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The status quo was maintained among the favourites for 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Tour de France victory at 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Plateau de Beille on Saturday but in the immediate aftermath of the stage, 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Ivan Basso (Liquigas-Cannondale) was critical of F♕ränk and Andy Schleck's reluctance to seize 🍨the initiative from further out on the final climb.

"I think that to make a difference, you shouldn't attack when there are still twenty riders in the group. You need to thin the group down to four or five," Basso said at the summit. "I think that if Andy and Fränk want to try and drop Cadel Evans and the others, they need to start their forcing earlier on the climbs, otherwise it wi🧸ll be difficult."

Although the Schlec🔯ks' Leopard Trek squad was prominent in leading the peloton over the Port de Lers and on the run-in to Plateau de Beille, their pace-setting relented on the early slopes of the final climb.

The Luxembourg duo launche🔜d a number of tentative attacks nearer the summit, while Basso himself also made a number of protracted efforts to try and snap the e𓂃lastic. After changing in the back seat of his team car, a wrapped-up Basso emerged to explain to reporters that it had been nigh on impossible to escape from such a large yellow jersey group.

"I believe that the attacks that really hurt are the ones that come from a small gr♒oup of riders. When you're in a group of 20 riders, the attacks don't make any difference," Basso lamentedꦅ. "It's clear that to make the difference on these climbs you needed to make it hard from the bottom."

"For me to express myself to the best of my potential, I need to attack when there aren't many of us left. Today we didn't succee👍d in doing exactly what we wanted t❀o."

Photo: Sirotti

Szmyd's off day

Bemused by the Leopard Trek tactics, Basso acknowledged that his Liquigas-Cannondale team had been unable to have the same impact on the final climb as it had done at Luz-Ardiden. With his trusted mountain gregario 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Sylvester Szmyd suffering from a rare off day, there was no repeat of the Polish-Italian ꦺtandem that whittled down the leading group on Thursday, and Basso was🦋 forced to alter his thinking accordingly.

"Today we had🎃 in mind to r🌼ide a certain kind of race, but unfortunately Sylvester wasn't on as good a day as normal," Basso said. "In an instant I had to change my plans at the beginning of the climb, and I had to attack in a moment that wasn't really ideal."

Last year Alberto Contador suffered during the opening mountain stages before coming to the fore in the third week, and the Spaniard again appeared short of his best on stage 14. Perhaps mindful of the lessons of 2010, Basso was frustrated by the lack of significant changes to the overall picture at Plateau de Beille. Nonetheless, he remains on course for his best Tour finish since before his suspension for his involvement with the blood doping clinic at the center of Operacion Puerto.

"It wasn't a 100✱ per cent positive day for me, so I'm not e👍xtremely happy," Basso said. "But it certainly wasn't a step backwards, we've stayed as we are."

One overall contender who did make gains on Saturday afternoon was Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel-Euskadi). Nobody chased down his attack in the finale and Liquigas manager Roberto Amadio noted that the overall conte🌌nders might live to regret their 🌺failure to mark Sanchez.

"Sanchez shouldn't be underrated, and I hope ♕that the others don't underrate him either," Amadio warned.