Yellow In the Mountains

The start this morning was swarming with people and many of them with a hope of catching a glimpse of the yellow jersey before stage 8 started. As is customary all the jersey wearers lined up on the start line and front and center was AG2R’s Rinaldo Nocentini. With the yellow jersey Nocentini was quite the opposite of what has been a common theme of hiding in the team bus until the last possible moment. Nocentini was excited and outside the bus speaking with the press and enjoying the moment that earned on stage 7.

With three big climbs on Stage 8 he would have to work hard to keep yellow. The race started straight uphill out of Andorra with the cat 1 climb Port d’Envalira followed by the steep Col de Port, another Cat 1 Col d’Agnles and then a 44 km run into the finish of downhill and flats. So far the newly introduced G5 bike has been performing flawlessly. Today the bike along with the help of some strong legs put AG2R’s Efimkin in the break for another possible win for the team. The break formed over the first climb but the problem was that Cadel Evans was there. He was too dangerous for the other riders to keep in the break and they knew that if Evans remained with them then their time in front was limited.

Eventually Evans fell back and the group with Efimkin was allowed to have a short leash to reach the finish line. While Efimkin was patrolling the front the yellow jersey hung tough in the main bunch. Nocentini found himself in trouble a couple of times but his teammates were able to pace him back to the leaders. At the end of the day Efimkin finished 4th, Riblon placed 2nd in the group sprint to finish 6th, and Nocentini kept yellow for another golden day.