page_title: 2013 Tour de France
section_title: Pre-race favourites
hierarchical_section_title: 2013 Tour de France / Pre-race favourites
caption_attribution_description: This file was uploaded with Commonist. Français&#160;: Critérium du Dauphiné 2013&#160;: quatrième étape en contre-la-montre à Villars-les-Dombes. Arrivée au Parc des oiseaux. Français&#160;: Christopher Froome&#160;; portrait.
context_page_description: The 2013 Tour de France was the 100th edition of the Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tours. It started on the island of Corsica on 30 June and finished on the Champs-Élysées in Paris on 21 July. The Tour consisted of twenty-one stages and covered a total distance of 3,403.5 km. The overall general classification was won by Chris Froome of Team Sky. Second and third respectively were Nairo Quintana and the Team Katusha rider Joaquim Rodríguez.
  Marcel Kittel was the first rider to wear the general classification leader's yellow jersey after winning stage one. He lost the lead the next day to Jan Bakelants of RadioShack–Leopard, who managed to obtain a one-second lead from a late solo attack. Simon Gerrans gained the race lead after his team, Orica–GreenEDGE, won the stage four team time trial. Gerrans passed the lead on to teammate Daryl Impey after the fifth stage. Froome took the lead from Impey after the eighth stage, the first classified as mountainous. Froome maintained his lead for the remainder of the race by consolidating his lead through solid performances in the individual time trials and in the high mountains.
context_section_description: In the run up to the 2013 Tour de France, Chris Froome (Team Sky) was widely considered as the top pre-race favourite for the general classification, with his closest rivals thought to be Alberto Contador (Saxo–Tinkoff) and Joaquim Rodríguez (Team Katusha). Astana's Vincenzo Nibali was also a possible contender after getting his first Tour podium in 2012 but he had focused on the 2013 Giro d'Italia. The other riders considered contenders for the general classification were BMC Racing Team riders Cadel Evans and Tejay van Garderen, Richie Porte (Team Sky), Jurgen Van den Broeck (Lotto–Belisol), Thibaut Pinot (FDJ.fr), Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin–Sharp), Robert Gesink (Belkin Pro Cycling), and Movistar Team riders Alejandro Valverde and Nairo Quintana.
  The 2012 Tour de France winner, Bradley Wiggins of Team Sky, had focused on the Giro d'Italia, but retired early due to illness, subsequently pulling out because illness and injury had left him insufficient time to train for the Tour de France and chose not to ride. This left Froome, runner-up in 2012, the undisputed leader of Team Sky. He had shown his form so far in 2013 season by winning four of the five stage races he had rode: Tour of Oman, Critérium International, Tour de Romandie and Critérium du Dauphiné. Two-time Tour winner (2007 and 2009) Contador returned to the race having been suspended from the 2012 race; he had won the 2012 Vuelta a España and his best major result of the season was second in Oman. Rodríguez had podium finishes in both the Giro and Vuelta in 2012, as well as winning the UCI World Tour. He had top-ten placings in three major stage races in the season.
  The sprinters considered favourites for the points classification and wins in bunch sprint finishes were Mark Cavendish (Omega Pharma–Quick-Step), Peter Sagan (Cannondale), André Greipel (Lotto–Belisol), Matthew Goss (Orica–GreenEDGE) and Argos–Shimano riders Marcel Kittel and John Degenkolb. Cavendish won the points classification at the 2013 Giro and had shown his form with thirteen wins in the season. In the previous year's Tour, Sagan won the points classification and had won the same at the Tour de Suisse in the month preceding the Tour. Greipel, whose team manager Marc Sergeant claimed he had the best sprint train, came into the Tour with nine wins in the season, including three at the Tour Down Under. Goss only had one victory in the season, but had a team of strong and experienced riders. Kittel, as with Greipel, would arrive with a team dedicated for the sprints and he had accumulated eleven wins in the season. His teammate Degenkolb won five stages at the 2012 Vuelta and it was thought he was most likely to be used for the hillier stages.
caption: Team Sky's Chris Froome was widely seen as the leading contender for the general classification.
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