FTDF Stage 5 - Gorilla's In The Midst

For a minute there, I though the plucky breakaway might have made it to the finish today. But it wasn’t to be, and they were swallowed up by the sprinters just in sight of the line. What a shame! So, we salute you, Matthieu Lagadnous, Pablo Urtasun, Jan Ghyselinck and Julien Simon. At least they got on TV for a while to keep the sponsors happy.

 

So it was another day of finishing straight thrills and spills for the sprinters, with yet another crash in the last 3km, and another win for Andre “The Gorilla” Greipel.

 

Not all the sprinters have been having as good a time as Greipel, and we said goodbye to Marcel Kittel today. He’s been sick since the start of the race, then got a bad knee too, and decided to call it quits early in the stage. His loss will come as a blow to the Charmers, who were hoping for great things from the young German. Let’s hope he’s back next year in better shape, to see what he can do against the likes of Cav and Greipel – he’s beaten them both this year.

 

The mini-league hasn’t changed much, as we see Flamin’ Nadgers are still in the lead. But they didn’t do quite so well today, with the best score for the stage going to the Veloraptors.

 

MINI LEAGUE SCORES

Tour De Pance

Rank		Team	Directeur	Score
1		Flamin` nadgers	Andrew Windrum	2537
2		Hell of the North	Vincent Lavallee	2044
3		The Charmers	Craigatron	1954
4		Evil Chanbots	Danny Chan	1932
5		Return of Reflex	Karl	1842
6		Velo raptors	Warwick Anderson	1723
7		Bile Beans	Vestan Pance	1675
8		Drews Riders Using Genuine Supplements	Drew Stephenson	1651
9		TEAM ITV4	Andrew Danson	1618
10		temple of FROOME	Tom	1553
11		Crazy Uncle Vince	Baby Lavallee	1542
12		Cejay`s Vanguard	Cejay	1539
13		Team Awesomeness	William MacKenzie	1422
14		RaboBrad	Brad	1390
15		ENRICO 666	Erik Mortier	1385
16		TheFastMenOnBikes Part II:THE SEQWHEEL!	Teagan	1344
17		Rouleurs	tdm911	1343
18		To Infinity and Beyond	Nick Cuthbert	1229
19		Its Sky Time	Mark	1227
20		10 minute team	dspeck	1153
21		Mungo Cycling	Mungo	1101
22		15	Joe Danson	1094
23		Ph.Dizzles	Ben	1044
24		Marmite Men	Alasdair MacKenzie	942
25		Looking Good in Lycra	Catherine Windrum	934
26		Dexter`s Midnight Wheelers	noj	874
27		Haxby Group Pharmacy	Richard Harrison	840
28		Ned`s Boys	Elizabeth MacKenzie	829
29		Smugblokes	Mark Philo	753

If you’re getting bored of all these sprints, then the waiting is nearly over, as we’ll be finishing off with a tough climb on Saturday. There’s still one more sprint stage to come before that though, so expect to see the same break-catch-sprint formula played out for one more day. Greipel seems to be the man to beat in the sprints recently, so let’s see if he can get three in a row.