Having endured a tough start to the Tour de Suisse, Andy Schleck's legs suddenly came around in yesterday's queen stage of the Swiss event. With a 15th place finish only 1.18 behind stage winner Rui Costa (Movistar), his performance was on par with his performance in the similar stage in 2010 and the Luxembourger takes away a boosted confidence from yesterday's battle.

Ever since his crash in the 2012 Criterium du Dauphiné, much has been written about Andy Schleck and most often he has not drawn any positive attention. For a long time, he was unable to simply finish a race and for the first time since 2008, he has not been mentioned as a pre-race favourite for the Tour de France.

Things started to improve in the Liege-Bastogne-Liege and he showed further encouraging signs in the Tour of California. He lined up at his final preparation event for the Tour, this week's Tour de Suisse, hoping to take further steps in the right direction.

Hence, he was badly surprised by his performances in the first two mountain stages of the race as he was dropped early on and lost plenty of time. Many people saw it as a sign that his legs would not come around for the Tour de France.

Yesterday, all suddenly changed as the Luxembourger easily stayed near the front of the peloton while Nicolas Roche reduced the yellow jersey group to only 20 riders on the Albulapass. When Bauke Mollema (Blanco) attacked and blew the group to pieces, he was not far behind and did a huge job in a small chase group containing Roman Kreuziger (Saxo-Tinkoff).

He faded towards the finish and lost further time on the descent but he crossed the finish line in 15th place, just 1.18 later than stage winner Rui Costa. That performance is actually on par with his result in the similar stage in the 2010 edition of the race when he finished 12th, 1.20 behind stage winner Robert Gesink. As most people know, he went on to win the Tour de France on that occasion (he originally finished 2nd but Alberto Contador was later disqualified).

Schleck has never performed well in the Swiss event and so he will now start the Tour de France with better recent results than he usually does. Unsurprisingly, he was greatly encouraged on a day which he has marked out as his final crucial test for the Tour.

“I am feeling good," he said. "It’s coming slowly. I don’t miss too much in being able to go with the best on the climbs so it’s a good sign. We were present in every breakaway today with the goal in mind of winning the stage. The second goal was for me to go really deep in order to test where I am. It was a long stage with the climbing at the end, so it was a good day to do that. Initially I could go quite easily without suffering too much, but in the last kilometer where it flattened out I lost some time there. But the rest of climb I felt really good."

"It was a good test and I’m happy with the results. My training is done now and the remaining days are just staying safe on the bike. Days like today give me a boost for my confidence too. It’s a good place to be.”

The team's GC rider Maxime Monfort crashed in Thursday's stage and so was not on his best yesterday. He lost 5.27 and moved back into 22nd, thus losing all hopes of a top 10 result on GC, and paid the price for his injuries sustained earlier in the race.

“In the beginning it was really hard because my muscles weren’t warmed up yet," he said. "But after one hour it was much better and I felt a glimmer of hope for the day. On the first long climb I was feeling ok. I tried to put myself and Andy in good positions.  On the last climb it was harder  I was missing something by then, definitely not 100%  I couldn’t find a good tempo so I finished well down."

The team had been represented in the early break as veteran Andreas Klöden had joined the move. Eventually, that came to nothing and it was left to Schleck and Monfort to deliver the goods for the squad.

"We knew with a guy in the break it would be hard to go all the way to the end," Monfort said. "Looking at the profile that was clear. But at the beginning it was so hard and unorganized in the peloton, when Klodi went with a group of twelve after more than 1 hour, we thought that was a good move. And we saw good movement from Andy. He didn’t finish in the front but only one minute down from the yellow jersey so this will give him confidence for the Tour.”

The team has been on the attack throughput the entire race and that will probably also be the case on today's final road stage that could be decided from an early breakaway. Starting at 16.55, you can follow the race on CyclingQuotes.com/live.