Team Sky may have held the yellow jersey ever since the Tour de France rolled out of a wet and dreary Düsseldorf, but the stark reality is that they have had to do very little to defend it.
As race leader, Chris Froome has had few difficult decisions to make in this year's race. His team have worked early on in some stages and positioned their GC assets near the front in the hectic finales. But for a team time trial on the slopes of La Planche des Belles Filles the only stress on Froome's shoulders came when he crashed on stage 2 and when a controversial skin suit had his rivals splitting at the seams.
"I think that we've ridden a good race tactically so far, in the sense that we've not ended up doing a huge amount on the front," Froome said after stage 6 finished in a bunch sprint.
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For all the talk of ASO trying to design a course to nullify Froome's strength and enhance the chances of his rivals, the reality is that Team Sky are just where they would like to be – out in front. The margins might be small but the route – asphyxiated of the classical mountain-top stages – is providing Team Sky with cover until they really need it. The puzzling tactics of some of Froome's closest rivals helps, too.
"Of course BMC controlled the race yesterday and I think that my teammates are certainly grateful for that but these sprint days are always going to be controlled by the sprinters' teams and the lion share of the work will be done by them. Thankfully up until this point we've not had do a lot of work on the front and hopefully, that will continue. It will make a difference in the third week, that we're still fresh at the moment."
When he climbed off his bike, Froome was asked if he would be willing to effectively loan out the jersey in order to avoid a heavy workload for his team. It's true, they miss a rouleur in Ian Stannard, but they are still brimming with riders who would make any Tour selection on a rival team.
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