Luis-Leon Sanchez handed his stricken Rabobank team a welcome boost by soloing to victory on a Tour de France stage yesterday marked by mass punctures after spectators threw nails on the road.
The end of the 191 km 14th stage race was brought to life in equally dramatic style by a rash of punctures suffered in the peloton after nail-throwing spectators decided to liven up the final climb of the day.
Yellow jersey holder Bradley Wiggins survived potential disaster to retain his overnight lead of 2:05 on Sky team-mate Chris Froome with Italian Vincenzo Nibali, of Liquigas, still in third at 2:23.
For a while, it looked as though Wiggins would take more time off challenger and defending champion Cadel Evans after the Australian lost over two minutes when he suffered the first of three punctures at the summit.
Amid farcical scenes, he lost time waiting for a spare wheel and then his team manager Jim Ochowicz slipped into a ditch while helping the Australian a second time.
Wiggins’s Sky team, however, did an act of fair play by instructing the peloton to sit up and ride at a pace that, eventually, allowed Evans to rejoin the bunch.
“Sometimes you’ve just got one or two guys, but when you get 16 guys puncturing at once it becomes apparent that something’s had happened,” said Wiggins.
It later transpired that “one or two” spectators, according to race director Jean-Francois Pescheux, had thrown nails on to the road.
Even Wiggins had to change bike, the Englishman signalling to his team car to stop as he got a quick replacement.
It left Evans in a desperate chase with his BMC team to catch Wiggins’s leading group, although he admitted he had no idea what had gone on ahead of him.
“I couldn’t see two minutes in front of me so I don’t know what went on in front,” said Evans.
Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme was quick to condemn the incident.
“The punctures started at the end of the Mur de Peguere climb, and then on the descent, and it could have had tragic circumstances,” said Prudhomme.
“It’s very rare... I can only condemn it as a stupid act.”
On the first of an eventual three testing days in the Pyrenees, Spaniard Sanchez and his fellow escapees were left untouched by the nail-throwers.
He had been part of an 11-man break which built a 16-minute lead on the peloton and after counter-attacking Frenchman Sandy Casar on the descent Sanchez made a decisive move with just over 11 kilometres to race before clinching victory.