Looking at tomorrow's route might be the best explanation of why the peloton is letting the breakaways run away today.
OHyeah. Tomorrow has the chance to really throw things into turmoil. The first climb alone could completely shred the entire field apart.
Yep, today was the day for local boys with no chance at the podium in Paris to get their pictures in Le Monde, tomorrow's the real deal. Just caught the rerun this evening, I can't see why that's such a mystery to Bob R & Al T, who said in their wrap-up commentary that it was a strange stage. But teams with guys who actually have a shot at the GC would have had to have been crazy to shoot their wads chasing down those guys with Tourmalet looming ominously before them. My goodness, even the stage profile looks like a meatgrinder: the first giant blade to roughly eviscerate, and then progressively smaller ones to turn the meat/peloton into finely shredded mince.(Shudder)
Dessel & Mercado are gonna wake up tomorrow in Tarbes, take one look at that monster hors-cat 70km down the road and will wish that they had been thrown off the tour for blood doping! Unless their real names are Clark Kent & Bruce Banner respectively, I don't think we're going to be seeing much of 'em tomorrow.Heck, it wouldn't surprise me if they pedal over to the officials' car first thing and "confess" right then and there to smoking crack for breakfast!LOL.