Tour de France 2023: Cofidis toast another win as Ion Izagirre takes Stage 12 on frantic day
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Updated 13/07/2023 at 19:04 GMT
Cofidis had waited 15 long years for a win at the Tour de France until Victor Lafay landed a surprise win in the Basque Country – now, a little over a week later, they are celebrating a second. Ion Izagirre got in the breakaway and timed his move to perfection to solo clear to his second win at the Tour, seven years after his first. In the GC, Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar finished together.
Stage 12 highlights: Attacks galore with Izagirre last man standing
Just like the proverbial London buses – you wait an eternity for one, then two come in quick succession. So it has proved for Cofidis in this year’s Tour de France – the French team now swooping two stage wins in two weeks, having previously experienced a drought stretching back 15 years.
Spanish veteran Ion Izagirre delivered Cofidis their latest triumph after attacking from a breakaway on the fifth and final climb in a beautifully anarchic Stage 12 through the rolling hills of the Beaujolais wine region.
Eleven days after team-mate Victor Lafay won in San Sebastian, and 15 years after another Frenchman, Sylvain Chavanel, won in the 2008 Tour in a stage that also started in Roanne, Izagirre proved the strongest of a 15-man move that also included his French team-mate Guillaume Martin.
After an unrelentingly fast and furious opening half to the 168km stage, the day’s breakaway eventually came together until shortly before the intermediate sprint – with wave after wave of attacks turning the race on its head and forcing yellow jersey rivals Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) and Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) to ride aggressively from the outset to put out fires their team-mates could not.
When a select breakaway finally came together with around 75km remaining, Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) made the first decisive move with an attack on the penultimate climb with Costa Rica’s Andrey Amador (EF Education-EasyPost).
Once Amador faded, Van der Poel pushed on but was joined on the final climb by a chase group that included Cofidis duo Izagirre and Martin, the American Matteo Jorgenson (Movistar), Belgium’s Tiesj Benoot (Jumbo-Visma), Norway’s Tobias Johannessen (Uno-X) and Frenchmen Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ).
On the day before Bastille Day, veteran climber Pinot gave the home crowds reason to believe – and was rewarded for his enterprise by rising to tenth place in the general classification ahead of the Alps. But even the experienced Pinot had no answer when Izagirre struck out halfway up the Col de la Croix Rosier with 32km remaining.
If the Spaniard’s move initially looked like a softener for team-mate Martin, his 20-second gap going over the summit gave the 34-year-old good reason to believe in a second Tour de France stage win seven years after his only previous success in Morzine.
With Martin closing down moves from the chase group and sitting on wheels when necessary, Izagirre extended his lead with some daredevil descending on the ride into Belleville-en-Beaujolais.
Jorgenson – who came so close to glory on the Puy de Dome on Sunday – led the chase with Burgaudeau, but the duo had too much to do and left it too late. When Burgaudeau pipped Jorgenson for second, an emotional Izagirre was already celebrating with ecstatic Cofidis manager Cedric Vasseur, whose reign at the helm of the French team is now beginning to reap solid rewards.
The main field came home over four minutes down with Pogacar and Vingegaard pushing it right to the very end, the Tour’s “Big Two” going shoulder to shoulder in the sprint – just as they had for the majority of the frantic 168km since Christian Prudhomme waved the flag less than four hours and 3,000m of climbing earlier.
“Utterly chaotic,” said Robbie McEwen. “Out of control,” opined Jens Voigt. “Breathless since the start,” commentator Rob Hatch said that Stage 12 “packed more punch” than any other he could remember in recent memory.
The tone was set from the outset with Denmark’s Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) zipping clear from the gun – the first of an entire Napoleonic War’s worth of attacks that peppered the first half of the 168km stage through the Rhone wine region in central France.
The Jumbo-Visma team of yellow jersey Vingegaard was particularly active – with Wout van Aert, Wilco Kelderman and Benoot all enjoying early sustained forays off the front, stringing out the fractured peloton behind on countless occasions, but not enough for the elastic to snap.
An early split caught out both the Yates brothers, Simon and Adam, and forced a cluster of GC riders to fight back into contention while Vingegaard and Pogacar traded blows near the front.
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When the day’s breakaway finally went after two hours of ferocious racing, such had been the fallout that the yellow jersey “peloton” only included around a dozen riders – practically the same number as the move which had finally gone up the road.
“I can’t understand the method to their madness,” McEwan said of Jumbo-Visma’s tactics, which he described as “absolutely bonkers,” adding: “We love it, but it makes zero sense.”
As things started to settle, McEwan was still trying to find some sense what he was seeing. “I’m getting the impression I’m watching the junior Tour de France with the way they are jumping around like madmen.”
At this point, the current madman was Pinot, who darted clear of the yellow jersey group to bridge over to the leaders and make it a baker’s dozen clear – soon to be joined by compatriot Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep) and Belgium’s Jasper Stuyven (Lidl-Trek).
In this move could be also found Dylan Teuns (Israel-PremierTech), Victor Campenaerts (Lotto Dstny) and Ruben Guerreiro (Movistar), as well as Benoot, Amador, Pedersen, Van der Poel, Martin, Izagirre, Jorgenson, Johannessen and Burgaudeau.
The move combined well together to exploit a ceasefire behind and stretch out a lead of three minutes before, bizarrely, the French team AG2R-Citroen came to the front to lead the chase – a role they carried out until deep into the stage when Ineos Grenadiers took over.
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Van der Poel’s move could have been decisive had the Dutchmen not been coming back from a slight illness that has laid him low for two days. It was Pinot who combined with Jorgenson to reel in Van der Poel on the penultimate climb – but the duo dragged the other chasers back into contention in doing so, most notably the Cofidis pair of Izagirre and Martin.
Izagirre then responded to a move from Pinot to blast clear on the final climb, the Basque climber never looking back as he completed the latest Cofidis coup in this intriguing Tour de France.
While the second half of the stage did not pack as many punches as the opening two hours, Vingegaard’s Jumbo-Visma team may regret being so aggressive on Friday when they will defend the Dane’s slender 17 seconds lead over Pogacar in the Jura mountains.
A short but sharp 138km Stage 13 on Bastille Day will be decided with a summit showdown on the majestic Grand Colombier climb where the ultimate destination of the maillot jaune may become more evident.
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