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Tour de France 2017: Green Jersey Overview – Week 2

By Martin Mrazek

Marcel Kittel was cautious last week, saying that he’s only interested in stage wins and that he’ll see about the green jersey later. But now it looks like nothing can stop him. With Sagan and Cavendish out of the race for good, nobody seems to be able to compete with the German pro. He leads the points classification with 352 points after only 12 stages. That would be sufficient to beat the 2011 green jersey winner Mark Cavendish, who got 334 points in total that year.

But let’s take a look at how it happened. Marcel Kittel wasted no time after winning his second stage this year in Troyes last Thursday and took another victory the very next day. It was a very tight bunch sprint finish in Burgundy as a photo finish was needed to determine whether Marcel really beat Edvald Boasson Hagen.

Kittel didn’t add any points on Saturday as Lilian Calmejane soloed to victory to Les Rousses. He still managed to retain the jersey, though, both through the 8th and 9th stage, and spent the rest day in the green. He struck again at the end of stage 10 and secured his fourth win this year. It seemed it was no problem at all for him to beat John Degenkolb and Dylan Groenewegen.

Stage 11 was very much the same story with Kittel outsprinting Dylan Groenewegen and Edvald Boasson Hagen in Pau. Thursday took us to the Pyrenees where we saw a surprising ending as Christopher Froome lost contact in the last metres of the mountainous stage. Romain Bardet took the victory with Fabio Aru close behind snatching the yellow jersey. The Tour got a whole lot more interesting all of a sudden.

However, the competition for the green jersey is a different story. Marcel Kittel holds the jersey firmly in his hands. He sits in first place with 352 points, followed by Matthews with 222 points and Greipel with 171 points. Is it all done and decided? What do you think?