David Millar, normally a time trial specialist, proved he could still win a road stage by initiating a breakaway 125 km into the 226-km Stage Twelve of the Tour de France and staying ahead until the finish line.
The Garmin-Sharp rider led over two Cat 1 climbs, a Cat 3 in the final 25 km and an upward sloping finish doping most of the work in a breakaway which was as big a 22 at times and finished up with Millar and four other riders, and finally just Millar and Jean-Christophe Peraud of Ag2R sprinting for the line.
Millar was too exhausted to stand at the finish line; he lay on his back gasping for breath while reporters crowded around. When he had recovered the 35-year-old Brit told NBC Sports that he had planned the win halfway through the race.
“First of all it was a case of getting over the two mountains, then it whittled down to those five riders—I didn’t actually expect to be at the front but I was feeling great,” he said. “Once we were in the group of five and I saw the situation, I knew was the best sprinter there so I decided my tactics 120 Ks out and that was to win the sprint
Millar told the BBC that this might be his second-best Tour stage win of four.
“I won Stage 13 which was a road stage to Bezier in 2002 which was a probably my proudest win in the Tour,” he told the BBC interviewer. “Today was very similar the manner in which id did it. There’s nothing quite like the sensation of winning a road stage—it’s much more emotional than winning a time trial or a prologue. I really enjoy it.”
Garmin has been decimated by wrecks and retirements; Millar’s win is the only good thing that has happened to the team through the 2012 Tour. “It’s taken the team going through turmoil to bring out the best in me. We needed and I wanted to do it,” Millar explained.
Millar told NBC the psychological effect of the win was “massive” for Garmin-Sharp. “We’ve had a horrific Tour so far. I really wanted to do something. Because normally I am helping out leaders and so today I kind of wanted to prove that we’re still here and show that Garmin-Sharp is still one of the best teams in the world.”
The interviewer noted that Millar was the fourth British stage winner to win a stage in the 2012 Tour, Sky’s Mark Cavendish, Bradley Wiggins, and Chris Froome being the others. Millar responded, “Our Olympic team is basically made up of Tour de France stage winners. I think we are going to be a force to be reckoned with.
He went on to say he never thought Great Britain would produce such a crop of powerful cyclists.
“We’ve become one of the top nations in the world, if not the top. We’ve got the world champion [Mark Cavendish], we’ve got Bradley Wiggins winning all the stage races and leading the Tour de France, with Chris Froome in second, and me, the old dog, winning a stage here, so yeah, I think we’re the top. our Olympic team is pretty darn scary.”
Sprint Controversy
The five breakaway riders took the first five positions; the fight over sixth got a bit nasty. Orica-GreenEdge rider Matt Goss, who has been beating Pete Sagan of Liquigas at every intermediate sprint, tried it take the Green Jersey points at the line in Stage 12, but he failed to hold his line.
Goss got a good leadout, with Sagan right on his wheel; as Sagan began to edge past 100 meters from the line, Goss, perhaps inadvertently, cut sharply left, baulking the Liquigas rider.
Sagan was adjudged to have been in a position to win and illegally interfered with; Goss was relegated to the back off the bunch and given no points. This increase Sagan’s lead in the points classification.
Stage 13 will be one for the sprinters; it has a lot of rolling hills but only one categorized climb, a Cat 3 25 km from the finish. The final three km slope up half way, then down, with the final 500 meters being flat, so this is not a Peter-Sagan sprint stage; this is a full-on Cavendish/Goss/Greipel/Farrar stage, one of the last in the Tour, and it is guaranteed that the sprinters’ teams will not let a breakaway spoil the fun.
Sunday brings the Tour back to the mountains, the Pyrenees this time, for a 191-km stage with a Cat 2 and two Cat 1 climbs and an uphill finish. The last Cat 1, the Mur de Péguère, features grades of 11–13 percent for the final four kilometers—that will test the peloton.
Monday’s stage might end with a bunch sprint, despite two Cat 4s and a Cat 3 climb. The finish is flat, and the sprinters won’t get many chances for that. Tuesday will be the final rest day.
