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2015 Tour de France Stage 2: Greipel rounds Cavendish for win, Cancellara takes yellow

A day of wind made for a decisive stage Sunday, as Andre Greipel took the podium champagne, Fabian Cancellara assumed the race lead and Chris Froome, Alberto Contador, Tejay van Garderen and Rigoberto Uran grabbed a more than 1:20 advantage over their GC rivals.

A day of wind made for a decisive stage Sunday, as Andre Greipel (Germany/Lotto Soudal) took the podium champagne, Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland/Trek) assumed the race lead and Chris Froome (Great Britain/Sky), Alberto Contador (Spain/Tinkoff-Saxo), Tejay van Garderen (USA/BMC) and Rigoberto Uran (Colombia/Etixx-QuickStep) grabbed a more than 1:20 advantage over their GC rivals.

In the start at Utrecht the peloton was well aware of two things in the finishing town of Zélande: deteriorating conditions and the bonus seconds of 10, 6 and 4 offered at the line.
The weather forecast of rain and wind didn’t discourage Perrig Quémeneur (France/Europcar), Jan Barta (Czech Republic/Bora-Argon 18), Stef Clement (The Netherlands/IAM) and Armindo Fonseca (France/Bretagne-Séché) from bolting immediately to become the first breakaway of the 2015 Tour. The quartet only ripped out a 3:00 maximum gap.

Tinkoff-Saxo forced the issue when the race hit the crosswinds at the 58-km mark. The field was split into three bunches, with Rui Costa (Portugal/Lampre, Alejandro Valverde (Spain/Movistar) and Bauke Mollema (The Netherlands/Trek) getting caught in the second bunch. However, things calmed down when the course was more protected from the wind and the bunch re-formed.

Barta surged up the road to take the intermediate sprint at the 80.5-km mark and carried on solo. Behind in the peloton, John Degenkolb (Germany/Giant-Alpecin) won the battle for the fifth place points. Clement and Fonseca joined Barta with 74-km to go and just under a minute’s lead.

Wilco Kelderman’s second crash of the day split the peloton just before the race hit the nasty weather, with Ryder Hesjedal in the chasing group. The last of the escapees were swallowed up with 62-km remaining.

Echelons desperate to catch up formed in the stinging rain. Valverde again was caught lagging behind, as was his Colombian teammate Nairo Quintana, Joaquim Rodriguez (Spain/Katusha) and Jean-Christophe Peraud (France/Ag2r). Up front Froome and Sky, Contador and Tinkoff-Saxo, Lotto-Soudal and BMC turned the screws. With 46-km to go, the gap between the two groups was 1:00, with yellow jersey Rohan Dennis (Australia/BMC), Thibaut Pinot (France/FDJ) and Vincenzo Nibali (Italy/Astana) in between.

The leading group got smaller while the Nibali and Quintana gangs amalgamated. There was still a 1:04 gulf with 33-km remaining. Nibali punctured at an unfortunate time, ramping up the drama once more. The chasing group could not make inroads into the gap; in fact, the time increased.

The 24-rider leading group headed towards the finish, the red kite arch having been disassembled because of the wind. Mark Cavendish (Great Britain/Etixx-QuickStep) swung around his lead-out man with Greipel nailed to his rear wheel. The Gorilla was able to power past the Brit–who seemed to sit up prematurely–to take his seventh Tour victory and pull on the green points jersey.

Ryder Hesjedal came in 5:04 in arrears and is no longer in contention for yellow in Paris. Svein Tuft finished in the same l’autobus.

Monday, which will be Cancellara’s 29th career day in yellow, is the “Classics” stage as the race heads into Belgium, scuttles over the first categorized climbs of the 2015 edition and ends on the Mur de Huy, the sharp finishing climb of La Fleche Wallonne.

2015 Tour de France Stage 2
1) Andre Greipel (Germany/Lotto Soudal) 3:29:03
2) Peter Sagan (Slovakia/Tinkoff-Saxo) s.t.
3) Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland/Trek) s.t.
168) Svein Tuft (Canada/Orica-GreenEdge) +5:04
179) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Cannondale-Garmin) s.t.

2015 Tour de France GC
1) Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland/Trek) 3:44:01
2) Tony Martin (Germany/Etixx-QuickStep) +0:03
3) Tom Dumoulin (The Netherlands/Giant-Alpecin) +0:06
101) Svein Tuft (Canada/Orica-GreenEdge) +5:57
132) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Cannondale-Garmin) +6:17