After 220 km and five categorized climbs, Stage Six of the 2013 Paris-Nice cycling race was decided by a bunch sprint, where Omega Pharma-Quickstep’s Sylvain Chavanel snuck past the favorites at the line to take the win.
Chavanel surprised everybody by finding the power to pull out from behind World Champion Philippe Gilbert in the final fifty meters and to pass both the BMC rider and AG2R’s Samuel Dumoulin.
“I am super happy,” said Chavanel on omegapharma-quickstep.com. “It’s the second time I won here in Nice, after my victory in 2008. It’s always a great emotion to raise the arms here. Today I decided to do the sprint because I was looking for some points for the Green Jersey[as Points leader].
“There was a head wind in the final, so I asked Kevin De Weert to stay near me. He did a great job and he left me in the perfect position on the wheel of Gilbert and Dumoulin. With the bonification fixation I took, I’m now 3rd. Tomorrow will be difficult for me, but I will try to do my best to stay in the top 10.”
Chavanel is being modest; he is a reasonably good time trialist and could well maintain his position. It is unlikely he—or anyone else—will unseat Sky’s Ritchie Porte.
Ritchie Porte held onto his 32-second lead in General Classification over Garmin-Sharp’s Andrew Talansky; Chavanel advanced to third, tied at 42 seconds with Vacansoleil’s Liuwe Westra.
The day started with an 11-rider break, composed of Simon Clarke (GreenEdge,) Egor Silin (Astana,) Gatis Smukulis (Katusha,) Eduard Vorganov (Katusha,) Brent Bookwalter (BMC,) Arnold Jeannesson (FDJ,) Julien El Fares (Sojasun,) Borut Bozic (Astana,) Jerome Pineau (Omega Pharma QuickStep,) Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale,) and Johann Tschopp (IAM Cycling.)
After 150 km or racing and five climbs, the last two Cat 1, the break was down to five riders: Johann Tschop who took all the King of the Mountain points to secure that jersey, Romain Bardet, Eduard Voganov, Arnold Jeannesson, and Simon Clarke, who set out on his own with 45 km to go and the gap down to ten seconds.
The other breakaway riders pursued Clarke, and the group managed to stay away another nine km before getting swept up.
A kilometer later Astana’s Andriy Grivko, attacked joined soon by two Omega riders, Sylvain Chavanel and Peter Velits, sixth and ninth in GC. This attack was too much of a threat for race leader Ritchie Porte to ignore; Vasil Kiryienka and race leader Ritchie Porte closed down the attack within five kilometers.
Kiryienka set such a high pace over the rest of the distance that no rider even bothered to launch an attack, saving their legs for the inevitable sprint.
Coming into the final kilometer, AG2R, and IAM Cycling all pushed to the front; AG2R, riding for Dumouilin, took the lead coming under the flamme rouge, but BMC took it back with 500 meters to go. BMC’s Daniel Oss led a single file of sprinters towards the line: behind Oss came Gilbert, followed by Dumoulin, Chavanel, RadioShack’s Tony Gallopin, and Movistar’s Jose Joaquin Rojas.
Gilbert started the sprint, with DuMoulin pulling out on his left halfway to the line, but Gilbert surged a second time and passed the AG2R rider. As he did, Chavanel popped out on the left side and snuck past both sprinters in the final meters, leaving Gilbert and Dumoulin with shocked expressions.
Juan Joaquin Rojas stayed on Chavanel’s wheel but tried to go right; The Movistar rider got stuck behind Dumoulin, so Rojas cut back to the left and pipped the Frenchman right on the line.
Sunday’s Stage Seven time trial from Nice to Col d'Eze is short at only 9.6 km, but it climbs 469 meters over that length. This will be a short, high-power blast; Ritchie Porte should manage fine, with Tejay Van Garderen, Sylvain Chavanel, and Liuwe Westra all having great shots at the podium.
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| Paris-Nice Stage Six | |||
|
| rider | team | time |
| 1 | Sylvain Chavanel | Omega Pharma-Quick Step | 5:14:23 |
| 2 | Philippe Gilbert | BMC |
|
| 3 | Jose Joaquin Rojas | Movistar |
|
| 4 | Samuel Dumoulin | AG2R |
|
| 5 | Tony Gallopin | RadioShack Leopard |
|
| 6 | Julien Simon | Sojasun |
|
| 7 | Borut Bozic | Astana |
|
| 8 | Heinrich Haussler | IAM Cycling |
|
| 9 | Jonathan Hivert | Sojasun |
|
| 10 | Alberto Losada Alguacil | Katusha |
|
| General Classification after Stage Six | |||
|
| rider | team | time |
| 1 | Richie Porte | Sky | 29:40:31 |
| 2 | Andrew Talansky | Garmin-Sharp | 0:00:32 |
| 3 | Sylvain Chavanel | Omega Pharma-Quick Step | 0:00:42 |
| 4 | Lieuwe Westra | Vacansoleil-DCM |
|
| 5 | Jean-Christophe Peraud | AG2R | 0:00:49 |
| 6 | Tejay van Garderen | BMC | 0:00:52 |
| 7 | Peter Velits | Omega Pharma-Quick Step | 0:00:53 |
| 8 | Simon Spilak | Katusha |
|
| 9 | Diego Ulissi | Lampre-Merida | 0:00:54 |
| 10 | Andriy Grivko | Astana | 0:01:08 |
