June 18, 2017

Spring 2017 Point d’Appui Winners

New contenders appeared in the Spring Classics and other early bicycle races as competitors for the upcoming Grand Tours.

In the just finished Tour de Suisse, there was no Point d’Appui due to 140 finishers coming home. Two veterans, Zdenek Stybar of Quick-Step Floors and Marcus Burghardt of Bora-Hansgrohe, finshed on les Cuspides of the fulcrum.

Silvio Herklotz of Bora-Hansgrohe finished in 63rd at the Critérium du Dauphiné earlier in June.

French rider Yoann Bagot of Cofidis, Solutions Credits finished in 61st place to win the Point d’Appui jersey during the Tour of California in May.

In April at the Tour of Flanders, Daniel Oss of BMC Racing Team finished as the Point d’Appui on the cobbles of Walloon.

In early April, Nicolas Torraca of Elevate-Khs Pro Cycling and Luis Villalobos of Aevolo Cycling split the cusps on the men’s side of the Joe Martin Stage Race in Arkansas, United States. With 102 finishers, there was no fulcrum. Emily Newsom of Team Elevate Racing won the Point d’Appui on the women’s side the race, finishing 33rd among 65 finishers.

There was no fulcrum at Paris-Roubaix this year. Two Dutch riders, Boy van Poppel of Trek-Segafredo and Pim Ligthart of Roompot-Nederlandse Loterij finished on les Cuspides of the race, at 51st and 52nd respectively.

Alessandro De Marchi of BMC Racing Team and Christopher Juul Jensen of Orica-Scott finished 64th and 65th respectively as les Cuspides of the 2017 Paris-Nice race.

In the 2017 Milan-San Remo race, Luke Rowe of Team Sky won the Point d’Appui, finishing 98th among 195 riders who came home safely.

In January, Gregor Mühlberger of Bora-Hansgrohe held on to win the Point d’Appuit in the 2017 edition of the Tour Down Under.

September 4, 2016

Boswell Wins Point d’Appui in 2016 Vuelta

Ian Boswell of Teamy Sky

American Ian Boswell of Team Sky won the Point d’Appui for the 2016 Vuelta a Espana, finishing 80th among the surviving 159 riders in the race.

Boswell’s placement had been 20 places above the fulcrum until Stage 16 when he finished dead last on the stage, which dropped in the overall standings closer to the middle of the pack. His former teammate, Joe Dombrowski, whom he had helped win the amateur Giro d’Italia back in 2012, held the GC Point d’Appui on Stage 17 and 18. Both Boswell and Dombrowski finished at the tail end of Stage 19, Drombowski slipping out of the fulcrum and Boswell slipping in.

He finished third on Stage 7 of last year’s Vuelta and seventh overall in the 2015 Tour of California. Back in 2012 when he was riding for Trek-Livestrong, he finished second in the Under-23 Baston-Liege-Baston race. But now he’s a workhorse for Team Sky, riding in support of Christopher Froome.

Asked what cycling has taught him, Boswell said, “You can get to where you want to get if you work at it. There’s more ups and downs in cycling than many other sports. It teaches you to be resilient.”

Nairo Quintana won the 2016 Vuelta, and Nikias Arndt of Team Giant-Alpecin was the Lanterne Rouge, some 5 hours adrift.

Zdenek Stybar of Etixx-Quick-Step had the time closest to the median time.

The general classification Point d’Appui after each stage:

Stage 1 – No fulcrum
Stage 2 – No fulcrum
Stage 3 – Rudiger Selig of Bora-Argon 18
Stage 4 – Silvio Herklotz of Bora-Argon 18
Stage 5 – No fulcrum
Stage 6 – No fulcrum
Stage 7 – No fulcrum
Stage 8 – No fulcrum
Stage 9 – No fulcrum
Stage 10 – Julien Bernard of Trek-Segafredo
Stage 11 – No fulcrum
Stage 12 – Thomas De Gendt of Lotto Soudal
Stage 13 – No fulcrum
Stage 14 – Tiago Machado of Team Katusha
Stage 15 – No fulcrum
Stage 16 – No fulcrum
Stage 17 – Joe Dombrowski of Cannondale-Drapac
Stage 18 – Joe Dombrowski of Cannondale-Drapac
Stage 19 – Ian Boswell of Team Sky
Stage 20 – Ian Boswell of Team Sky
Stage 21 – Ian Boswell of Team Sky

August 25, 2012

Vuelta Remains in Les Cuspides Since Stage 4

When a sailing ship hits the duldroms and the winds cease, the crew grows restless and starts doing ridiculous things like swabbing the deck. The Vuelta a España has gone three stages without a Point d’Appui, an even number of riders coming home each day. It got so bad that after Stage 7, the Vuelta’s website showed 194 riders finishing the stage but 196 still in contention for the general classification.

Suffice to say we don’t know how that works except that either there are two tandem bicycles out there or the Vuelta has entered its own period of blah.

Les Cuspides for the last few stages have been:

Stage 5 – Denys Kostyuk of Lampre-ISD and Zdenek Stybar of Omega Pharma-Quickstep.
Stage 6 – Bruno Pires of Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank and Assan Bazayev of Astana Pro Team.
Stage 7 – Pablo Lastras Garcia of Movistar Team and Rafael Valls Ferri of Vacansoleil-Dcm Pro Cycling Team.

Whether we find a new fulcrum on the first really tough mountain finish is yet to be seen. Maybe it will shake up the scorekeepers enough to get the number of riders correct.