Navardauskas Wins Rain-Soaked Stage 19!

Lithuanian Ramūnas Navardauskas led the field the entire way through the rain-soaked finish in Bergerac.  He held off a ferocious sprint in the final kilometer to take the stage by seven seconds.  I grabbed the image below as Navardauskas crossed the finish line (click on the image for a larger view).

Though it rained for much of the stage, speeds were not affected much.  As cyclists neared Bergerac, they were navigating some fairly narrow roads at speeds reported to be as high as 64 kph (40 mph).  That's pretty fast on wet roads!  Earlier in the race, there were crosswinds and tailwinds reaching 25 kph (16 mph).  Winds and rain thus canceled each other a bit in this stage.  Below is a comparison between our prediction and Navardauskas's winning time.

• Stage 19:  4h 43' 41" (actual), 4h 46' 18" (prediction), 02' 37" slow (0.92% error)

That makes five stages for us with an error under 1%.  Navardauskas's average speed is given below.

• Stage 19:  12.25 m/s (44.10 kph or 27.40 mph)

Given all the rain and wind, that's a great average speed!  Navardauskas was lucky to have missed a crash that happened just inside the magic 3-km (1.9-mi) mark.  The image below shows the crash (click on the image for a larger view).

Because the crash happened inside 3 km, riders did not lose much time, even if they could no longer compete for the stage win.

Tomorrow's Stage 20 picks up in Bergerac.  The stage is the only time trial in this year's Tour de France.  Moving north by northeast, the individual time trial finishes 54 km (33.6 mi) away in the commune of Périgueux.  Our prediction is given below.

• Stage 20:  1h 07' 55" (prediction)

We hope to see dry roads and fast cyclists!