Tour de France 2012: Rest day review (July 17)

By Nigel Wynn

17-Jul-2012 | 1 comment

After two weeks' of racing in the 2012 Tour de France, the riders are spending a rest day in Pau ahead of a decisive final five days in the Pyrenees and on the road to Paris for Sunday's finale.

Thus far, the race could not have collectively gone better for British riders, with four stage wins from four different riders and Brits Bradley Wiggins (Sky) and Chris Froome (Sky) sat in first and second in the overall classification.

The home nation has also fared well, with four stage wins from four riders to match the performance of the British contingent. The same cannot be said for traditionally strong cycling nations Spain, Italy and Belgium. Spain has only one stage win so far; Italy and Belgium have none.

Wiggins has already set the record for the most days spent in the yellow jersey for a British rider in one edition of the Tour de France - can he go one better and become the first Briton to win the Tour de France overall?

With a two minute and five second advantage over team-mate Froome and a 2'23" and 3'19" advantage over rivals Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas-Cannondale) and defending champion Cadel Evans (BMC Racing), something will have to go horribly wrong for Wiggins to lose his lead, or fail to make a historic appearance on the podium in Paris. But it's the Tour, and anything could happen...

It's been an eventful race so far, with multiple crashes once again forcing riders to abandon the race. At this point in the race last year - which itself was marred by crashes - there were 170 riders still in the race. This year, there are 156: 42 riders have been lost at the wayside through injury, illness and fatigue.

Aero helmets, Peter Sagan's victory celebrations, Froome's 'attack' on Wiggins, Remy Di Gregorio's arrest, tacks on the road, sprinters' teams unwillingness to work - there's been plenty to keep fans talking during the race so far.

Here we cast an eye back over the stats, winners and losers of the 2012 Tour de France so far.

Tour de France 2012: The race so far
Stages completed: 16
Stages to go: 5
Kilometres completed: 2757.9km
Kilometres to go: 736.5km

Tour de France 2012: Current classification leaders (after stage 15)
Overall (yellow jersey): Bradley Wiggins (Great Britain) Sky
Points (green jersey): Peter Sagan (Slovakia) Liquigas-Cannondale
KoM (polka dot jersey): Fredrik Kessiakoff (Sweden) Astana
Young rider (white jersey): Tejay Van Garderen (USA) BMC Racing

Tour de France 2012: Yellow jerseys awarded
Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland) RadioShack-Nissan: 7
Bradley Wiggins (Great Britain) Sky: 8

Tour de France 2012: Stage wins by team
Liquigas-Cannondale: 3
Lotto-Belisol: 3
Sky: 3
Europcar: 2
FDJ-BigMat: 2
RadioShack-Nissan: 1
Garmin-Sharp: 1
Rabobank: 1
Teams with no wins so far: 14 (out of 22)

Tour de France 2012: Stage wins by nation
France: 4
Great Britain: 4
Germany: 3
Slovakia: 3
Spain: 1
Switzerland: 1

Tour de France 2012: Withdrawals
Riders left in race: 156
Riders withdrawn: 42
Teams with least amount of riders left in race: Rabobank and Vacansoleil-DCM (four)
Teams with no abandons: BMC Racing, Liquigas-Cannondale, Lotto-Belisol, Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank
Tour de France 2012 start list with note of withdrawals>>

Tour de France 2012: Overall top ten after stage 15
1. Bradley Wiggins (GBr) Sky in 59-32-32
2. Christopher Froome (GBr) Sky at 2-05
3. Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale at 2-23
4. Cadel Evans (Aus) BMC Racing at 3-19
5. Jurgen Van Den Broeck (Bel) Lotto-Belisol at 4-48
6. Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) Radioshack-Nissan at 6-15
7. Tejay Van Garderen (USA) BMC Racing at 6-57
8. Janez Brajkovic (Slo) Astana at 7-30
9. Pierre Rolland (Fra) Europcar at 8-31
10. Thibaut Pinot (Fra) FDJ-BigMat at 8-51
....
Lanterne rouge
156. Tyler Farrar (USA) Garmin-Sharp at 2-47-29

Prologue
Date: Saturday, June 30
Start: Liège
Finish: Liège
Length: 6.4km
Type: Flat, individual time trial

Top three
1. Fabian Cancellara (Swi) RadioShack-Nissan in 7-13
2. Bradley Wiggins (GBr) Sky at 7 secs
3. Sylvain Chavanel (Fra) Omega Pharma-QuickStep at 7 secs

Race leader
Fabian Cancellara (Swi) RadioShack-Nissan

Tour de France 2012: Rest day review (July 17)

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Woody

July 17 13:42

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