We hope you enjoyed reading Part 1 of our race report for the Tour de la Mirabelle which covered the Prologue and Stage 1.

Read part 1 here.

Stage 2: 177km Neufchateau to Saint-Amarin

The Canyon dhb SunGod team had a dual strategy for this ‘queen’ stage (a term used for the most challenging stage of a race, usually in terms of how hilly or mountainous it is) which had four peaks ranging from 3-8km in length at gradients of 5-7%. However, instead of a mountain top finish as in 2019, the last climb was followed by a 22km descent from 950metres altitude down to 400metres giving fearless descenders a possibility of recovering ground that might have been lost on the best climbers. The first strategy was that Townsend would attempt to stay with the best climbers to protect his GC position of third overall and finishing high enough to retain his Green Jersey. The second strategy was to keep to the team’s climbers Macleod and Stedman in contention for the GC battle.

A breakaway took a lot longer to form on Stage 2, though by the 30km point Christensen had helped establish a 6-rider unit that opened up a substantial gap of 5 minutes over the next 30km of the stage. The fact that a team has a rider in a break should mean that the rest of that team’s riders do not have to work to pull back the escapees as they are not motivated to chase down their own team-mate. As the break opened up, Simon Holt and Eoin O’Donohoe moved the supporting team car up behind Christensen in the break.

However, misfortune struck for Stedman who punctured on the first climb just as the pressure of the chase had increased as the stronger teams in the peloton chose to hunt down the breakaway. With Townsend in third place on GC, this would usually have meant that the team support car would be third in line behind the peloton and the race organiser’s car. However, with the team car up the road Stedman was dependent on waiting for a neutral service vehicle to appear in the following caravan of cars to provide a replacement wheel. Rob Scott dropped back to help pace Stedman back up to the peloton, a selfless action that resulting in Scott losing contact for the remainder of the stage. Meanwhile, Christensen passed over the first climb in the lead taking maximum points in the KOM category.

The breakaway was caught on the second climb and tellingly for Townsend’s Green Jersey aspirations, Andersen (Uno-X) took third place in the intermediate sprint that was positioned in the short distance between the end of the descent of the second climb and start of the third climb, gaining a single valuable point in the Points category.

Townsend kept up with the leader group of about 30 riders until the final climb where he drifted off the pace leaving Macleod and Stedman to contend with the best climbers in the race. Towards the top of the last climb 7 riders clipped away from the rest of the 25 or so riders left in the leading pack. Once cresting the summit these 7 riders descended relentlessly to the finish with Dutchman Sjoed Bax (Metec-Solarwatt p/b Mantel) taking the stage win from 18 year-old New Zealander, Laurence Pithie (Equipe continentale Groupama-FDJ) and GC leader Andersen (Uno-X) who again retained his Yellow Jersey and by gaining 10 points for his third place, snatching the points leader’s Green Jersey from Townsend by a single point.

Macleod and Stedman finished in the second group 1min 22sec down in 21^st and 25^th places, and moved to 14^th and 17^th places on GC, respectively. Townsend finished at the head of the third group 3min 27sec down in 29^th place.

Townsend provides his insight into Stage 2 as follows:

‘It was the queen stage and what looked like a fairly routine stage until the final climbs, so we just looked after ourselves while we had Ryan in the break. That took a lot of stress away from us in terms of chasing things down, so it was perfect from the start of the stage in terms of a team plan. As we got into the climbs the plan was for me to ride them at my own pace and just get over them and meanwhile Max and Callum would be following any attacks that went. It was a bit of a blow when Max got a puncture on the first climb whilst the team car was up with Ryan in the break. So he (Max) had to ride up part of the climb with a flat tyre to get back up to them (the peloton) which probably dented his legs quite significantly. Not to mention all of the stress that it adds to the day. I was in my own little world trying look after myself a bit and make my way through the stage as far as I could. When we got onto the third climb which was 8km at 6.5% right on the limit of what I could usually handle, I really started to feel my legs buckle as I made it over the top of the climb, but a move had gone and I felt the best course of action should be to commit to looking after the guys on GC and give up on my chance on the GC and probably my chance of a stage win by committing on the descent where I knew I could be a lot more of a threat. So I rode the descent and into the base of the next climb to bring a group of 10 back and try to set the boys up for the finish. I got distanced about one km from the top of the final climb with Max and Callum still in contention, but a small group clipped off the front over the top and unfortunately they couldn’t to follow it and they were left trying to bring it back without any buy-in from the group they were in, so it was a bit of a frustrating situation for the two of them seeing the main race go up the road. They are still just outside the top 10 on GC, but as we go into Stage 3 the plan is looking for a stage win again and we’re going to fully commit to that’.    

Stage 3: 190km Luneville to Damelevieres

The goals of the team for the final stage which commenced in the splendid surroundings of the Chateau de Luneville were two-fold, firstly to win the stage which although being the longest stage of the race at 190km and containing six relatively mild categorised climbs, was likely to finish in a bunch sprint, and secondly to regain the Points Leader’s Green Jersey for Townsend (although Andersen was leading the Points classification after Stage 2, Townsend was sporting the Green Jersey for Stage 3 as Andersen was wearing the ‘Maillot Jeune’ as leader on GC. Along the way the team was out to rattle the rest of the peloton and to try and use the cross-winds and other course obstacles to break up the rhythm of the race.

Similar to Stage 1, a break formed very early with James Fouche (Black Spoke Pro Cycling Academy), a rider for Team Wiggins when he won the New Zealand National Road Race Championships as a 20 year-old in 2019, and another young Briton, Oliver Knight (AVC Aix-en-Provence). Fouche was the dominant partner and he took all three of the intermediate sprints as well as four of the categorised KOM climbs as he maintained his 175km breakaway into the last 10km, deservedly winning the overall KOM prize in the process.

Andersen (Uno-X) slightly extended his points lead by taking third place in the first intermediate sprint. However, Townsend hit back taking third places at the next two intermediate sprints levelling the score in the Points classification with Andersen. The Canyon dhb SunGod team helped keep Townsend in contention coming into the final sprint with Jacob Scott then Rob Scott as the final lead-out man. Townsend’s resulting 9^th place and two points towards the Points classification secured the final Green Jersey ahead of Axel Zingle (CC Etupes) who had closed to within one point of Townsend after his second place in the final sprint. Andersen who finished 13^th was a further point behind and settled for ‘just’ the GC leader’s Yellow Jersey.

Bottom Line…

In retrospect this was a very successful tour for the Canyon dhb SunGod team. After the euphoria of the Prologue performance and the Stage 1 win, the loss of GC hopes and the Green Jersey on Stage 2 was the real low point, with the team bouncing back on Stage 3 to win back the Green Jersey of the Points classification leader. Many thanks to Simon Holt, Eoin O’Donohoe, Marie Lynn and Russ Kingston for their first class support of the riders.

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Written by Paul and Marina Stedman with rider contribution by Rory Townsend.

Photo/Diagram Credits

1. Tour de la Mirabelle website
2. Alexis Dancerelle / DirectVelo
3. David Jaunet Photographie @clickadocphoto
4. Philippe Briqueleur
5. Alexis Dancerelle / DirectVelo
6. Alexis Dancerelle / DirectVelo
7. Tour de la Mirabelle website
8. & 9. Herve Dancerelle / DirectVelo