Stinks when your chances are sunk due to mechanicals, good on him for finishing, even though it was 15 minutes down. The top ten finish times literally trickle in from 1:30 (bettiol), with about a minute per rider until 7:45 down with smaller clumps coming in. This race must've been a trial run for many big names.
Still 5 punctures for alaphillipe!? Bad bike handling? Bad equipment? I mean how? Since I'm an arm chair expert, I rode single track yesterday on my 38mm gravel bike and had one real cringe worthy impact on the front - like the "oh I taco'ed the rim" impact but I was lucky to be running road pressure so it saved the rim. Is the gravel just really jagged like Kansas flint?