The whirlwind Tour de France of the Orica-GreenEDGE team continued with Simon Gerrans surrendering his yellow leader's jersey to South Africa teammate Daryl Impey on Thursday's sixth stage in a perfectly executed plan that the Australian proposed the afternoon before.
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Gerrans, who won stage 3 to Calvi last Monday and took the Tour lead on Tuesday when the Australian Orica-GreenEDGE team won the stage 4 team time trial in Nice, approached team head sports director Matt White with the idea after he defended the yellow jersey on stage 5 to Marseille.
Gerrans and Impey were placed first and second overall before Thursday's 176.5km sixth stage from Aix-en-Provence to Montpellier but on the same time. For Impey to take the race lead, there were two options. He had to finish ahead of Gerrans on time in the stage; or if they remained tied by the clock, finish eight places ahead of Gerrans on a count back score of accumulated stage placings which had Gerrans on 48 and Impey on 55.
In the end, Impey took over the Tour lead on time as he finished 13th on the stage and in a lead group of 16 riders that formed with about 500m to go when the peloton split; whereas Gerrans, who sat up as the split occurred, crossed the line in the next group of 108 riders in 48th place at 5secs.
Gerrans' role was huge and it began earlier when he revealed his intent by leading the Orica-GreenEDGE train to set up Australian sprinter Matt Goss who Impey was to provide the final lead out to, but profit from by gaining the places or time needed for the overall lead.
The stage was won by German Andre Greipel (Lotto-Belisol) in a sprint from Slovakian Peter Sagan (Cannondale), German Marcel Kittel (Argos-Shimano) and British champion Mark Cavendish (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) whose fourth place came despite crashing with 32km to go.
Impey, 28 and born in Johannesburg, is the first African to wear the Tour's yellow jersey. While it is a dream come true for him, it is one that he sensed could become real after Orica-GreenEDGE won the team time trial to leave him, Gerrans and Swiss teammate Michael Albasini on equal time overall.
Impey, a professional since 2008 who rode on four teams before joining Orica-GreenEDGE as a foundation recruit in a career that ha shad plenty of ups and downs, did not hid his emotion as the enormity of his achievement set in after the stage that was raced in steamy, hot, and windy conditions.
Until now, the greatest achievement by an South African in the Tour was the 2007 stage win by Robbie Hunter in - of all places - Montpellier.
"Sometimes all the stars line up. This is one of those moments. This is a career-changing movement - to wear this in the [100th Tour], to be the first South African, it's just magic ...," Impey said. "It's history made. It's one of South Africa's proudest moments. To wear the yellow jersey now will change a lot for me and it will put South African cycling on the map again. It's been Robbie Hunter who has been carrying the flag ...
"To be able to say I've even worn the yellow jersey is something I will treasure forever. Very few get to see the 'maillot jaune' [yellow jersey] leading out. Thanks to Simon for being a great champion and to pass it on to someone else."
The goal for Impey and Orica-GreenEDGE is to defend the race lead in Friday's seventh stage, a 176km hilly from Montpellier to Albi in the Tarn.
Achieving that will be hard, but it is within reach. Impey has an overall lead of 3secs on Norway's Edvald Boasson Hagen (Sky) who is in second place and 5secs on Orica-GreenEDGE teammates, Gerrans and Albasini who are third and fourth respectively. In fourth and fifth places are Poland's Michal Kwiatkowski (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) at 6secs and Frenchman Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) who is at the same time.
From the overall favourites, Briton Chris Froome (Sky) is 7th at 8secs at the same time as Australian teammate Richie Porte, Spain's Alberto Contador (Saxo-Tinkoff) is 11th at 14secs, Australian Cadel Evans (BMC) is 23rd at 31secs, and American Tejay van Garderen (BMC) is 25th at the same time.
White, meanwhile, revealed that it was Gerrans who approached him with the idea and the tactics of getting Impey into the Tour leadership.
"It was Simon's idea. For him it is two days in the yellow jersey or three days in the yellow jersey, but for Daryl Impey it is going to change his life," White said. "They are good mates and that is the tight knit team they are. Simon just asked me if it was, 'Okay, if I give the jersey to Daryl tomorrow?'
"I said was not at all. [Such a plan] can [be risky]. But we always knew it would be a tricky finale. When you looked at the [race] book, the last eight kilometres were pretty sketchy, but the main thing was that Daryl didn't miss the split and a couple of [challengers for the lead] weren't up the front."
White denied Impey was gifted the yellow jersey, saying: "People who would say that have probably never done a bunch sprint in the Tour de France before. It's very hard to be in that position. If you look at the positions Daryl has finished in every day ... it's not easy to hold your position in the top 10 in those hectic sprints. He wasn't gifted the yellow jersey. He had to earn it. To earn it, you have to have the balls to stay up there and in a hectic final."
- Twitter: @rupertguinness
