2008 Tour de France, Stage 12 to Stage 21#Stage 17

The 17th stage of the 2008 Tour de France on 23 July was 210.5 km long and ran from Embrun to L' Alpe d' Huez. There were two intermediate sprints and a mountain stage of the third category and three climbs the Hors Category on the program. This stage was the first Tour stage, for the three mountains of the highest category were busy. It thus was considered the queen stage of the Tour 2008.

Rémy Di Gregorio, Rubén Pérez and Peter Velits attacked at km 3 and allowed to settle. Carlos Barredo tried to join, but was not omitted. Stefan Schumacher managed eventually. The four of them were allowed to settle. From the field then attacked Stéphane Augé and Geoffroy Lequatre and unsuccessfully tried to give chase. Schumacher reached the first mountain stage first. Team CSC - Saxo Bank took over the pursuit. Di Gregorio won the first intermediate sprint. The mountains classification at the Col du Galibier Schumacher won again. Out of the box, Thomas Voeckler, Bernhard Kohl and other drivers attacked by the mountain points, Kohl drove the first of the field over the pass. Several riders crashed in the downhill, but could just continue it. Voeckler attacked even in the downhill, Amets Txurruka and Carlos Barredo joined in, followed by Vincenzo Nibali, but they were caught again. At the aid station, the outliers reached a maximum lead of 7:20 minutes. Bernhard Eisel crashed at a traffic island, but was able to continue with abrasions. An ascent to Col de la Croix de Fer CSC again increased the pace, the more drivers were killed. Di Gregorio was obtained first from the field. Then one after the other fell back also Pérez and Schumacher and was collected from the field. Velits reached the pass alone first. Carbon, which in turn led the group of favorites, drove in second over the pass. On the descent, Jérôme Pineau attacked and reached Velits still in the downhill and also won the second intermediate sprint. Meanwhile included relapsed drivers back on to the favorite group. In the final pitch CSC intensified the pace again. Carlos Sastre attacked and managed to get away while Velits and Pineau were finally asked. The Favorites group, there were several attacks in which Denis Menshov meantime lost the connection and the favorite group consisted only of carbon, Christian Vande Velde, Cadel Evans, Fränk and Andy Schleck, Alejandro Valverde and Vladimir Jefimkin. After a period of calm in which again could unlock more drivers, there were in this group further attacks. However, these were mainly countered by Andy Schleck and over again in order not to jeopardize the stage win of his moving to the top of teammate Sastre. The Schleck brothers now had no ambitions to reduce the deficit to Sastre, but also left no other driver in the top tier tear, causing the residue was getting bigger. At the finish in L' Huez, which was achieved on a 200 meter long and 6.5 meter wide stretch, Sastre finally had a lead of over 2 minutes, so he was able to secure the yellow jersey himself. Samuel Sanchez and Andy Schleck crossed the finish line ahead of the rest of the favorites. Kim Kirchen suffered a large backlog again. Bernhard Kohl secured 40 points at this stage in the mountains classification, which brought him an unassailable lead in the standings in the lead and he therefore - a finish in Paris provided - it was clear the winner of the Mountain jersey.

Tasks

Sprints

Second intermediate sprint in Le Bourg d'Oisans ( 195 km ) ( 715 m above sea level. NN )

Sprint in L' Alpe d' Huez ( 210.5 km ) ( 1850 m above sea level. NN )

Climbs

Côte de Sainte -Marguerite, Category 3 ( 31 kilometers ) (. 1 185 m above sea level, 3.5 km à 6,0 %)

Col du Galibier, HC category ( 79 km ) ( 2645 m above sea level, . 21.9 km à 5,6 %)

Col de la Croix de Fer, HC category ( 156 km ) ( 2067 m above sea level, . 29.0 km à 5,2 %)

L' Huez, HC category ( km 210.5 ) (. 1,850 m above sea level, 13.8 km à 7,9 %)

Driver's field

Tour de France 2008

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