Dear Rouleurs,

You have to feel for Richie Porte, Australia’s best chance of winning the Tour De France (TDF 2018), Stage 9 Arras to Roubaix over the dreaded cobbles, was always going to be a stern test of GC riders. It’s a very bad case of deja vu for Porte, who fractured his pelvis on the corresponding stage, last year. That horrific crash on a high speed descent, left MMT thanking the stars he has disc brakes on his Domane.

To crash out at the 10km mark, before reaching the cobbles, was just plain bad luck.  The team doctor’s  assessment of ‘Disjonction acromio-claviculaire de l’epaule droite’ was later updated to fracture of the right clavicle.  MMT can’t see how Porte could be ready in time for 2018 version of La Veulta.  This shameless plagiarised article from yesterday’s Sun-Herald, tells the tale of woe.

In fact, this blog could have just as easily been about Chris Froome who also had stack but had the good fortune to land on grass rather than bitumen. Almost all of the GC riders had some kind of misadventure over 156km  mini-Paris-Roubaix par cours.

Team BMC had a pretty poor day, despite Greg Van Avermaet’s second place and successful defense of the Yellow Jersey.  Tejay van Garderen, BMC’s other GC hope, lost almost 5 minutes on the stage, with a succession of crashes.  Bruised and battered by the day he’s almost 4 and 1/2 minutes behind Chris Froome.  Froome sits in equal 8th with Michelton-Scott’s Adam Yates.  Provided Froome stays upright on the remaining 11 Stages, he will win his 5th TDF and complete a TDF-Giro double.

Until next time, ride safe

MMT