2020 Tour de France: Stage 6 News, Notes and Quotes

Stage 6 of the 2020 Tour de France saw Astana’s Alexey Lutsenko take a solo win after a long breakaway, while British climber Adam Yates safely held onto the maillot jaune for another day.

Lutsenko Wins Solo

It was a day of glory for Kazakh cycling as the national champion of Kazakhstan Alexey Lutsenko took a great solo win atop Mont Aigoual at the 6th stage of the Tour de France.

Lutsenko made a decisive attack from the breakaway with some 17 km to go on the final climb of the day. The Kazakh Champion was able to drop all the rivals and to go solo. Taking over 50 seconds on the chasers, Lutsenko finished alone atop Mont Aigoual, taking his biggest success in career.

“Coming to the Tour de France I had a goal to fight for a stage win,” said Lutsenko at the finish. “The Tour de France was one of the biggest goals of this season. I was dreaming about this victory for a long time and now my dream came true! Indeed, I was aiming this stage and in previous days after doing my job for Miguel Angel I was dropping from the group, on purpose losing some time in the general classification, hoping that the GC favorites won’t follow me in a decisive moment. Today, before the stage we discussed our tactics for this day, and with sports directors and our general manager Alexandr Vinokurov we decided that I would try to go in a break since it could have a chance to go until the finish. I felt quite good all day and my legs worked pretty well. It took some time for our group to break away from the peloton, but finally, we succeed. It was a long and hot day, but I was guided really nice through the stage by Alexandr Vinokurov, who was in the car behind me. On the last climb I tried to stay calm and to keep on my own rhythm. And on the hardest part I made my attack. I am so happy with this win, it is a big achievement for me and for our team! Also, it is a great feeling to win in the jersey of the national champion of Kazakhstan! I thank my team for this great opportunity and a special thank to all our sponsors and our main partner Samruk-Kazyna, who is supporting us so many years!”

“It is a big day for our team, but also for our Kazakh cycling,” said Dmitriy Fofonov, sports manager of Astana Pro Team. “We were waiting for this day for many years and now we see the victory of the Kazakh Champion in the Kazakh team at a stage of the Tour de France! We all are happy and proud to deliver this success to our country. We are also happy because we were aiming this stage, we had a good plan for the day and, in the end, we perfectly achieved our goal! The team did a great job and also Alexey Lutsenko spent a phenomenal day on the road. He was strong, smart and did not do any mistake! It was our day and I congratulate all our fans with such a nice victory. But, the Tour de France is going on ahead. We are still at the first week of the race and there is a long way until Paris. We will keep on fighting during the whole race to try to get more nice results in this Grand Boucle.”

Adam Yates Retains Yellow

British climber Adam Yates of the Mitchelton-SCOTT team retained his race lead as the breakaway stayed away on stage six.

The day had been earmarked as a potential one for the general classification contenders, but a battle for the overall failed to materialise with Yates crossing the line safely in the reduced peloton.

In contrast to yesterday there was action as soon as the flag dropped to signal the start of the stage, with riders eager to get into the breakaway knowing they may be allowed to stay away until the finish.

Mitchelton-SCOTT kept a close eye on the riders heading up the road before eventually allowing eight riders to go clear.

With the yellow jersey on the shoulders of Yates, Mitchelton-SCOTT assumed their place at the head of the peloton for much of the stage. The escapees were allowed to stretch their advantage out to a maximum of six minutes before the gap began to fall on the approach to the day’s climbs.

Team Jumbo-Visma took up the pace making on the first of the two third-category climbs, and the increase in tempo saw the gap to breakaway halved down to three minutes. INEOS Grenadiers then moved to the front of the pack over the following ascent and into the foot of the category one Col de la Lusette.

Yates remained calm and was hovering around the head of the peloton with Basque climber Mikel Nieve and Giro d’Italia stage winner Esteban Chaves for company. The gap to the breakaway went on to fall to under three minutes by the summit, but an attack by eventual winner Alexey Lutsenko (Astana Pro Team) saw it stretch out again.

Heading onto the final uphill drag to the line it was clear that the remains of the break would take the stage victory, while behind, Nieve placed himself on the front of the bunch, setting the pace and guiding Yates through the finale to retain the yellow jersey.

“It was nice [the first day in yellow], I think we controlled quite well, it was a strong breakaway and there were a lot of guys that really wanted to go in there today,” Yates commented after the stage. “It was pretty much flat all the way into the climbs, so it was quite hard to control, but I think we did a good job and in the end I still had Mikel and Esteban in the final, so all in all, a good day.

“I think just the way the break already had the gap and all the bonuses were already taken, there wasn’t really much to gain from anybody attacking. Also, the final climb wasn’t super steep, so it takes a lot of effort to get a few seconds, so everyone just kept their energy and saved it for a later day.

“Like I said yesterday, it was a strange situation, but I think we rode well today and hopefully we did the jersey proud. I still want to win a stage, that’s what we came here to do, but it’s pretty hard to throw away time when you’re in the lead, so I think for now we’ll just play it day-by-day and see what happens.

“Tomorrow’s a sprint stage and then we’ve got two really hard stages. These two stages I actually know quite a lot of the climbs, so it’s going to be really tough, but like I said before, we’ve got a super strong team here, not just for the flats but for the climbing stages, so I’m looking forward to it.”

Birthday 4th for Neilson Powless

And as soon as the flag was waved earlier this morning, it was clear that this stage would be more energized than yesterday’s. Neilson Powless specifically made it an entertaining stage to watch – and not just because it was his birthday. Powless showcased his acceleration and climbing skills throughout the race, and although the 24-year-old California native didn’t end up winning — he proved that he’s a serious contender for a future stage victory at the Tour de France.

Powless came to the front of the breakaway early with seven other riders as they set the pace and increased their gap over the rest of the peloton by 17 seconds. With 150km to go, the tempo of the race was quick as the breakaway then widened the gap to five minutes. Powless looked calm and collected out in the front, almost like he’s ridden in the world’s biggest cycling race before.

“We thought that today could be pretty interesting with Mitchelton–Scott having the jersey and we thought that they may not want to ride really hard to bring back a breakaway as long as it wasn’t threatening for the jersey. So we had Greg in there with 4 minutes, which wasn’t as much time as I originally thought. But it was just a super strong breakaway that was really quick. Everybody was encouraging each other to keep rolling smooth for as long as possible. I think I got a little too excited on the second to last climb and just attacked a few too many times. I was still really proud of that ride,” said Powless. “I thought I had a decent shot with the guys that were in there and I think maybe I was a little bit too overzealous on the last 25 kilometers or so and maybe was just too much the aggressor on the second to last climb. That kind of got the better of me. In the end, I was still super proud of that ride and it was just amazing to be out in the front in the Tour de France. Everybody in there was just a world-class rider and I was really happy to be amongst that group.”

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