Stage 17: Guillestre - Méribel-Mottaret, 205km
Climbs:
Côte de Saint-Marguerite (cat.3) 4,3km @ 5,3%
Col du Galibier (HC) 36,3km @ 4,0%
Col de la Madeleine (HC) 19,3km @ 7,9%
Méribel-Mottaret (HC) 22,0km @ 5,9%
Points:
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne (Rue Plan Pinay), 117km
Méribel-Mottaret, finish
Although this is probably the (second) most conventional stage in my Tour, using some of those well-known climbs that Prudhomme loves, it's still got something new for audiences to sink their teeth into; that's right, two big mountaintop finishes in the race so far, and two brand new summits never seen by the Tour. Actually, this may or may not be true; in 1973, stage 7b finished at Méribel-les-Allues. Les Allues is at 1433m, far below Mottaret, some 342m higher up. The winner of that 1973 stage was Bernard Thevenet, who just beat a star studded quartet behind him of Zoetemelk, Fuente, van Impe and eventual Tour champion Ocaña.
Whether you want to consider that Méribel-Mottaret is a brand new summit as the Tour has never gone this high up on the route, or a long-forgotten summit thanks to the climb to Les Allues in '73, is probably irrelevant however; it has long gone unnoticed sitting between Courchevel and (the also sadly underused) Val Thorens, but it has plenty of challenge all its own.
The main meat and drink of this stage will be familiar to most cycling aficionados. The transfer to Guillestre is short, and then the riders will face a 200km stage with three long, epic climbs to top. The stage starts in relatively benign fashion, with 20 flat kilometres and then the pretty unthreatening Côte de Saint-Marguerite to start us up. After this it's a long period of false flat as we roll into one of the Tour's most well-known stop-offs, the old walled town of
Briançon.
After this point, the stage starts to turn into a proper Alpine stage par excellence, sending us over some of the most storied and historic climbs in the race's history. The
Col du Lautaret is of course one of the most common climbs on the Tour's route these days, not because of its being especially difficult, but more because of its acting as a gateway from the south and east to Les-Deux-Alpes or, more predictably, Alpe d'Huez, or of course, in the same way it was used in the 2011 Tour, and the way that I am using it - as a gateway to
The Col du Galibier. Combining the two climbs, Lautaret and Galibier, gives us pretty much an uninterrupted 36km of climbing, so those diesels had better get warmed up on those earlier, flatter slopes, before it gets steeper as we head up into the thin air at the
high,
isolated pass, the highest point visited on my Tour de France.
Of course, we've climbed the easier side of Galibier, so that means a long, difficult descent to come. On the plus side for the Schlecks, Basso and Menchov, it's so far to the finish nobody will attack. On the minus side, there's almost 40km of it, with only a short dig up the Col du Télégraphe to break it up. At the bottom of the descent we have 25km of downhill false flat, into which I have inserted the intermediate sprint, in
Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne. After that, the road turns uphill again, and this time it's even more serious, for the
La Chambre side of the Col de la Madeleine is one of France's toughest ascents; a punishing, relentless ascent of 19 kilometres averaging a painful 8%. In a world of overused, repetitive climbs in the Tour, the Madeleine stands out as one that is well-known, popular and still manages to not be used as often as it should. Its famous
lacets lace (hehe) the hillside and delicately lay over wild, untamed country. It's a wilderness
up here, but a wilderness inevitably invaded by thousands of crazed lunatics after a glimpse of the big stars of the world of cycling.
As this is the toughest climb of the day, it is perhaps the best place to launch an attack; I wouldn't expect one, however, for there are still 57km to go when the riders pass over the summit. However, I can well imagine a train of pain shelling much of the chaff, leaving us with a péloton shrunk to the bare essentials before the descent into Aigueblanche. This isn't such a challenging descent, so I would anticipate that the leaders' bunch gets together in one piece to the base of the final climb of the day, which starts 9km after the base of the descent from the Madeleine.
This profile of the Méribel-Mottaret climb begins from Moutiers, but we are considering the climb as starting in Brides-les-Bains; effectively this is exactly the same from the 4km mark on, but has two slightly tougher kilometres replacing that early, easy start on the Moutiers profile. As a trade off, there are a couple of extra pan-flat kilometres between the climbs. As you can see, the climb is not a killer; some difficult phases of 7% or so in the early running give way to a long period of consistent 5.8%; I would therefore expect any left-over hangers-on to be shelled in the early going, and then it will be cagey between the contenders on the way to
Les Allues and Méribel village. After this it's a brief bit of flat before the climb ramps up to its steepest, the next two kilometres over 8%. If any decisive gaps are to be created by attacks today, then here is where it will happen, at the
heart of the
three valleys, as there are just four kilometres left when these are dispensed with, the last of these at a not-especially-threatening 4,4% as the riders wind their way through the ski village to the summit.
Overall, this is a difficult climbing stage, with three long, drawn-out climbs, but this is one designed for attrition rather than explosivity. I'm concerned that riders might race this one conservatively in view of the queen stage tomorrow, and so I've tried to keep it so that the climbers have opportunities to attack, but it's one where the diesels have plenty of opportunity to stay in contact as well; the climbers CAN really make a difference on this stage, but they will have to work hard - but if they do make those diesels go into the red, even if it doesn't work today they could reap the benefit tomorrow.
Guillestre:
Méribel-Mottaret:
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