In Nîmes
To discover
The general classification of the Tour de France
The German Nils Politt, huge rider and tireless teammate, offered his place on Thursday in the sun in Nîmes.
And this, the very day its leader, Peter Sagan, said goodbye to the Tour de France due to a knee injury.
Gone with the wind in the back in the breakaway of the day, with twelve other adventurers, this good giant of 1.92 m took his chance at the right time, 12 km from the goal, to offer himself this great victory which was missing from his record. despite good places in the classics and especially in Paris-Roubaix, where he took 2nd place in 2019. Slovenian Tadej Pogacar for his part imposed a ceasefire in an overheated peloton and kept his yellow jersey effortlessly three days from the Pyrenees (the ranking here).
Sagan, latest victim of the Breton hecatomb
On the morning of this 12th stage, starting from Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, the Tour de France lost one of its most popular servants, Peter Sagan, a late victim of the Breton hecatomb. Falling violently with Caleb Ewan at the finish of the 3rd stage in Pontivy, a fall which had forced the Australian to give up, broken collarbone, the seven-time winner of the green jersey came to the start of the stage floating black, baseball cap on the head, to address journalists massed in mixed zone.
“I especially did not want to give up the Tour de France. It's a race that is particularly close to my heart, but after discussing it with my doctors, we agreed that it was better for me to stop and rest ”,
explained the Slovak,showing off a swollen knee.
“I hope to be recovered for the Olympics,
” he sighed.
Read also: Tour de France: in search of René Vietto's toe
In ten participations, Peter Sagan, winner of twelve stages of the Tour, had never given up, even if he had been excluded from the Grande Boucle in 2017 following a stormy sprint with Mark Cavendish. The latter seemed then in an ideal position to achieve this holy grail of cycling whose name he refuses to mention: the record of 34 stage victories held by Eddy Merckx. But the race and especially the strong favorable wind which swept the Vaucluse and the Gard decided otherwise. Thirteen riders indeed chose the powder of escampette, among which Julian Alaphilippe, teammate of the sprinter of the Isle of Man, and solid rollers like the Swiss Stefan Küng and Stefan Bisegger or the German sprinter André Greipel, in search of last laurels. at almost 39 years old.
Behind, the yellow jersey Tadej Pogacar decreed a strike of zeal and locked the chase, the best classified rider of the breakaway, the Colombian Sergio Henao, drifting more than 50 minutes in the general classification.
The advance of the fugitives soon peaked at fifteen minutes and the expected sprint was beating down.
“It is truly an incredible reward after all the efforts I have put in since the start of my career. "
Nils politt
In the final, Nils Politt stood out with the Basque Imanol Erviti, the Australian Harry Sweeny, and Stefan Küng. 12 km from the finish, the German threw himself on his pedals, tongue sticking out, and went to seek this victory which had escaped him so little in 2019 in Paris-Roubaix, where Philippe Gilbert had dominated him. in the sprint.
“Peter's abandonment was a game changer and I've been feeling good for a few days. There were a lot of sprinters in the group and I knew I had to toughen up the race and attack. It is truly an incredible reward after all the efforts I have put in since the start of my career, ”
he said. On the menu for the 13th stage, Friday, 219.9 km between Nîmes and Carcassonne.
