Steve Cummings says Ineos Grenadiers must be ready to take risks in quest for Tour de France glory as second week begins
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BySam Few
Published 12/07/2022 at 13:28 GMT
Steve Cummings, sports director for Ineos Grenadiers, has stated his team must be risk takers if they want to stand a chance of success at the Tour de France this year. The Tour enters its second week with Stage 10 seeing the riders travel 148.5km from Morzines les Portes du Soleil to Megeve on Tuesday. Ineos' Geraint Thomas, Adam Yates and Tom Pidcock are in the top 10.
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Ineos Grenadiers sports director Steve Cummings has called for bravery from his riders saying that 'we have to take risks' in the quest for Tour de France glory.
After Monday's rest day, the Tour enters its second week with Stage 10 seeing riders travel 148.5km from Morzines les Portes du Soleil to Megeve on Tuesday. Ineos' British contingent of Geraint Thomas, Adam Yates and Tom Pidcock have impressed thus far, positioning themselves in the top seven on the general classification.
Their performance is the strongest collective showing of all the teams at this year's event.
Cummings, whose sporting director role is shared with Oliver Cookson and Dario Cioni, is pleased with the team's performance thus far but has insisted the riders must be brave if they want to go one step further.
"The plan is to use the same approach we've had in many races where we're trying to use the numbers - race intelligently off one another," said Cummings. "At some stage, if we want to win, we have to take risks and we're in that mindset."
Ineos were dealt a blow when Colombian rider Dani Martinez dropped off GC contention. In spite of this disappointment, the team still has three riders into the top 10 in the general classification and Cummings praised his team's performance as individuals and as a collective.
"I'm sorry we lost Dani Martínez off the GC too because I know he's been really thinking and working hard and dreaming about this race and he was coming here with a completely blank piece of paper, a 'you-write-the-script' situation, to see what happened.
"But having said that, I think it's kind of exceptional to have had four riders after eight stages in the top 10. You don't often see that and if you look at the broader picture of not just this race but the whole team, we must be doing things really well to get to that point."
However, there are bigger dreams at Ineos and although the team find themselves in a strong position going into the second week, Cummings has his sights set on going one step further.
"We're here to try and win and we haven't managed to win yet. But on Sunday we were close [with Jonathan Castroviejo] so we just need to keep doing what we've been doing, whether we end up winning the overall, or whether we win stages or whether it's both."
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