Despite the difficulties he faced the Tinkoff-Saxo team captain finished the day in a select group of seven riders who rounded out the top ten places for the day. The group crossed the finish line of the 138km Alpine stage 2min 26sec behind Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), who claimed his first victory of the Tour.
While spectators questioned the Spaniard’s lack of form, Contador explained that in light of everything that happened the stage turned out quite well.
"It was a day where I had to survive. I started with bad sensations and cramps all day so I had to save energy as much as I could,” he said and explained his team’s revised strategy after it became apparent that Contador was in trouble.
“I sent (Rafal) Majka to pull at the front and he set the pace and it calmed a bit down. Things turned out quite well.
“In what regards me, I think it deserves more merit to have reached this point than previous victories. I had strong cramps throughout the day and I was praying to make it through. Tomorrow will be another day,” he said.
The 2015 Giro d’Italia champion began the Tour de France hoping to claim his second grand tour victory of the season, but has not been able to ride at the same level he displayed in Italy last May.
He lost another place on the general classification to Nibali last night but Sky’s Geraint Thomas had an even harder day on the road slipping from fourth to 15th. Contador retained fifth overall at the end of the stage, but his margin to the yellow jersey of Chris Froome (Sky) blew out to almost eight minutes.
Stage 19 extras
Spitting games no fun for Froome as rough stage hits Sky
“Nibali is now ahead in the GC and I congratulate him for that. It's true he did a very good job today,” said Contador.
“We will see how I will feel tomorrow. The most important thing right now is to have a very good massage and recover. My muscles and tendons suffered a lot because the extreme heat dehydrated me.”
Rafal Majka pulled hard on the final climb and showed that has retained good form at this late stage in the race.
“I tried to help Alberto as much as possible during the stage and surely on the final climb,” said Majka who finished the stage in 15th, 5min 2sec behind Nibali.
“It was difficult because there were some flat parts on the climb, which made it difficult to keep the rhythm.
“I like the steep climbs but in the end it is what it is and we are going to try our best again tomorrow for sure.”
The Tinkoff-Saxo team took another hit overnight as Michael Valgren was forced to withdraw with bronchitis.
With two stages remaining the team will direct all their energy into tonight’s climb of Alpe d’Huez before celebrating their efforts on the Champs-Élysées. It is there that they will help Peter Sagan with one last opportunity for a stage victory and hope to see the Slovak take home the green sprinters’ jersey for the fourth year in a row.
