stage win. Farrar finished the stage over 46 minutes behind the stage winner, in a large group with most of the Giro's remaining sprinters. The time gap meant they stood the risk of being disqualified from the Giro. Race officials did not eliminate the group, but instead assessed each of them a 25-point penalty in the points classification. Farrar still led the classification and held the red jersey, but his lead was narrowed considerably, to the point that he was certain he could not win the jersey at the conclusion of the Giro. Farrar, who had plans to ride all three Grand Tours as well as the world championships, left the race two days later, but made a specific point not to do so while he still held the red jersey. The squad was quiet in the second half of the Giro. Only Dean, Fischer, Martin, and Meyer completed the race. Stage 18 was the only mass sprint finish in the Giro's third week. With the leadout train working at its best, their leader André Greipel took the victory ahead of Dean in second. In the individual time trial which closed out the Giro, Australian national champion Meyer was eighth. The squad finished last of the 22 teams in the Trofeo Fast Team standings, and tenth in the Trofeo Super Team. Tour de France Garmin-Transitions came to the Tour de France with a versatile squad, led by Farrar aiming for stage wins and possibly the green jersey, while Vandevelde was also present as a General Classification hopeful. Despite not being particularly known as a specialist in the race against the clock, Farrar was seventh-best in the opening prologue time trial. He clocked in 28 seconds off Fabian Cancellara's winning time and better than riders such as Michael Rogers and Bradley Wiggins who are known much more strongly as time trial specialists. The first road race stage the next day was flat and favored a sprinter like Farrar. He was, however, caught up behind the numerous crashes that took place near the finish line and finished near the back of the peloton, in 140th place. He later harshly criticized rider Lloyd Mondory for obstructing him. The crashes continued in stage 2. A slippery descent of the Col du Stockeu in Spa led to dozens of riders from nearly every team crashing. Garmin-Transitions was perhaps the team most affected – Dean, Farrar,