Plomi Foto
1er Biniam Girmay Intermarche Wanty
2er Primosz Roglic RedBull Bora Hansgrohe
3er Mark Cavendish Astana
Saitama (Japan) – Saturday, November 2nd 2024
Key points:
• Biniam Girmay, the winner of the green jersey in the last Tour de France, prevailed in a rather unorthodox sprint to take the tenth edition of the Tour de France J:COM Saitama Criterium. The peloton only barely neutralised a last-minute attack by Primož Roglič, allowing the winner of the Vuelta a España to hang on for second place, between the Eritrean and Mark Cavendish, the man with 35 stage wins to his name, who rounded out the podium.
• Never before had an African rider emerged victorious from the Japanese race touted as „stage 22 of the Tour“. Jasper Philipsen claimed the points classification on the 3.6 km urban circuit. Romain Bardet, who bade farewell to the Tour de France last July, was crowned king of the mountains in Japan, as he had been in 2019. Chris Froome, another rider who had already taken part in the inaugural edition in 2013, got the combativity award for his panache.
ROGLIČ FLIES SOLO
The Saitama Super Arena, which hosted the Olympic basketball events in 2021 after rolling out the red carpet for artists of the calibre of Madonna, U2, Whitney Houston, Queen and Taylor Swift, flung its doors open once again for the Criterium. The riders sought refuge from the showers that sprinkled the circuit in this monumental building while waiting for the start of the team time trial, which ended in victory for the Japanese Shimano Racing squad. As soon as it hit the streets, the peloton became a boiling pot of ambition that only got frothier with every passing lap. Japanese cyclists such as Hikaru Sato and Yusuke Hatanaka, eager to shine on home soil, tried to break away time and again, but they were frustrated by Jasper Philipsen and Mark Cavendish’s dogged determination to fight for the points at stake at the intermediate sprints, which were set up on the finish line every four laps. Meanwhile, Romain Bardet and Chris Froome, two former winners of the polka-dot jersey at the Tour, vied for the king of the mountains points on offer at the top of a gentle slope at the exit from an underground tunnel.
Race conditions were more reminiscent of the northern classics than of the blistering heat that sometimes bakes France in July, causing a few spills. The Spaniard Roger Adrià had to bow out of the race after hurting his knee with 34 km to go. The points classification went down to the wire, with Philipsen sewing up victory at the last intermediate sprint. Romain Bardet came out on top in the mountains classification after joining Primož Roglič and Yukiya Arashiro in a breakaway within the final 10 km. The three-man lead group opened up a gap of about 15 seconds over the peloton but, by the time the bell rang for the final lap, the red jersey was alone at the front. The Slovenian had good reason to believe in his chances with 2 km to go, but Intermarché–Wanty got all hands on deck to catch him in the nick of time. Girmay, who has got sprinting down to a science, handily defeated his rivals to get a new victory and a new taste of the Tour de France. Come next July, „Bini“ will have his sights set on the yellow jersey at the end of the opening stage in Lille.
CHRIS FROOME: „THE VENTOUX HOLDS A VERY SPECIAL PLACE IN MY HEART“
Retirement is still a remote prospect for Chris Froome, who has no intention of hanging up his bicycle at the very least until the end of next season, perhaps after taking part in what would be his eleventh Tour de France next summer: „I didn’t make the cut for the last two, but it’s not far-fetched to think that, if I give it my all, I can still earn a spot on the team and play my part —hunting for a stage win, maybe, or working for my teammate Derek Gee, for example“. At any rate, the festivities around the tenth Saitama Criterium, whose inaugural edition he won in 2013 after claiming his first yellow jersey, are an invitation to take a trip down memory lane with the British champion. „Back then, when I won, I thought to myself that this wasn’t the accomplishment of a mission, but rather the start of a story. Later, when I came to Saitama, I was blown away by the number of fans waiting for us and by how well versed in the lore of the Tour they were.“ The former Sky rider became the hegemon of the race until 2017, when he took the win for the fourth time in his career. Little did he know that there would never be a fifth: „That’s life. At the end of the day, I think the 2019 Tour was the one that really got away. I’d never been as strong in training as before my crash in the Critérium du Dauphiné“. To sum up his relationship with the Tour, Froome picks the Ventoux as the symbol of his sometimes mixed feelings: „The Ventoux holds a very special place in my heart. When I won there in 2013, that was when I really knew I was going to take it all the way to Paris. In 2016, I had a similar performance in me, but that crash happened and mayhem ensued. It made no sense at all to start running, but it was an automatic reaction that just kicked in. And, in the end, it went down in history“.
