Channel Tunnel, becoming the first solo rider to do so and one of few cyclists ever to have made the journey. The Crossing took under an hour at a top speed of 65 km/h. Froome crashed out on the fifth stage of the Tour de France after falling three times over two days, putting an end to his defence of his Tour de France crown. He came back in time to duel with Alberto Contador on the Vuelta a España. He lost time on the first individual time trial. Before the last stage, a short (10 km) flat time trial, Froome was in second place with a deficit of 97 seconds on the Spaniard. He finally finished second. He was also awarded the overall combativity award. 2015: Second Tour de France victory Following his 2013 and 2014 early-season victories in the Tour of Oman, Froome decided to begin his 2015 racing season in February at the Ruta del Sol in Spain. He was joined there by Contador, both riders competing in this race for the first time. Having lost eight seconds to Contador in the first day's individual time trial, Froome ceded even more time to him on the third stage, when the Spaniard broke away from the peloton during the uphill finish to win the stage. Now 27 seconds behind Contador, with only one mountain stage remaining, Froome seemed likely to end up second. But on the penultimate fourth stage, which had a steep uphill finish, Team Sky worked hard and dropped all of Contador's Tinkoff-Saxo teammates as the leaders reached the final climb. After some punchy moves by his support riders, Froome began a solo attack. For a short time Contador was able to follow, but he soon fell away. Froome won the stage and was able to open a 29-second gap on second-place Contador by the finish line, enough to overcome his deficit and take the overall race lead by two seconds. The final fifth stage was relatively flat, with no likely chance for Contador to make up his deficit, allowing Froome to collect his first stage race victory since May 2014. This was the third year in a row that Froome won his season opener stage race. For the second year in a row, Froome did not start Tirreno–Adriatico, due to a chest infection. He participated in the La Flèche Wallonne but crashed badly, remounted and