This year’s Tour de France was the most successful yet for the Cannondale-Drapac team which saw them win a stage through Rigoberto Uran who also finished second overall.

In addition, there were numerous other highlights for the American team. On stage two, Taylor Phinney nearly held off the peloton in the finale. Caught in the final kilometre following five hours up the road, he came away with the polka dot jersey.

Nate Brown got in the breakaway the next day and scored enough mountain points to keep the polka dot jersey within the team. Dylan van Baarle spent several days in the first week on the escape. He earned most aggressive on stage seven, sporting the award’s distinctive red numbers on stage eight.

Uran won stage nine of the Tour de France, jumping up to fourth overall and announcing himself as a general classification contender. And suddenly the target shifted shape. Cannondale-Drapac spent the final two weeks of the Tour de France largely at the service of their leader – a leader who went on to finish second overall, the best general classification result in Slipstream Sports Tour history.

Photo: NV/PN/Cor Vos © 2017

“Finishing second to Froome at less than a minute seems pretty good to me,” Uran said afterwards. “It’s a quality final podium in Paris, so this is the greatest success of my career. This result is dedicated to my family, friends, my team and everyone who has supported me during the last three weeks.”

“We knew it would be difficult to win the Tour but not impossible, so we gave it everything. It’s been a great Tour.”

13 COMMENTS

    • Seems you hadn’t heard of him before, but long story short: he’s been twice runner up for Giro d’Italia, and after that he had 3 years with “poor” results. Cannondale sent him for chasing a stage, he prepared well aiming for a top-10 but they nor he even expected he would be on podium.

      So no, he didn’t “lost” anything.

    • so you are denying him his own sense of satisfaction and acheivement? seems a bit odd. i’m not sure he’ll see your comments. maybe his agent or his team can pass them on for you. really hammer it home to him.

    • so you are denying him his own sense of satisfaction and acheivement? seems a bit odd. i’m not sure he’ll see your comments. maybe his agent or his team can pass them on for you. really hammer it home to him.

  1. Pity though he never attacked or put Froome under pressure. Dan and Aru attacked Froome while Uran followed wheels all the Tour, followed the right wheels but never threatened.
    Fair play to him but maybe next time he’ll have the courage of Dan or Aru to attack.

    • His team were under pressure for survival for next year, a podium would be massive in securing their future. I think their safety first plan was justified. Neither team or rider could have imagined it before hand so they weren’t going to risk it.

  2. If Richie Porte hadn’t crashed he would of come close. Same with Dan Martin, teams needs to build for GC if they want to win. Also not do the giro as of deep muscle fatigue. Where was Quintana n Pinot???

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