2010 route announcement makes annual “Race to the Sun” intriguing Tour prep.
by Joe Lindsey
The Tour de France is a ways off, but this March racers will get a dry run of sorts at one of the race’s important finishes.
One hallmark of the Tour de France is there’s always a stage that, on paper, shouldn’t be significant but ends up being exciting, must-see racing. Last year it was the run-in to la Grande Motte, which almost ended in disaster for Alberto Contador. In 2008 it was the finish atop Super-Besse.
(The corollary is that there’s also a stage that on paper should be fabulous and ends up a snoozer, like all but about 3km of the Arcalis stage in 2009.)
This year, that unlooked-for day might be Stage 12, to Mende (another is Stage 7, in the Jura region).
Mende is a modest town in the Massif Central, an area that doesn’t get the attention that the Alps and Pyrenees do. But it’s a long stage at 210km, hilly, and ends with a short but steep climb of the le Croix Neuve (aka Montee Laurent Jalabert, after it was the scene of Ja-Ja’s 1995 Bastille Day stage win). Marcos Serrano won here in 2005 as well.
The Croix Neuve is just 3.5km long, but rises about 350 meters in that stretch. For those playing along at home, that’s an average 10 percent grade, and there are stretches closer to 13.
It’s also the finishing section of Stage 5 of Paris-Nice this year, as announced today by the ASO (also promoters of the Tour). The overall route is different – the Paris-Nice stage approaches from the west – but the all-important finishing climb is identical.
Let’s not overstate this – Paris-Nice is already going to be one of the marquee events on any rider hoping for success in stage races. And while important, the finish at Mende will produce smaller time gaps than any of the true mountain stages, both in the Tour and Paris-Nice, where the Col d’Eze will probably be the decisive climb as it has been in the past.
But for any rider looking to train for the Tour and recon a sleeper stage, it makes Paris-Nice a more compelling choice than Vuelta Murcia or Tirreno-Adriatico.