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Chris Froome wins but Nairo Quintana is the Star of the Tour de France

While the victory wasn’t handed to Chris Froome of Team Sky as the winner of the 100th Tour de France, he was the favorite to win and proved that his strong performance last year supporting team leader (sir) Bradley Wiggins was not just a fluke. Froome took a decisive victory in stage 8 taking the yellow jersey from Daryl Impey of Orica GreenEdge and further cemented his victory with a stage 15 win and stage 17 Individual Time Trial win – defending his yellow jersey for two weeks.  Australian Richie Porte was crucial in providing team support and finished a commendable 7th overall.

The star of the 2013 Tour de France was however the Colombian cyclist Nairo Quintana of team movistar who moved into second place overall in the second last stage and along with 3rd placed Roman Kreuziger (Czech) pushed Alberto Contador off the podium into fourth. Quintana overtook Chris Froome on stage 20 with a kilometer until the finish line at Annecy Semnoz. Experts are already speculating that if he can improve his time trials then he will become and even stronger challenger.

The best placed Australian was Michael Rogers in 16th of team Saxo-Tinkoff who was supporting Alberto Contador. Richie Porte finished 19th while Cadel Evans didn’t achieve the Team BMC expectations – despite being well placed at the start of the tour, Evans consistent lost time and was not able to maintain the pace in key mountain stages.

Simon Clark of Orica GreenEdge finished in place 68 (just behind Jens Voigt) and Adam Hansen in place 72.

Simon Gerrans exceeded is own and his team Orica GreenEdge expectations winning a stage three sprint finish and then moving into yellow on stage four. He led the General Classification for two days before graciously passing the yellow jersey to teammate Daryl Impey which becomes the first African to wear the yellow. Chris Froome is Kenyan born and grew up in South Africa though races with a British licence. Orica GreenEdge, the Australian team held the yellow for four days.

Orica GreenEdge rider Cameron Meyer finished in place 130, Matthew Goss was in place 152 with teammates Brett Lancaster in 154 and Aussie cycling veteran Stuart O’Grady in 161.

Rohan Dennis of Team Garmin Sharp did not start in stage 9, after making his tour debut this year and starting strongly he finished 7 minutes behind the gruppetto, slightly short of the ‘team review’ after the first rest day.

In the green jersey classification, Slovakian rider kept Mark Cavendish at bay with almost a 100 point lead. Nairo Quintana also took the King of the Mountains Polka-Dot jersey and U23 White Jersey while team Saxo Tinkoff took the team classification.

Mark Cavendish suffered defeat in the prized Champs-Élysées sprint finish, German Marcel Kittel  takes the Paris victor ahead of Cavendish and Andre Greipel and equals the Englishman’s tally of two wins during the Tour de France.

Christopher Jones
Christopher Joneshttps://www.bicycles.net.au
Christopher Jones is a recreational cyclist and runs a design agency, Signale. As the driving force behind Bicycles.net.au he has one of each 'types' of bicycles.
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