July 24, 2017

Arndt Wins 2017 Tour Point d’Appui

Bicycle racers in the Tour de France rounding a curve.

Nikias Arndt, winner of the Point d’Appui in the 2017 Tour de France, rides in protection of Warren Barguil, the holder of the polka dot jersey.

After a tour in which the Point d’Appui changed hands 16 times, Nikias Arndt of Team Sunweb grabbed the fulcrum on Saturday’s individual time trial and held onto it Sunday, despite some last minute changes in the standings swirling around him.

Arndt was one of the riders leading out the eventual winner of the points classification, Michael Matthews, but also riding in support of Sunweb’s eventual winner of the King of the Mountains, Warren Barguil, who was also named the most-combative rider overall. So Sunweb takes home four of the top seven honors available in the Tour: the green jersey, the polka dot, the red jersey number and the gray jersey of the Point d’Appui.

Arndt won minor tours early in his career, including the Tour of Alanya and the Tour of Berlin, more recently winning the points classification in the Tour of Bulgaria and best young rider of the Arctic Race of Norway. He won the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race earlier this year. He has ridden in the Vuelta a Españas three times, finishing as the Lanterne Rouge in the 2016 edition, and twice in the Giro d’Italia, winning stage 21 of the 2016 Giro.

This was Arndt’s first Tour de France. He finished 11th on Stage 1 of the Tour, the individual time trial, with the same time as fellow German Marcel Kittel of the Quick-Step Floors team and Edvald Boasson Hagen of the Dimension Data team. He rose to 10th place on Stage 2 and held that spot until Stage 5, slowly settling back to the middle of the peloton. In the final time trial of the Tour, Stage 20, Arndt finished at 7th place on the stage, showing he still had legs under him. Sunweb, which signed him for the 2017 season, announced the next day that it would extend his contract.

The winner of the Tour, of course, was Christopher Froome of Team Sky, and his teammate Luke Rowe finished as the Lanterne Rouge, 4 hours, 35 minutes and 52 seconds adrift. The median time of the race also went to a Team Sky cyclist, Michal Kwiatkowski, who had a time of 2 hours, 7 minutes and 48 seconds.

On the stage, Dylan Groenewegen of Team LottoNl-Jumbo won the sprint on the Champs-Élysées, and Daniel Martin of the Quick-Step Floors team, was the fulcrum finisher for the day.

The general classification fulcrum placement by stage:

Stage 1: No fulcrum.
Stage 2: Jay McCarthy of Bora-Hansgrohe.
Stage 3: Janez Brajkovič of Bahrain-Merida.
Stage 4: No fulcrum.
Stage 5: Vegard Stake Laengen of UAE Team Emirates.
Stage 6: Yoann Offredo of the Wanty-Groupe Gobert team.
Stage 7: Yukiya Arashiro of the Bahrain-Merida team.
Stage 8: Mike Teunissen of Team Sunweb.
Stage 9: Nils Politt of the Katusha-Alpecin team.
Stage 10: No fulcrum.
Stage 11: Michael Albasini of the Orica-Scott team.
Stage 12: Paul Martens of Team LottoNl-Jumbo.
Stage 13: Michael Schär of BMC Racing Team.
Stage 14: No fulcrum.
Stage 15: Andrey Amador of Movistar Team.
Stage 16: Jay McCarthy of the Bora-Hansgrohe team.
Stage 17: Danilo Wyss of BMC Racing Team.
Stage 18: Andrey Amador of Movistar Team.
Stage 19: Danilo Wyss of BMC Racing Team. Wyss finished on the cusps of the 2013 Vuelta.
Stage 20: Nikias Arndt of Team Sunweb.
Stage 21: Nikias Arndt of Team Sunweb.

July 7, 2017

Arashiro First Japanese Rider to Claim Point d’Appui

Yukiya Arashiro

Yukiya Arashiro of the Bahrain-Merida team is the new general classification Point d’Appui after Stage 7 of the 2017 Tour de France.

Arashiro is the first Japanese rider to claim the fulcrum position, although he was one of Les Cuspides after a stage during the 2014 Tour. He won the road race of the Japanese National Road Championship in 2007 and 2013, the road race of the Asian Road Championships in 2011, and the Tour du Limousin in 2012. He was also named the most combative rider during two stages of the Tour de France, once in 2012 and once in 2016.

He has ridden in 10 grand tours, including six Tours de France prior to this year’s edition. His highest finish was 65th place in 2014.

Brent Copeland, manager of Bahrain-Merida, told Cycling News: “His constant results also show the type of rider he is, where [he] is always doing the extra work to do his best as well as a great teammate who is always willing to help where needed.”

Marcel Kittell of the Quick-Step Floors team won Stage 7 by a whisker, overtaking Edvald Boasson Hagen of the Dimension Data team at the last possible second. On the stage, Eduardo Sepulveda of Team Fortuneo-Oscaro took the fulcrum.

The sprint finish, with riders reaching 75 kilometers per hour, followed an otherwise uneventful day in which even the crosswinds, quite strong on the end of the course during the early part of the day, had quieted by the time the peloton arrived.

Chris Froome of Team Sky remains the leader of the Tour, and Olivier Le Gac of the FDJ team remains the Lanterne Rouge.

July 4, 2012

Kuchynski Becomes First Point d’Appui in Tour de France

The Point d’Appui of Stage 4, Aliaksandr Kuchynski, is seen in the red jersey amid the riders of the peloton.

Aliaksandr Kuchynski

The Tour de France has its first Point d’Appui of the race: Russian Aliaksandr Kuchynski of Katusha, who nibbled on the fulcrum during Stage 3, edged out his co-cuspide Rubén Perez to take the first Point d’Appui of 2012. Kuchynski is 7:22 behind race leader Fabian Cancellara and 28:01 ahead of Brice Feillu, the Lanterne Rouge.

Finishing at the Point d’Appui on the stage is Arthur Vichot of FDJ-Bigmat. Yaraslov Popovych of Radioshack-Nissan,who was a workhorse on the front end of the peloton for most of the day, finished just behind Vichot.

Coincidentally, Popovych and Kuchynski finished the 2010 Tour de France as Les Cuspides, an even number of riders finishing that year. Popovych may have had a hand in slowing down Team Katusha and keeping Kuchynski in the overall Point d’Appui today. Team Katusha came to the front of the peloton to press the pace as the peloton hit a waterspout. Coming out of the next roundabout, Popovych seemed to have stern words for the Katusha riders and their seeming lack of concern for the safety of the peloton.

Safety will get you to the Point d’Appui, though, and Popovych himself is only four spots out.

Notes about Stage 4:

Europcar’s Yukiya Arashiro, who was one of the Stage 1 Les Cuspides, stayed in the break from the start of Stage 4 and was voted most aggressive rider on the stage. Arashiro is now up at 53rd place.
Maarten Tjallingii of Rabobank finished Stage 3 after a crash. He abandoned the race before Stage 4 once his injury was diagnosed as a fractured hip. His loss left 195 riders to finish the day, and all came home.