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Peter Sagan in green after Mûr de Bretagne

  • Ron 

Tinkoff-Saxo’s Peter Sagan got what he had been searching for during the first week of Tour de France, as he rode his way into the green jersey on the finishing climb of Mûr de Bretagne, where he crossed the line as 4th behind stage winner Vuillermoz. Sagan, Contador and team sports director de Jongh unanimously concur that a great possibility and challenge lies ahead with tomorrow’s TTT.

After a trip to the podium atop Mûr de Bretagne claiming the white and green jersey together, Peter Sagan said that he was glad to be in green at Tour de France.

“The finale was very hard because we did full gas from the bottom to the finish line. I took the decision to stay with Froome and in the last hundred meters I tried to accelerate but I was in the red zone and Valverde beat me, while I wasn’t fully able to do my sprint. I was hoping to take the win but the two guys up front did a strong attack and for sure, it’s nice to be back into the green jersey. It’s only with a three-point advantage but I will do my best to stay in the lead. I am very happy with the points I took and I don’t see why I should be disappointed”, comments Peter Sagan, who lead the points classification by three points.

“I would have liked to take more points but I’m satisfied and now we look forward to the team time trial, where I think we can do well. We have to do our maximum like in every time trial but I think we have a good team for this challenge. The yellow jersey is 11 seconds away, it will be difficult but we are here to try”, adds Peter Sagan.

Stage 8 consisted of 181.5 kilometers in rolling terrain, while the undeniably biggest obstacle on the stage came with 2km to go, as both GC riders and those with stage win ambitions had to enter and cope with the punchy climb up Mûr de Bretagne. Ultimately, it was Alexis Vuillermoz (ALM), who took the win after launching an attack within the final kilometer. Team captain Alberto Contador notes that he is satisfied with the stage, while he redirects his attention towards the important TTT.

“We all finished together but I saw that Nibali lost 10 seconds, which is not irrelevant. The stage was not too hectic but the pace was high in the last part before the final climb. I was in the wheel and I tried to help Peter in the final part but it was impossible to set it up at that moment. In any case, I’m happy with the stage and I look forward to the team time trial. We have a good team, of course we have used energy in the first part of the Tour but I am optimistic”, says Alberto Contador, who sits 7th in the GC, 0’36” down on the race lead.

Despite having eyed the possibility of taking the stage win, Steven de Jongh tells that he’s happy to see Peter Sagan pulling on the green jersey.

“It’s good, we had hoped for the win today but it is very good to see Peter pulling on the green jersey. He deserves it, he has been working very hard and he is a very versatile rider, which he showed today. We obviously knew that he could potentially do well today and in the end he got the necessary points. The boys rode a good race and they were positioned well before the start of the last climb. Alberto was perhaps a bit back, but he showed that he was ready to move up”, tells de Jongh before concluding:

“We had the TTT in mind during the stage, but we’ve also had that the other days in order to conserve as much energy as possible during the Tour. We’re happy to start tomorrow with nine riders – a complete team – and we have a good group of riders for this challenge. There are many strong teams so it will be exiting to see what the outcome of tomorrow will be”.

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