Four days after falling 90 metres short of a stage win, it was another case of close but not close enough for Lennard Kämna.
He crossed the line in tenth, 22 seconds behind the stage winner but with a handy lead on the main pack. After the agony of Planche des Belles Filles, Kämna had his eye on a stage victory in Megève, trying repeatedly and fruitlessly to drag himself back into a splintering race. The setting was familiar – at the 2020 Critérium du Dauphiné he’d snuck free from a breakaway on these same roads, punching clear and then punching the sky.
After a day in the break, the German rider is left short by 11 seconds.
In the end that made the difference. That Jumbo started to ride in the end, well, we didn’t really think they would do that. It is of course disappointing now to realize I almost got it and finally got nothing in hands for the second time.” He crossed the line sufficiently close in time to Kämna to hold on by 11 seconds. “I just wanted to go for the stage today but that really wasn’t easy. The Bora-Hansgrohe rider infiltrated a 25-man breakaway which moved clear shortly after 50 kilometers of racing, and gained sufficient advantage for him to became race leader on the road.
There are times when the Tour de France seems more like a homely bike race than a global sporting event. Consider how it was for Lennard Kämna standing all ...
Back in the peloton, about three kilometres from the finish, the race leader Tadej Pogacar rolled along in the slipstream of his team-mate Marc Soler. At the front There was a good chance he was about to become the leader of the Tour, and a good chance he wouldn’t. Kämna’s fate was in the legs of others.
'I can't remember the last time a German was so close to yellow after 10 stages' says team manager Denk.
And even if Kämna could not quite take yellow, his gutsy ride on stage 10 and near-miss on GC will still surely count as a high point for Bora-Hansgrohe in this year's Tour, too. "And it's already worked quite well. Fast forward 16 years and even if Kämna couldn't repeat his 2020 Critérium du Dauphiné stage victory on the same summit finish of Megève airfield, as Denk points out "the tactics become easier now.
It was again a case of Lennard Kämna (BORA-hansgrohe) being denied by Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) this time in the fight for the yellow jersey.
Kämna felt that he was marked out of a chance to win the stage after everyone had seen his strength on Stage 7. It appeared to be a pace that would allow Kämna to move into yellow, but not by a significant margin with some tough days in the mountains to come. I guess it would have been nice for him."