Tour de France 2019: Chris Froome’s crash leaves Geraint Thomas without his lightning rod

Geraint Thomas has lost a rival for the yellow jersey in three weeks’ time, but he has also lost his powerful alliance in a gruelling bike race best not fought alone

One of the most famous clips of Lance Armstrong comes from the 2003 Tour de France, when the American swerved off the road, pedalled manically across a field, got stuck against a verge, jumped off his bike and hauled himself back into the race a hundred yards down the mountain. It was an odd and dramatic sight, and perhaps in hindsight it was neatly symbolic of a cyclist who spent his career cutting corners with grim persistence.

Less famous is the man who crashed in front of Armstrong, forcing the detour. Joseba Beloki had finished on the podium in the previous three Tours de France, but that year his yellow-jersey hopes ended when he hit the road. Beloki broke his right femur in two places and suffered a fractured wrist and elbow. A year later he was still in too much pain to ride, and finished the only subsequent Tour de France of his career 75th.

It is too soon to suggest Chris Froome’s career will fade in the same way, but history shows such hard impact injuries can be devastating, and it is not much of a leap to suggest the heavy crash at the Criterium du Dauphine on Wednesday, which left Froome in intensive care, is likely to end his season.

The crash happened while Froome was on a reconnaissance ride with his Ineos team-mate Wout Poels, scouting out the day’s time-trial route around Roanne in central France. Perhaps the unfamiliarity of his time-trial bike played its part, but it was an unfortunate and uncharacteristic lapse: Froome took his hands off the handlebars to clear his nose while riding downhill at around 60kph, losing control and slamming into a wall.

The long-term ramifications are unknown but the short-term impact is clear. Froome will miss the Tour de France, which starts on 6 July, and what soon came to mind was the reaction of another of his Ineos team-mate’s, Geraint Thomas. Viewed bluntly, Thomas’s chances are improved by Froome’s absence from the Tour: one of his main rivals will not be riding, a four-time winner who had geared his entire year towards peaking in the clouds around the Alps. Thomas will become the outright leader of the team, with talented support like Egan Bernal working solely for his aims.

But dig a little deeper and it is not so simple. Froome is about as perfect a rival for the yellow jersey as Thomas could possibly dream up. He is not just a strong rider in the team, not just someone who makes intelligent decisions on the road, but also a presence, a champion in the peloton with the ability to shape a race just by being in it. He draws the eye of the media, other riders, and the French fan holding a bottle of warm urine to the immeasurable benefit of Thomas.

No one ever won a Tour de France without making alliances, either with team-mates or even fierce rivals when the moment was required. Last year Sky’s unusual double-act of Froome and Thomas worked in their favour, giving other teams two threats to cover, and Froome became the lightning rod: even when Thomas was in the yellow jersey, Froome’s moves were being carefully marked by nearest challengers like Primoz Roglic and Tom Dumoulin.

And no one knows the value of a team-mate more than Thomas. He built his career on being the fall guy, pedalling the hardest yards, sacrificing his own legs for others. In the final days of his 2018 triumph, the tables turned and Froome became his domestique. Thomas has lost a rival, but he will know that he has also lost his most powerful alliance.

The Tour itself has lost something powerful too. Froome may not be popular in France but for a man with the charisma of a cardboard box he is curiously compelling. In the race itself he is its most gloried member, one yellow jersey away from an exclusive club of five-time winners and the kind of rider who can produce something eye-catching at the most unsuspecting moment. Outside the race, too, he always seems to get himself in the thick of something or other, like his argument with the gendarme who knocked him over last year.

The Tour will miss Froome, and likewise Froome will miss the Tour – at 34, he is running out of time to write one more piece of history. And while his absence opens up the road for Thomas, it is a lonelier road than it would have been. Last year Thomas emerged sensationally from Froome’s shadow, but this time he will be exposed, and he will ride this Tour de France from the very start with a target on his back.