Mathieu Warnier, Media365: published on Tuesday July 2, 2024 at 9:30 p.m.
After a thunderous start to the Tour de France, the French riders have fallen into line. To the point that the first of them, Guillaume Martin, is already far behind the yellow jersey Tadej Pogacar. Something that has not been seen for nearly 90 years.
The good start of the Tour de France for the Tricolores is already a long way off. While Romain Bardet during the first stage in Rimini and then Kévin Vauquelin the next day in Bologna raised the colours of France high, the situation changed radically this Tuesday after the first high mountain stage. While Tadej Pogacar placed a first banderilla in the four-way match for the final victory which pitted him against Jonas Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel and Primoz Roglic, the Blues are no longer at the forefront. Indeed, while Romain Bardet started this third stage of the Grande Boucle in fifth place in the general classification with a six-second deficit on the yellow jersey, we now have to go down to find a trace of the first Frenchman in the hierarchy of the event. Arriving in 20th position this Tuesday in Valloire, four minutes behind Tadej Pogacar, Guillaume Martin is in 17th place overall. But it is not the rank that is in question in this case, it is rather the difference in time with the yellow jersey.
The French far from the outposts
Indeed, the Cofidis team rider is a little less than five minutes behind. However, to find a gap at least as large for a French rider after only three stages of the Tour de France, we have to go back to the 1937 edition, according to statistics from the specialist website ProCyclingStats. 87 years ago, Maurice Archambaud was slightly more than six minutes behind the German Erich Bautz, who was then wearing the yellow leader’s jersey. Aware of his performance, Guillaume Martin preferred to look for the positive in this first crossing of the Alps. “It wasn’t great Guillaume Martin, but it wasn’t a disaster either,” he told the specialist website Cyclism’-. Until now we had more explosive climbs, whereas here we had long climbs, it was not easy. ” If the French have already responded to this Tour de France, the road is still long concerning a good final position in the general classification.
