10 conclusions from the 2015 Tour de France

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Chris Froome rides solo toward the stage 10 finish.(Image credit: Courtesy of Polartec-Kometa)

1. Froome won the Tour de France at La Pierre-Saint-Martin, not in the Netherlands

Sky’s Richie Porte took over midway up the climb and set up Froome’s attack with 6.5 kilometres remaining. Only Quintana could follow the yellow jersey but he, too, would have to give best, distanced by Froome’s astounding cadence. By the summit, Quintana would lose 1:04 (plus a further 6 seconds in bonuses) to Froome, and to add insult to considerable injury, he would be caught and passed by Porte in the final kilometre.

The effect was devastating. Quintana attacked out of duty rather than out of conviction at Plateau de Beille and seemed hesitant deep into the Alps, even when Froome was beginning to flag. By the time Quintana finally began his offensive on Froome’s yellow jersey in earnest, six kilometres from the top of La Toussuire (or two and a half mountains from Paris), he had already long since run out of road.

Sky manager Dave Brailsford will feel that the repetition of the same litany of suspicions – the curious spike in Froome’s performances in 2011, the startling cadence, the long history of doped Tour winners – simply demonstrates the impossibility of “proving a negative,” namely of proving that Froome is clean. An alternative view, however, is that the resurfacing of the same questions yet again is an indictment of Team Sky’s failure to engage with them seriously and openly the last time around.

Many pushed for the disclosure of Froome’s power data as a means of delivering on the team’s long-standing pledge of transparency. Sky’s eventual, limited release of some of Froome’s power data from the La Pierre-Saint-Martin stage did precious little to quell the debate, however, not least because the yellow jersey’s average power output of 5.78 watts/kg was lower than the 5.93 watts/kg already reported by Robert Gesink, who finished 1:33 down.

Whereas last year he endured, for whatever reason, an off day after the rest day and lost four minutes, this time it was illness that derailed his ambitions in much crueler circumstances in the early phases of stage 17 to Pra Loup. Van Garderen sat second on GC heading into the final stages in the Alps and while it was unlikely he’d be able to usurp Chris Froome, he was thought to possess the resilience, a characteristic borrowed from BMC’s former leader Cadel Evans, needed to hang onto a podium spot.

Hindsight is 20/20, as they say, but Movistar had to know that every second lost in the first week to Froome would matter, but that didn't help them in the critical early stages. While Quintana and Valverde limited their losses to Froome in the opening time trial, things quickly changed on one of the stages most feared by the GC men: the flat stage 2 along the blustery North Sea to one of the monuments to man's hubris in the face of nature - the island of Neeltje Jans.

A plaque at the dam at Neeltje Jans, which holds back the sea, reads, 'Here the tide is ruled by the wind, the moon, and us'. The wind decided to show just who was in control, and made an example of Movistar, blowing apart the peloton with more than 50km still to race. As Etixx-Quickstep drove the pace, Froome held fast and finished on the back of the group of stage winner André Greipel, while Quintana and Movistar languished at 1:28.

Another 11 seconds lost on the Mur de Huy was only insult to injury, especially considering that Movistar held Team Sky to just three seconds in the stage 9 team time trial. At the first rest day, Froome was already in the yellow jersey and Quintana almost two minutes behind and Valverde only slightly closer. Although Quintana would claw back 1:50 in the final two mountain stages, he could pinpoint stage 2 and 10, where he gave up 1:14 to Froome, as the points where he lost the Tour de France. (LW)

In 2014 Nibali won in Sheffield and extended his overall lead on the cobbled stage. This year the early stages revealed Nibali’s lack of form and highlighted the lack of unity and dedication to the cause within the Astana team. The group of multi-nation mercenaries selected for the Tour showed little loyalty to Nibali and left him isolated in the echelons on the stage to Zeeland. Nibali knew that he would struggle to regain the lost time and his morale only seem to lift when he attacked at the moment of Froome's brief mechanical problem on stage 19. Sadly their exchange of strong words was the only moment they clashed, with Froome dominating on the road.

Sagan has once again dominated the points classification and showcased his extraordinary all-round prowess, yet has failed to come away with a stage victory. The classification was recalibrated to afford more weight to stage wins and Sagan’s victory margin over four-time stage winner André Greipel – 432 points to 366 – speaks volumes about his consistency and ability to mix it over all sorts of parcours. However, his five second places and 10 top-10s have confirmed him as the nearly man of the Tour.

In the absence of Kittel, who wasn't selected for Giant-Alpecin's Tour team after an illness-plagued early season, Greipel proved to be not only the strongest and the quickest, but the one with the knack of consistently timing his sprint to perfection. The German made a mistake just once on stage 7 to Fougères, where he went a bit too early into the headwind and was overtaken by Cavendish before the line.

On stage 5 to Amiens, no sprinter had an organised lead-out, and Greipel freelanced his way to victory in a straight-up power match over Sagan, Cavendish and Alexander Kristoff. On stage 15, Cavendish didn't make it over the climbs, but Greipel did and handily outkicked John Degenkolb to win. But it was his win on the final stage that cemented his place in history: although Kristoff had the last lead-out man, the Katusha rider faded in the final meters, but Greipel still had plenty of punch left. The German muscled past to snatch the victory while Kristoff faded to third behind Bryan Coquard. (LW)

But it quickly became apparent that Contador simply did not have the legs and, after losing considerable time on the first mountain stage in the Pyrenees, attacks in the Alps were based on heart rather than strength. As feared, the Giro had taken its toll and Contador himself admitted he’d been pushed too far by an aggressive Astana team and a demanding final week. Seeing the swashbuckling Spaniard so hamstrung was a strange and slightly sorry sight.

The innovation brought in by Gouvenou has shaken up the Tour de France, made it more unpredictable and so much more entertaining. He revealed in an interview during the race that he even studies local riders’ Strava data to find secret climbs and roads near stage finish towns. ASO seems to have reacted to the innovation of the Giro d’Italia and found ways of allowing the huge technical and organisational caravan to finish atop the highest mountains and cover the narrowest of roads.

In Paris Prudhomme claimed that this year’s route proved that the first week of the Tour de France is as important as the third week. However he is also probably aware that the intensity of the first week left the peloton tired and so perhaps dulled the racing in the Pyrenees and Alps. The mountain stages were dominated by breakaways and solo attacks, as Froome and Team Sky controlled their closest rivals and let other riders save their race with a day of glory. It was entertaining but the 2015 Tour de France will probably not go down in history as a special race. Hopefully ASO will study the flow of this year’s race in detail and accept that back-to-back mountain stages are no guarantee of a fight for the yellow jersey.

By the first rest day, however, expectations had been well and truly dashed and GC hopes had gone out of the window. Pinot lost his head on the cobbled stage 4 and leaked time at other junctures to find himself over eight minutes down, while Bardet and Péraud were minutes back, too. Add in the fact that Nacer Bouhanni, who had been in roaring form ahead of the Tour, crashed out on stage 5, and things were looking decidedly bleak for the home faithful, despite a stage win from Alexis Vuillermoz.

However, the Alpine conclusion to the Tour has put an entirely different complexion on things. Pinot claimed a huge penultimate day win atop Alpe d’Huez, where Bardet wore the polka dot jersey thanks to his own solo victory two days earlier. Meanwhile, 23-year-old Warren Barguil hung admirably with the top GC contenders in the mountains and, though he blew up on stage 19 and lost a stack of time, he more than confirmed the potential he showed in the Vuelta a España the last two years. Pierre Rolland also produced spirited displays in the Alps and, along with Bardet, moved into the top 10 on GC as Barguil fell out.