FTDF Stage 3 - Sagan Takes Second Sprint, Nadgers On Fire

Another stage, and another win for slippery Slovak speedster, Peter Sagan. I had a feeling he’d do well in his first Tour, and along with Bradley Wiggins, he was pretty much guaranteed a spot on the Bile Beans. Those of you that didn’t pick him are probably kicking yourselves right now. He may have done some showboating as he approached the line, but at least he kept his hands away from his “area” today.

 

Earlier on in the stage, the breakaway yet again featured Micheal Markov, who has been off the front for three days in a row now. And thanks to all that hard work, he’ll be keeping the polka dot jersey for a while longer.

 

It wasn’t all smiles though. Today we said goodbye to Kanstantsin Siutsou, who had the unfortunate honor of being the first man to abandon the race. He went down in a crash, and my diagnosis is a broken ankle, which I know from experience can make cycling a bit tricky. His loss will be a blow to the Sky team, who were counting on his ability to ride on the front of the peloton for hours on end, chasing down breaks for Wiggins.

 

Shortly after we said goodbye to Spanish sprinter JJ Rojas, who I’ve diagnosed with a broken collarbone. And then, just before the finish line, there was a big ol’ crasharoo. A few big names were caught behind the carnage, but as it all happened inside the last 3km, no one lost any time.

 

In the minileague, the best score for the day went to those Flamin’ Nadgers, who netted an impressive 530 points to increase their lead at the top. Will anyone be able to stop them?

MINI LEAGUE SCORES

Tour De Pance

Rank		Team	Directeur	Score
1		Flamin` nadgers	Andrew Windrum	1943
2		Hell of the North	Vincent Lavallee	1652
3		The Charmers	Craigatron	1446
4		Evil Chanbots	Danny Chan	1389
5		TEAM ITV4	Andrew Danson	1353
6		Return of Reflex	Karl	1306
7		Crazy Uncle Vince	Baby Lavallee	1257
8		temple of FROOME	Tom	1246
9		Velo raptors	Warwick Anderson	1220
10		Bile Beans	Vestan Pance	1205
11		Drews Riders Using Genuine Supplements	Drew Stephenson	1189
12		Team Awesomeness	William MacKenzie	1093
13		TheFastMenOnBikes Part II:THE SEQWHEEL!	Teagan	1073
14		ENRICO 666	Erik Mortier	1035
15		Cejay`s Vanguard	Cejay	1008
16		To Infinity and Beyond	Nick Cuthbert	982
17		Rouleurs	tdm911	974
18		RaboBrad	Brad	938
19		Its Sky Time	Mark	927
20		10 minute team	dspeck	813
21		15	Joe Danson	778
22		Mungo Cycling	Mungo	709
23		Looking Good in Lycra	Catherine Windrum	701
24		Dexter`s Midnight Wheelers	noj	675
25		Haxby Group Pharmacy	Richard Harrison	647
26		Ned`s Boys	Elizabeth MacKenzie	624
27		Ph.Dizzles	Ben	599
28		Marmite Men	Alasdair MacKenzie	591
29		Smugblokes	Mark Philo	560

Stage 4 should be another one for the sprinters, but there could be a few surprises. The route runs along the coast for a fair way, and if it’s windy we could see some splits in the peloton. Then there’s some tight corners around the streets of Rouen just before the finish, which could lead to more last minute carnage.