Voeckler to wear a yellow jersey for the tenth day and repeat his 2004 performance
French cyclist and leader in this year’s Tour de France Thomas Voeckler did not hesitate at any point as he nearly ended up in an injury on the Pra Martino Descent at the end of stage 17.
Voeckler is in the yellow jersey for nine days and has a great chance of equalling his own record of 2004 Tour de France when he wears it for ten days.
“I’m taking it day by day. What is sure is that I’m not going to keep it for 10 days.” he said after stage 9.
Since, the stage 9 Voeckler has been riding his luck, but his bigger challenge are the mountain stages towards the end of the Tour as he does not considers himself amongst the best climbers as he said, “I know that I cannot gain time on the race favourites
uphill, so I absolutely wanted to ride downhill at the front.”
Voeckler, who is a serious contender of this year’s Tour de France, was clearly trying too hard at stage 17 to maintain his lead as he was seen over pushing himself to control Contador and Sanchez.
He realised the fact that he should have followed Cadel Evans, instead of Alberto Contador and Samuel Sanchez.
Voeckler also admitted that he never attended the training camps, but now as he is leading the Tour and is a strong contender, he has to change his mind.
He gave his best shot and managed to maintain an advantage of 1:18 on Evans and 3:15 over Contador as he said, “Technically I went above my capabilities. I could have lost much more today but its part of my composition to try. I’ve lost a bit of time but
I could have lost a collarbone.”
Frenchman made a bold attack at stage 9 that took him to the top and was really lucky to survive the drama as a result of a huge pile up of cyclists that ended the Tour for many cyclists and hasn't looked back since then.
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