The penultimate stage in Paris-Nice, the final mass romp in the mountains ahead of an uphill time trial tomorrow, proved to wreak more havoc than anticipated as rain and cold assaulted the peloton. An early 31-man move in the 181.5-kilometer stage six created a dangerous situation forcing Etixx-Quick Step and Team Sky to maintain control from behind.

Their pace whittled down the peloton as victims spit out the back, struggling with the freezing weather over leg-searing climbs. Today turned into a race of subsistence for most. Bob Jungels leads the escape group.

With nothing to lose, and to redeem a poor start earlier in the week, Bob Jungels jumped into the large breakaway group; it was a good move but the freezing rain changed the game plan for the Luxembourger, who nonetheless was encouraged with better sensations today.

Jungels explained what happened to the Trek website:

“In the beginning everything went how we wanted with Gert [Steegmans] and myself in the breakaway group. When a lot of riders wanted to jump, Gert set the pace really high until Col de Vence. There I pulled really hard because [Sylvain] Chavanel was coming from behind and with him in the group the peloton would chase harder from behind.

“I think I made the race tougher there, which was not bad, but in the end, yeah, when it started raining I started to freeze. When I was dropped I couldn’t feel my body anymore.  I was getting hungry, too, but when you are that cold you cannot move and it takes too much time to eat something. I saw a lot of guys get the hunger flat today.  I am satisfied with the performance; compared to the beginning of the week my level was much better today.”

While the peloton was quickly trimmed behind, ahead the large breakaway group also shattered leaving nine men in the lead. Bob Jungels, suffering from the cold and hunger knock, was soon rolled over by a fast-charging yellow jersey group containing most, but not all, of the GC rivals.

While many overall favorites suffered under the miserable conditions, Tony Gallopin (Lotto Soudal) grabbed the opportunity and rode to an impressive solo win, wrenching the yellow jersey from Michal Kwiatkowski (Etixx- Quick Step) in the process and setting up a possible upset in the final stage tomorrow.

Riccardo Zoidl also grappled in the cold, wet climate that mixed with punishing climbs and gnarly descents, and had one of his worst days on the bike, explained director Josu Larrazabal. Riccardo Zoidl struggled in the freezing conditions.

“Today it was such a hard stage – maybe even the hardest of the season so far – the stage was already hard with all the climbs but with the weather it made it much more so,” said Larrazabal. “Going over 1000 meters the temperature was around 5 degrees (Celsius) and at this point many guys are so frozen they forget about the race and it’s about survival and simply get to the end.  Especially the skinny guys like Riccardo and Bob.  Riccardo had one of the worst days on the bike and he did a great job just to get to the line with big help from Greggy [Rast], Giacomo [Nizzolo], and Eugenio [Alafaci].”  

“At least we had a super strong Bob in the front, and that was great to see, but during the long downhill of 20kms he got so cold it was impossible to warm up and come back to a normal level.  And then in last climb he took his pace simply to get to the finish.”

Gert Steegmans, Kristof Vandewalle and Marco Coledan joined numerous other non-GC riders who raised the white towel in the brutal conditions, and with only an individual uphill time trial tomorrow it was pointless to continue.

In the end, almost 50 riders would abandon, leaving a much smaller peloton to tackle the final stage Sunday.