Stage Twenty-One: Sèvres to the Champs-Élysées, Paris
Well, here we are: the last day. The meandering, aimless, I-Don’t-Know-Where-We’re-Going wander though the French countryside that culminates in one of the most iconic race routes ever. Out of 198 riders, we have a mere 160 remaining. Up at the front, all the winning jerseys: Green, White, Polka Dot, and, of course, Yellow, are riding together, giving the cameras perfect photo ops as they chat and roll. This is like the last school day before summer vacation: no one’s really working, and everyone is chatting with the people they may or may not see again for a bit.
Unfortunately, it’s a grey, cold, rainy day. I’m hoping the rain lets up early enough to dry off the Champs-Élysées, because as beautiful and storied and iconic as it is, it’s small, flat, slick cobblestones, and while it’s dangerous for cycling at the best of times, it’s murderous in the rain. Race Officials may well call the race for the Yellow Jersey over before the riders get there. The sprint would likely happen, still, but it’s possible that would be called off, as well. I’ve seen that happen on other stages when the weather’s been hideous. People love a good fight, but no one loves carnage.
Ah! At long last, Chris Froome rides from the front of the peloton ahead a couple of yards to the red official’s car from which a large white flag flies. Within a moment, the sunroof opens, and Tour Director Christian Prudhomme pops up. The two men begin to chat about when and where the race will be called for Yellow, and it looks like they’ll do it when the racers cross the finish line for the first time (the last part of today’s stage is ten laps of the Champs-Élysées). That means Chris and the GC contenders can all take it comparatively easy, sitting back a bit and leaving the insanity for the sprinters. It’s the same thinking that created the rule that anyone crashing within the final three kilometers of a stage gets the same time as the group with which they were travelling: the end of a sprint stage can be utter madness, and whatever works to lessen that tension and get more people out of the way is a good thing.
Prudhomme has waved the flag long since, now, just after shaking hands with Froome and Peter Sagan, but the riders aren’t doing much, yet. They’re cruising through the forest, chatting, laughing, and being cheered by the enthusiastic spectators, wrapped, as the riders are, in rain jackets. There’s an incredibly touching human interest piece on AG2R rider Jean Christophe Perraud, who pressed on and is finishing the race despite leaving sizable amounts of skin and blood on the roads after horrible crashes. French President François Hollande said of him, “He won’t be first in Paris, but he’ll be first in our hearts.” It may be cold out, but it’s rather a heartwarming day.
It’s so chilly, in fact, that Chris Froome has stopped altogether to put the Yellow Jersey on over his rain jacket, since there’s no way anyone would cover it up. I’m sure he gave some spectators quite a thrill, stopping there in front of them. As he moved back up to the peloton from his team car— gloriously accompanied by the sound of church bells— we’re told that the rate of injuries per rider was actually lower this year than usual. While most years average 2.7 injuries per rider, this year, it was only 1.7. Gee. I think I won’t quit my day job.
Chris is back up with his teammates, now, and we see that all of the remaining Sky riders have big yellow stripes down the back of their jerseys, and big yellow armbands. And ahhhh! They all link arms and sit up, eight abreast, while the photographer right in front of them goes nuts. Ahhh, I was so hoping to see that! Poor Richie Porte tries taking both hands off the handlebars, but his bike is having none of it, and wobbles like a baby giraffe. Shortly thereafter, the entire team is back at the car— also newly decked out in a huge yellow stripe and yellow trim— for their plastic champagne flutes, toasting their manager and staff, and each other. I think champagne has to taste better with Parisian rainwater in it.
The riders swing up towards the very last climb of the Tour, a Cat 4 hill at the Meudone Observatory, and we’re treated to an utterly breathtaking montage of just a few of the staggering landscapes through which we’ve travelled these last three weeks. When I win the lottery, I’m going to go to France, find one of these pilots, and just say, “Pretend it’s a Tour day and fly me everywhere. Start with the castles.”
Today’s the day for photo montages, statistics, and human interest pieces. There is, of course, a bit on the heartbreaking story of Tony Martin, who missed Yellow by millimeters four days in a row, finally got it through sheer heart, only to lose it in a horrible crash the next day that snapped his collarbone right through his skin. I think he’s actually here, today, commentating for a German TV station. I hope he’s okay. He’s a young rider— he’ll be back.
We’re into the outskirts of Paris now, and Jens Voight, whose retirement accorded him the honour of leading the peloton onto the Champs-Élysées last year, is reminiscing. Does he miss the race? He says he was nostalgic the first morning, looking at all the bright, hopeful faces at the team meetings before the Grand Depart in Utrecht, and that lasted until the crashes started. He did his time, he says, and has no regrets. In other words, I think, he got out with all his limbs intact.
AH! They’re FINALLY in Paris proper, swinging past the Louvre, the ferris wheel, and onto the Champs-Élysées! And they cross the finish line for the first time, and the watches are stopped— Chris Froome has officially won the 2015 Tour de France!
I’m so thrilled. I love this day. I love it SO MUCH.
We have ten laps and 65km to go, though. The peloton is cruising, content to let Sky lead the way at a very gentle pace. The Women’s race was this morning, and it was just crash after crash. The men know this— they were watching from their tour buses, and no one is in a hurry to repeat that, even though the rain has stopped.
But before long, the peloton has stretched out into a long, thick snake as some of the riders are trying to kickstart the actual race part of our show. Soon enough, Sylvain Chavanel— a great rider whose name I haven’t heard at all this year— has taken off, getting a twelve-second lead on the race. It’s not surprising in the least that a French rider is determined to step things up a little. It takes a while, but there are finally some battles and breakaways starting behind him.
Hold on— Ivan Basso is back today? Jesus Christ. That’s two men who had to leave the Tour and have immediate surgery, and they’re both back to commentate. What the hell are these guys made of? They make steel look like scrambled eggs.
The sun is slowly starting to wake up (though it’s still very grey), and so are the sprinters. I see Andre Greipel at the front with the rest of Lotto, and Peter Sagan is methodically chucking all the extra ballast he was carrying: his rain jacket, for one, which will make some spectator an incredible souvenir.
Sylvain Chavanel has faded, and we now have three men off the front: Nelson Oliveira (Lampre-Merida), Florian Vachon (Bretagne-Séché) and Kenneth van Bilsen (Cofidis), with four laps left. They had a space of 28 seconds at one point, but it’s down to 19 now. Around and around the Arc du Triomphe we go. The Chamos is dry, now, amazingly. Turns out the last time there was an actual wet finish was 1977. Huh. And now we know.
Two laps left, and I’m still pulling for Mark Cavendish. But I hadn’t realised that he’s lost his best leadout man, Mark Renshaw. Renshaw abandoned in the eighteenth stage with an horrific migraine. UGH. Fav is so far down the GC he can’t even see the top, but that’s no matter. In his early days, he’d come to the Tour, win all the first week’s sprint stages, and abandon once the race got to the mountains, because he’s a phenomenal sprinter and a terrible climber. (Like most sprinters.) But the last few years, he’s made it through the mountains, and I couldn’t be prouder or more amazed. I want him to win.
Oh, FFS. Froome has to pull over. There’s a bloody plastic bag stuck in his back gears. His teammates have tried to yank it off, but it’s not coming. So his team car meets him by the side of the street, and hand him a new bike. Bright yellow, of course!
The front riders are up to four, now, having been joined by Astana’s Andriy Grivko. And amazingly, the sun is out. Joan of Arc is shining in her new gold leaf as the riders come around Norwegian Corner (so named because that’s where all the Norwegian fans gather, draping themselves and the barriers in flags).
The giant hand bell is ceremonially rung as the riders begin the final lap. French Air Force jets fly over the Champs-Élysées, streaming the colours of France, and I burst into tears. This is magic.
They’re off in earnest, now, for the sprint. Sky surrounds Chris near the back, insulating him so he can party like a rock star in just a few minutes, finally off the bike.
Lotto has lost peloton control in the front to Orica GreenEdge, but it goes back and forth many times. Cav is tucked into the pack right next to Peter Sagan. There’s no leadout train yet, no organisation. Down into the tunnel they go, one last time between Joan and the Norwegians, and oh, man— under the red kite and OH NO! There are three riders down— one of them is lying in the road not moving!
But the race doesn’t stop!
Alexander Kristoff of Katusha is going! Greipel is behind him, then takes off with Europcar's Bryan Coquard beside him— where is Cav!? No! there’s no time! IT’S GREIPEL! Andre Greipel of Lotto has won another sprint— the grandest of them all!
And there, seconds later, all alone, is Team Sky, arm in arm again, eight abreast, crossing the final finish line in the brilliant sun: the 2015 Tour de France is over.
It doesn’t take long to set up the giant, open-backed stage for the final jersey and trophy presentations. Andre Greipel gets the stage winner’s commendations, then it’s Peter Sagan getting his Green Jersey for the overall win. Then Nairo Quintana comes out to get his grand White Jersey, and it’s impossible not to say something about the fact that this guy is TINY. there are huge Colombian flags waving from the crowd, and they’re bigger than he is.
Most Aggressive rider goes to Roman Bardet, who honest to G-d looks like he’s twelve. And he’s really not that much older— we’ll be hearing so much from him in the future.
Movistar is backstage, all of them holding the huge bouquets given them as winners of the Best Team competition. Their faces show so much joy. And, I’m sure, relief. They head up to the stage, accompanied by their manager, all holding their flowers, and each one with a trophy of a rider’s number 1 on a yellow background. The podium girl is holding a stuffed cow, and I want to know who gets THAT.
And there, finally, is Chris Froome, up on the podium collecting his final Yellow Jersey and stuffed lion and the gorgeous, enormous, cobalt-blue Sèvres footed bowl, then turning and waving to the crowds up and down the Champs, grinning hugely. This is his second Tour de France win. I doubt it’ll be his last.
And so that’s it. We’re all done. The riders get to go home, now, and sleep, and eat what they want, and drink what they want, and sleep with whomever they want as opposed to being crammed into hotels and buses and pelotons with their teammates for three weeks. No more cameras on motorcycles, no more screaming crowds, no more guys in clown suits running up the road beside them.
Until the next race.
Team Sky’s Chris Froome (yellow jersey) crosses the finish line with team-mates to claim his second Tour de France. Photograph: Mike Egerton/PA, via The Guardian
