Stage 20: Sunday, July 25 – Longjumeau to Paris Champs-Elysées (102.5km)

It’s the final stage of what has been a thrilling Tour. As per convention, the overall yellow jersey winner Alberto Contador (Astana) will not be challenged today. But the green jersey points competition has yet to be decided, with veteran Italian Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre) leading, and the world’s fastest sprinter Mark Cavendish (HTC-Columbia) still within reach.

Another feature of every stage into Paris is a certain amount of show-boating. The winning team will sometimes drink champagne as they ride along. Teams who have had an underwhelming Tour will sometimes launch a break once the stage enters Paris. Riders nearing the end of their contract will try to get some TV time, before the transfer season starts at the end of August.

Similarly, today’s stage started somewhat farcically. Lance Armstong’s Radio Shack team turned up at the start line wearing a completely different kit than normal – all black, with a huge ‘28′ on the back, to publicise the world’s 28 million cancer sufferers, as part of Armstrong’s Livestrong campaign. The race officials are rather strict about this type of thing, and insisted that the team switch to their standard, approved kit. Radio Shack clearly knew this would happen, as their team car magically produced officially-sanctioned jerseys. The team stopped, changed their jerseys, re-attached their race numbers, and were on their way. This resulted in the peloton waiting a full 15 minutes for Lance and his boys.

Adding to the sense of the ridiculous, Andy Schleck appeared to suffer another chain-related mechanical problem – recalling the ‘Chaingate’ incident up in the Pyrenees. The second-placed man’s team car were quickly on hand to swap out his bike.

The field pootled at a very sedate pace through the environs of Paris, finally stepping up the pace as they neared the city limits. This year, the route took the classic route – across the bridge from Issy-les-Moulineaux to Boulogne-Billancourt, then taking the right-turn onto the quayside expressway on the right bank (i.e. north side) of the Seine. Up ahead, the Tour Eiffel would loom large across the river. Then, a gentle left-turn onto the Place de la Concorde, around through the Louvre underpass, left at the statue of Joan of Arc onto the rue de Rivoli, then across the Concorde again, and on to the Avenue des Champs-Elysées, with the Arc de Triomphe in the distance. 8 frantic laps of the Parisien circuit would follow.

An 11-man break rolled off the front, looking for glory. But amongst them was Cavendish’s team-mate Tony Martin, who would obviously do no work whatsoever to assist the break. Petacchi was happy for this group to go off, as they effectively neutralised all the bonus intermediate sprint points. The green jersey winner would therefore be decided on the Champs-Elysées finish line.

The group were allowed to take an advantage of nearly 30 seconds, before the main field started closing things down. But the capture wasn’t simple or quick, with just scant seconds being knocked off the break’s advantage. Eventually, in-fighting and disorganisation doomed the break, which split in two and ultimately lost its impetus. The main field finally overhalued the echappée with one lap of the Paris circuit remaining.

With the peloton back together, HTC-Columbia put in some serious pace-making, as did the other sprinters’ teams. Lampre joined the fray, hoping to launch Petacchi. Sky took a lot of interest, hoping to provide a platform for Edvald Boassen Hagen. Garmin-Transitions were also present, looking to lead out the big Kiwi sprinter Julian Deane.

The final passage of the rue de Rivoli was as tense as expected. Cavendish hooked on to the wheel of the returning Tony Martin who took up the long-range leadout. The sheer speed strung the leaders out as they rounded the right-hand bend onto the Champs Elysées, with the finishing line just 400m away. Hushovd was being led out well, but Petacchi broke left with a burst of speed. At that exact moment, Cavendish broke right, fired the warp drives, and blew the doors off everyone. The Manxman flew over the line several bike-lengths clear of Petacchi, for his fifth stage win of this Tour, and his fifteenth in just 4 Tours. Julian Deane came in third.

All the overall contenders rolled in safely amongst the exhausted peloton. Alberto Contador (Astana) won his third Tour in the last three times of his competing. King of the Mountains had already been awarded to Anthony Charteau (Bbox Bouygues Telecom). Petacchi was confirmed as the winner of the green jersey points competition, by dint of his 2nd place finish today.

Final standings for the 2010 Tour de France:

Overall GC WINNER – Alberto Contador (Astana) – 91 hrs 58 mins 48 seconds
2nd: Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) – 39 seconds
3rd: Denis Menchov (Rabobank) – 2 minutes 01 second

Points WINNER – Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre) – 243 points
2nd: Mark Cavendish (HTC-Columbia) – 232 points
3rd: Thor Hushovd (Cervelo) – 222 points

King of the Mountains WINNER – Anthony Charteau (Bbox Bouygues Telecom) – 143 points
2nd: Christophe Moreau (Caisse d’Epargne) – 128 points
3rd: Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) – 116 points

Young Rider WINNER – Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank) – 91 hours 51 minutes 27 seconds
2nd: Robert Gesink (Rabobank) – 8 minutes 52 seconds
3rd: Roman Kreuziger (Liquigas) – 11 minutes 15 seconds

Overall team prize was taken by Radio Shack, with Caisse d’Epargne 2nd, and Rabobank 3rd.

So, the exceptional 2010 Tour de France is over, with a brilliant final flourish from Mark Cavendish. I’ll make a final posting in the next day or so, wrapping things up.