Greig Leach

Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-Quick Step) seems to be having a love/hate relationship with his bike, or perhaps it is the mechanics that are in a toxic relationship with his machine. He is in the break about ot start the climb up the Col de Porte and appears to be unable to shift out of his big chain ring. Earlier it looked like he was having cleat issues, but instead he was struggling just a bit to re-cleat after having kicked his front derailleur with his heel to get it to shift. The Mavic Neutral Service came up to him, but it was more of a job for his own team car, and team mechanic. I had to step away from the live broadcast for a bit, (and am writing this as I wait for the replay of the stage) so I don't know what the final diagosis from the mechanic was. But it must be said that these guys have an amazingly high pressure job to fix anything while a rider and the car are moving along at 25 miles an hour. That is a recipe to lose some fingers at the very least.