Bora’s teamwork isn’t the same as on the rainy stage: in the beginning of the second climb of the day, D.F. Martinez🇨🇴 crashed on the (concrete) side of the road while taking over a teammate.

At first he was in pain and shocked by what suddenly and unlikely happened, but once back on the bike behind his teammates, most of the pain must have vanished and his morale was restored by the help he got. They did well, basically alone for 50 km. They restarted about 1 mn behind, and lost a bit in the beginning, perhaps up to 1mn30 versus the best at the front, but then they stabilised that gap, and in the end managed to reduce it, arriving just 45 seconds behind the Vauquelin group.

It wasn’t a great Vingegaard🇩🇰 today:

• he couldn’t drop L. Martinez🇫🇷 in the climb where he attacked;
• not only L. Martinez🇫🇷 wasn’t dropped, but he was easy in the Dane’s backwheel; shaking hands with a mate on the roadside…
• L. Martinez🇫🇷 launched his sprint way too early; in spite of this mistake, Vingegaard🇩🇰 never could overtake the French (until after the line).

Of course, the Dane didn’t need to win, or create gaps, or score time bonifications, so the motivation wasn’t maximal; yet he was clearly trying to win. And of course too, he (and the Frenchman) were easily above the rest of the field in spite of what I perceived as a lack of power compared to previous days.

Vauquelin🇫🇷 wasn’t that great either. Not dropping one direct opponent for a moment, finishing with Baudin🇫🇷 and Rondel🇫🇷. I mean those aren’t bad riders, but they are supposed to be a step below the level with which Vauquelin🇫🇷 pretends to compete. During this Paris-Nice, Vauquelin🇫🇷 never managed to dominate his competitors; the only match was the distant one which happened on the rainy day, which sprang many theories about what he could have achieved if he had been in the front group.

We didn’t see one of those surprising improvements which sometimes happen, by going from Arkéa (in this case) to a major foreign team, anyway.

Tejada (🇨🇴 Astana) won again the sprint of the Vauquelin group, easily. Including his stage victory, that’s 3 stage podiums in 3 ‘real’ stages in a row. Sweet UCI points 🍬 🍭 🧁

Not a single change within top-12 on this last day of race, despite the terrain.

Vingegaard🇩🇰 wins all 3 jerseys: GC, points, mountain! despite the attempt of V. Paret-Peintre (🇫🇷 Soudal-QS) who scored max points at the first 2 passes. But the Dane was scoring behind him as well on those passes (that’s the problem of those secondary classifications, when you are going alone).

Several riders didn’t start today, including 2 at Décathlon and Costiou at FDJ.

Many more didn’t finish the stage, most likely because riders more than 15 minutes behind at some point in the race were eliminated. What an asinine decision for the last miles of an 8-day race, and riders who survived the bad weather! 😠

So in the end there are less than 90 finishers…

It is interesting that Cavagna (🇫🇷 FDJ) managed to remain 16^th^ in GC. 30 minutes behind, of course, but still, that seems to confirm (after his stage podium on the Time Trial of UAE tour) that he found a level of performance that was lost for several years, during which he was really bad. That’s not something I expected from him this year. I am not sure that much can be built over that, but at least he should be able to be a useful domestique this year. Pacher🇫🇷 seems to experience a bit of a revival too, this season. A pity FDJ only has one leader in working order (Grégoire)…

At Décathlon, Prodhomme🇫🇷 has been rather disappointing. 17^th^ in the last stage (that’s the group caught up by the Bora rescue team); 12^th^ in stage 6 (Apt), in the group for place 2, but in that group were several sprinters as well. He can’t find his legs this year: the two stages I quoted are his best performances so far.

In the past, I have been complaining that this race was too much about Nice. Well, this year, we never saw Nice…

Stage 8

Standings before this last stage:

General classification:

J. Vingegaard 🇩🇰 Visma

D.F. Martinez 🇨🇴 Bora – +3′22″

G. Steinhauser 🇩🇪 EF – +5′50″

K. Vauquelin 🇫🇷 Ineos – +6′09″

L. Martinez 🇫🇷 Bahrain – +7′37″

M. Soler 🇪🇸 UAE – +8′15″

I. Izagirre 🇪🇸 Cofidis – +9′02″

Points:

D. Godon 🇫🇷 Ineos – 55 pts

L. Lamperti 🇺🇸 EF – 51 pts

L. Pithie 🇦🇺 Bora – 44 pts

J. Vingegaard 🇩🇰 Visma – 40 pts

H. Tejada 🇨🇴 Astan – 35 pts

There are still 25 points to grab (10 at I.S. and 15 at finish). NB: the I.S. is very, very close to the finish line.

Mountain:

J. Vingegaard 🇩🇰 Visma – 26 pts

C. Pedersen 🇩🇰 Soudal-QS – 18 pts

M. le Berre 🇫🇷 Total – 14 pts

M. van Dijke 🇳🇱 Bora – 10 pts

A. Vlasov 🇷🇺 Bora – 9 pts

There are still 30 points to grab: 10 at each of the 3 climbs. So in theory, any rider still present on the race can win!

Youth

G. Steinhauser (🇩🇪 EF), K. Vauquelin (🇫🇷 Ineos) and L. Martinez (🇫🇷 Barhain), ranked 3 to 5 in GC, qualify for this category.

Teams:

Ineos 🇬🇧

Bora 🇩🇪 – +2′34″

Visma 🇳🇱 – +5′44″

The rest is far away.

Many riders didn’t start. The peloton is now down to 110 riders. Bessèges, here we are! 😃

Q36.5 and Jayco only have 3 riders. Alpecin, Lidl-Trek, Bahrain, Movistar, Picnic and Uno-X only have 4.

Only less than 50 km remain. A long slightly uphill false-flat, made of the road at the bottom of the valleys of the Var (a bit, first) and then of the Tinée.

Nobody but an Alpecin and then Vinokourov Junior tried to race a bit. Yet, the peloton managed to crash twice in the last 3 miles on that smooth wide road in uphill false-flat…

The start was pushed back again and again, because 3 riders managed to crash in a round-about at 20km/h while they were chatting during neutral start, just before where the real start should have been given, 1 of them (Denz) hanged around at the back for miles instead of joining back the peloton, then when he finally joined it, there was a village, so the start couldn’t be given, and of course another rider had a puncture in that village…

Stage 7

…will be shortened due to weather forecast.

So far, it seems that the stage will simply stop in Isola, where the Intermediate Sprint was planned on the original course:

(see the beautiful, very readable official profile in light grey over white, like before I altered the original ones…)

BTW, even without the shortening of the stage, the TV broadcast was supposed to start significantly earlier today.

Only 122 riders left, and with some cold rain and perhaps a bit or snowfall or icefall on the menu today, we shall probably see more week-end departures.

NEW CHANGE

Due to the not nice weather in Nice, the beginning of the stage is removed too. The new start shall be located at where the Intermediate Sprint was moved yesterday (le Plan du Var).

Only less than 50 km remain. A long slightly uphill false-flat, made of the road at the bottom of the valleys of the Var (a bit, first) and then of the Tinée.

125 in fact. Onley🇬🇧, J. Bernard🇫🇷 and another rider do not start either. Lidl-Trek is thus down to 4 riders too.

Only 129 rides left. In Nice, it will look like Bessèges’ peloton 😃

128, as Romeo (🇪🇸 Movistar) won’t restart, despite having joined the breakaway with Campenaerts🇧🇪 yesterday. A scheme I seem to see more and more often:

• a leader/outsider suffers a big trouble (illness, crash, …) one day;
• next day or day after, as he is no longer in GC, he (easily) breaks away, hoping for a stage win;
• he doesn’t succeed, and packs his bags before the day is over.

Anyway, Movistar is now down to 4 riders. Still one more than Jayco.

Before it started, everyone said that the course of this Paris–Nice would not allow creating gaps. Well… 🤣

It was quite a race today again. It lacked the harsh weather and dramatic events of yesterday, but otherwise…

After the first 70 km of battle to create a breakaway, the rest was short before the final series of 4 Ardèchois climbs. In fact even that part wasn’t eventless, as Campenaerts (🇧🇪 Visma) and two Movistar had decided to make a (big) jump from the peloton to the breakaway (and succeeded).

Visma was keeping the gap suspiciously low. As soon as the first climb (Sècheras) started, there was an attack in the breakaway, and an acceleration by Armirail (🇫🇷 Visma) at the front of the peloton. In the breakaway, I think (I missed a few seconds) that Cavagna (🇫🇷 FDJ) was the first to drop after Cepeda (🇪🇨 Movistar) attacked, followed at distance by Prodhomme (🇫🇷 Décathlon) and Vlasov (🇷🇺 Bora), and farther by Tarling (🇬🇧 Ineos, in the breakaway again!) and Campenaerts🇧🇪. In the peloton, Armirail🇫🇷’s attack reduced it to about 30 riders, but as he was the only teammate of Vingegaard🇩🇰 left, he reduced his pace mid-slope.

Then Vingegaard🇩🇰 got Campenaerts🇧🇪 coming back from the breakaway, to help him catch Cepeda🇪🇨 and accelerate at the beginning of the second climb. While the peloton was being thinned again, Vingegaard🇩🇰 attacked; L. Martinez (🇫🇷 Bahrein) tried to follow a bit, to no avail (he also had tried to attack a few seconds before Vingegaard🇩🇰, I think, or was it someone else? edit: most likely Paret-Peintre). Ineos, with Onley🇬🇧 pulling Vauquelin🇫🇷, was preparing to attack too, but they didn’t have the time.

Behind were mostly the top riders from yesterday, in disorderly positions, with riders dropping then coming back. But they didn’t help each other much: in the following sections, they mostly attacked each other, stopped, attacked and so on. The only successful attack was V. Paret-Peintre’s (the 🇫🇷 skeleton, Soudal-QS) attack #17.

Summary of the day: Daddy Jonas teaches the kids a lesson.

Among the non-Danish top-10 riders, Vauquelin🇫🇷 didn’t look as strong as he was yesterday, nor as he hoped to be; the legs didn’t exactly follow his will to climb in the classification.

The time lost looking at each other in the first (non-Danish) group allowed Rondel (🇫🇷 Tudor) and even Soler (🇪🇸 UAE) to come back. So, Soler🇪🇸 is still an important threat for L. Martinez🇫🇷’s 5^th^ place in GC, deprived of the last time bonus by Tejada’s (🇨🇴 Astana) sprint.

Good performance by 37 years old I. Izagirre (🇪🇸 Cofidis) who is in good shape at the moment, and managed to stay with Vauquelin🇫🇷 and Co. 👍 (and that’s 20 UCI points for his Pro Team).

Nice roads/landscape today.

Only 129 rides left. In Nice, it will look like Bessèges’ peloton 😃

FDJ’s secondary leader, Costiou🇫🇷, finished today ½ hour behind the winner, for the second day in a row. He has now the worst GC position in his team, 113^th^ at 1 hour…

Stage 5

Another 3 riders didn’t start. A Jayco and Sivakov (🇷🇺🇫🇷 UAE) withdrew early in the stage too.

• Sivakov was crap already on the TTT, and yesterday probably didn’t help.
• Jayco is down to 3 riders.

Gaudu (🇫🇷 FDJ) is dropped by the peloton in or at the top of the first 3^rd^ category climb of the day…

20 km farther, Gaudu🇫🇷’s goin’ home… ➡️ 🏚️

I thought it could be one of his early failures when a stage starts quickly on a hilly terrain and the battle for breakaway remains intense for 1 or 2 hours, and then he recovers and catches up with the main groups, as he is familiar with this type of temporary failures, but no.