On the long climb to Thyon 2000, David Gaudu and his teammates got a taste of the next Giro this Saturday. In the queen stage of the Tour de Romandie, featuring three major climbs, the French rider was able to test himself and ultimately secured 32nd place after completing the final climb at his own pace. On Sunday, the Swiss race will conclude with a time trial in Geneva, where Stefan Küng and Rémi Cavagna will have some ambitions.
The Tour de Romandie’s “main course” was expected this Saturday. A proper mountain stage was laying ahead of the riders heading towards the Thyon 2000 resort. Despite a relatively short distance of 118 kilometres, they indeed had to cover 4,000 meters of elevation gain across five categorized climbs, including three first-category ascents. One of these climbs actually launched the stage for the peloton, towards Anzère (14.5 km at 7%), where the day’s breakaway developed around three men. However, the bunch never really eased off and maintained a maximum gap of two minutes. On the second major climb of the day, towards Nax (11.5 km at 7%), the selection began to take place and the peloton was reduced by half before descending to Sion and tackling the long, final climb of Thyon 2000 (20 km at 7.7%). Still represented by five riders at the bottom, the Groupama-FDJ cycling team was however unable to compete when the pace picked up significantly after a few kilometers of climbing.
“David wanted to do the climb at his own pace”, Stéphane Goubert
David Gaudu and then Rémy Rochas were both dropped, and the climber from Brittany eventually crossed the line in thirty-second position, while Lenny Martinez secured the day’s victory. “It was really a big mountain stage,” emphasized Stéphane Goubert. “Rémy did everything he could. As for David, he tested himself for a bit with the best, then worked for the Giro. He wanted to get close to his limit, then take a deep breath and do the climb at his own pace, which he managed to do. He was able to get his second wind, and that’s positive going forwards. It was a hard day, but a good test for those heading to the Giro”. Now out of the battle for the Tour de Romandie’s general classification, the French team will however have real ambitions tomorrow on the seventeen-kilometre time trial around Geneva. “Stefan and Rémi managed the last climb in anticipation of tomorrow, and we will now be fully focused on that,” concluded Stéphane.
