The margin for error at this Tour de France seems to grow tighter by the day. The proof is in the photo finish stills. For the second day running, the commissaires had to review the images before designating a winner, as Marcel Kittel (Etixx-QuickStep) edged out Bryan Coquard (Direct Energie) by mere millimetres to win stage 4 in Limoges.
In Angers on Monday, Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data) and André Greipel (Lotto Soudal) had each punched the air in celebration on crossing the line, but the margins were so tight here that neither Kittel nor Coquard dared the claim the victory for himself.
The jury’s deliberations barely lasted a minute but the wait must have seemed interminable for Kittel, who sat on the tarmac past the finish line, only daring to break into a smile once his soigneur had slapped him on the shoulders in congratulations.
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On rising gingerly to his feet, Kittel wiped a tear from his eyes, and his voice was still raw as he spoke beneath the podium. After placing second to Cavendish on stage 1 and then making a hash of his sprint in Angers, the pressure was beginning to mount on Kittel. Victory in Limoges – his 9th Tour de France stage in total, but his first since 2014 – was something of a release.
"I feel very emotional right now – it feels like my first stage win again. I’m super happy. I’m very proud because the team was really fighting for this win," Kittel said. "Things went wrong in the last days and I’m so happy to be back in the Tour and to win a stage like this. I can’t believe it."
The finishing straight pitched upwards for 700 metres and, at least in theory, was less suited to Kittel than the previous two sprint finishes. For Alexander Kristoff (Katusha), by contrast, the terrain presented a considerable opportunity, and there was little surprise when his teammate Jacopo Guarnieri took over from Lotto Soudal in the final kilometre and led out the sprint.
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