third week.
“We know you can go through ups and downs in this race but ultimately it’s the consistency which tends to pay off. It will probably go down to the wire. Who knows? It’s different. It’s exciting, isn’t it?” he added.
From a man who said last week that he loved nothing better than to “stick a knife” into his rivals and if he got the chance “to twist it”, that felt slightly like revisionism. But no one can deny Brailsford is right.
Thomas, meanwhile, insisted he was fully over his wobble at the weekend and was now “looking forward” to the long gradual ascents of the Alps, which are more to his liking. "I’m confident we are in good shape," he said.
The 2018 champion also denied there were any leadership issues with Bernal, saying he “wouldn’t hesitate” to call on the Colombian’s help if he needed it. Similarly, if he felt he was on a bad day, he would not stop the youngster from riding.
“Obviously, I want to be the one to win,” he said. “[But] the main thing is that we don’t race against each other and throw away the race.
“We’ve got to be honest with how we are feeling. If I’m on a really bad day and I just tell Egan to stay with me and we ride together and both lose a minute then that’s obviously not the way to go. I’m confident that we can keep that communication and honesty going.”
Bernal, for his part, said he still considered Thomas to be the “first leader” and would help him if asked to do so.
It was an assured performance from Ineos and from Thomas. But it was clear from their rival teams’ press conferences that they feel they have a golden opportunity to knock the British superteam off their perch.
Groupama-FDJ, in particular, were in very good spirits with Pinot - now the bookmakers’ favourite - insisting he was relishing the pressure of becoming France’s first champion in 34 years.
“Yesterday they [Bernal and Thomas] put in as much effort as I did and they weren’t as good as I was,” he said of his performance on Sunday. “Trying to make up time and trying to lose the least time possible are two different things mentally. I think yesterday made their legs hurt more than mine.”
Alaphilippe cut a slightly less confident figure, but said it remained to be seen how everyone came out of the rest day, and whether he could recharge sufficiently over the next two days - both of which are expected to be blisteringly hot - before the final decisive stages in the Alps.
