{"id":2044797,"date":"2026-07-15T06:58:54","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T03:58:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2044797"},"modified":"2026-07-15T06:58:54","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T03:58:54","slug":"the-tour-de-france-sprayed-roads-white-to-stop-the-tarmac-melting-it-made-the-riders-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2044797","title":{"rendered":"The Tour de France Sprayed Roads White to Stop the Tarmac Melting. It Made the Riders Crash."},"content":{"rendered":"
Tom Pidcock, Matteo Jorgenson, and Chris Harper all came off worse when Tour de France safety measures appeared to backfire on Tuesday\u2019s 10th stage.<\/p>\n
All three riders crashed on the sinuous, narrow descent of the Col de Puy Mary on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
According to master descender Pidcock, the culprit was the \u201cwhitewash\u201d sprayed across the road to prevent the tarmac from melting.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t expect the roads to be like this,\u201d Pidcock told TV reporters after Tuesday\u2019s stage. \u201cI don\u2019t know what they do to the roads here. They\u2019ve thrown all sorts of white shit over them.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt made it very slippery, especially on the descents.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pidcock and his Pinarello-Q36.5 teammate Chris Harper both slid out on a tight left-hander on the gnarled, precipitous descent from Puy Mary.<\/p>\n
Pidcock was able to jump back on the bike and battle his way to 9th in the frenetic final through the Massif Central.<\/p>\n
\u201cI crashed in the middle of one of those corners,\u201d Pidcock said at the finish. \u201cThe damage does not seem too bad. I feel fine at the moment, but we will have to see how everything feels later and what the checks show.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
ADVERTISEMENT<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Harper came off worse. The Aussie was pictured with bloodied hands having opted not to wear gloves. He suffered his way to the finish, 32 minutes back.<\/p>\n
He abandoned the race overnight after undergoing surgery for a \u201cserious injury\u201d to his thumb.<\/p>\n
Treating road surfaces during mid-summer heat<\/h2>\n
Local authorities typically spray roads with whitewash or lime when the Tour de France comes to town. The coating cools the tarmac to prevent it from turning into a sticky, melty mess under the peak July sun.<\/p>\n
The chalky white stuff was all over the back half of Tuesday\u2019s stage as the Tour pushes through a fearsome European heatwave.<\/p>\n
Jorgenson also crashed on the Puy Mary descent and finished the stage with bandages across his left elbow.<\/p>\n
The incident occurred off-camera, and it remains unclear what caused the Idahoan\u2019s fall.<\/p>\n
Seixas: \u2018The tarmac was melting \u2026 it was like an ice rink\u2019<\/h2>\nSeixas\u2019 teammate Nicolas Prodhomme picks his way down a sketchy whitewashed descent in Tuesday\u2019s stage.<\/span> (Photo: Dario Belingheri\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Tour de France organizers and local authorities seemed in a lose-lose situation Tuesday as the Massif Central cooked under a 32 \u00b0C sun.<\/p>\n
Pidcock blamed his crash on whitewash. Teen prodigy Paul Seixas suggested sections of asphalt without<\/em> the coating were just as bad.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the tarmac was melting,\u201d Seixas said.<\/p>\n
\n
ADVERTISEMENT<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The French ace told RMC Sport <\/em>he and Decathlon CMA-CGM pushed the pace on the way up<\/em> the Puy Mary on Tuesday\u2019s stage so they could get a safer line on the way down<\/em>.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was more for positioning,\u201d Seixas told RMC<\/em> when asked about his team\u2019s aggression on the Cat.1 climb.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe could see the descent was very dangerous. I think the tarmac was melting,\u201d he said. \u201cThe descent was like an ice rink. It was lucky we were at the front at that point. We didn\u2019t want to take any risks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seixas\u2019 conservative descent didn\u2019t slow him down in the final.<\/p>\n
The 19-year-old kicked for third on the finish into Le Lioran for the best result of his hotly-hyped Tour de France debut.<\/p>\n
The Tour de France is grappling with how best to keep racing through a rapidly warming world. Managing road surfaces might be the latest thing it needs to add to its climate change action plan.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Z8B_0133-1-e1784105638625.jpg”] Jim Cotton Updated July 15, 2026 03:49AM Tom Pidcock, Matteo Jorgenson, and Chris Harper all came off worse when Tour de France safety measures appeared to backfire on Tuesday\u2019s 10th stage. All three riders crashed on the sinuous, narrow descent of the Col de Puy Mary on Tuesday. According to master descender […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,71],"class_list":["post-2044797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-velo-outsideonline-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2044797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2044797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2044797\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2044797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2044797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2044797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Seixas'](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/GettyImages-2286071804.jpg?width=2048&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")