Tom Boonen played the role of ‘patron' on the penultimate stage of the Vuelta a San Juan, as the peloton enacted a go-slow protest and the Belgian visited the commissaire's car to complain of the searing heat, with the ultimate outcome being the shortening of the stage by 17.6 kilometres.
The mercury hit 42 degrees in Pocito, the start and finish town, with even higher temperatures reported out in the exposed countryside, and the decision was taken to cut the finishing lap shortly before the half way mark through the 185.7km stage.
The UCI's Extreme Weather Protocol, introduced last year, doesn't apply to Category-1 races, and as such there was no formal platform for discussions between riders and the organisation, though the head of the commissaire's panel here, Thomas Nee, claimed stakeholders had been discussing contingency plans for the heat as early as two weeks ago.
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It was Boonen who paid a visit to Nee's car on stage 6 shortly after it became apparent the peloton was riding slow in protest. Boonen's teammate Max Richeze was in the breakaway and went on to win the stage, his Quick-Step team having already called for the stage to be shortened at the start of the day.
"I talked to every single team before the race started. I was allowing longer feeding than normal and I wanted to tell them personally. Only one team told me they thought the stage should be shortened and that was Quick-Step. No other team said anything," Nee told Cyclingnews.
With only a fraction of the overall peloton unhappy, the race set out as planned, but after just before the first KOM point, after 71.5km, Nee claims the riders knocked off the pace considerably.
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