There's no pressure so we're having some fun

TOUR DIARY:With no one in our team riding high in general classification we are approaching each stage with a lot of aggression, writes DANIEL MARTIN

PRIOR TO this year’s Tour, our team always had someone up in the general classification in the race and so the other riders had to ride quite conservatively as a result. This time round, our leader Ryder Hesjedal crashed out and Tom Danielson and Christian Vande Velde were both messed up by falls. Tom pulled out while Christian lost a lot of time.

It was a blow to the team but yesterday showed a benefit to it too; we are actually having a lot of fun, in that there is no pressure and we can just race hard, trying to go in the breakaways and being a lot more opportunistic than in the past.

Normally I am a general classification rider, but this week will be about just going really hard from the start. It is fun racing.

That showed yesterday when we were really aggressive early on. We were taking it in turns – me, David Millar and Christian were all trying to get away in a break. We covered pretty much every group that went away and, eventually, one Christian was in was the one which stuck.

He got away with five others, then in the end was the only one able to bridge across to Pierrick Fedrigo, a French rider with the FDJ BigMat team. They went clear of the others in the finale and in the sprint to the line, Christian took second. It’s obviously a really nice placing, although he was hoping for more. Realistically, though, it was always going to be tough to win with all those fast sprinters up there.

He’s pretty happy with the result. It would have been nice to get another stage victory, but I think it shows we are in the race again. Everybody is quite impressed that we are down to three or four riders, but are still making the race. It’s really good.

On a personal level, I’m still coughing and finding it hard to get air into my lungs, but my legs were really, really good yesterday . . . I felt super strong and that’s very reassuring.

The start was crazy . . . it took 70 kilometres for the breakaway to go and it was just absolutely chaotic. But it was really good fun if you were feeling good. I was, so that was great.

The route was super, too – just up, down, left, right all the time – it was a real Classics type of course. It made me pretty happy about the Olympics; there were the same kind of climbs, and I felt really explosive and really strong in big gears. I could pretty much do what I wanted. As it’s the third week of the race, and because we have a rest day today, I think it really bodes well for the next couple of days in the mountains.

Hopefully I’ll be feeling really good for the Pyrenean stages and will be able to do something good there. We had something relatively rare yesterday; the stage was pretty short and didn’t start until 1.30pm. As a result the riders could all lie in until 10am. That’s really appreciated at this point in the race.

Even though the shorter stages are harder, it’s funny how I seem to be recovering well now. We’ve been riding over 200 km on the stages but I’ve been feeling fresher every day. That shows how this race makes you stronger. It’s pretty mindblowing that you can use a 200km stage as a recovery day, though!

Today is the second rest day of the race and we’ll have what has become an annual thing for the Garmin-Sharp team. We are sponsored by a Mexican restaurant called Chipotle, and they come over and lay on burritos and margaritas for us. I’m not sure if the latter will have any alcohol, but it will be a lot of fun anyway.

I never had Mexican food before I came to this team, but now I am a fan of it. It is pretty hard to get quality Mexican in Europe so it is a bit of a treat. It’s going to be very good for relaxation, too, helping us to switch off a little on the rest day.

The function is also a press event and journalists are invited to come along. I’m not sure how many will be there as we don’t have someone high up in the general classification but either way, its going to be something a bit different. I’m looking forward to that.

When the race restarts tomorrow, the plan is for us all to be ambitious. Every day is an opportunity for our riders. Christian and myself will definitely be trying to get in the break. He got banged up earlier in the race due to crashes but he’s feeling pretty good now.

It wasn’t actually the plan for him to got in the break yesterday, it just sort of happened because of how hard the stage ended up being. He got into the move that way, then ended up getting second!

It would be ideal if we can both get in the breakaway, getting that numerical advantage and being able to help each other out, but we will have to see what happens. It could be fun, though.

Twitter: DanMartin86