I can't understand why there was not more pressure put on Cadel.
Especially from the strong CSC team. Surely they could have at a minimum fatigued Cadel by making him cover any breakaways by the leading riders.
Every second will count in the last stage for Sastre so 10 seconds or a more buggered Cadel might be the difference.
Anyone able to explain this (non) tactic?
On flatter stages, Cadel doesn't have to do anything, his team can do it for him. So their attacks would tire themselves and Cadels' team, but not Cadel. Its only the super mountainous stages where his team is all dropped and he has to do everything himself.
Secondly, all the other teams and riders know they only have a couple of stages left to try for stage wins, so they also race harder, chase things, so they keep things together or get in breaks by themselves.
Finally, its not just Cadel's team, just as when Menchov was dropped on the early part of Alpe D'Huez, guys further down GC (General Classification) started riding hard at the front of Cadel's group, becasue then they would move up from say 6th to 5th. On the flatter stages if a high up guy got away, he would have 4 or 5 teams chasing as those teams don't want their leaders dropping down places, or losing further time on the overall standings.
Thats why barring very unusual circumstances, (which do happen, but very rarely for the above reasons,) things will most likely stay as they are til the T/T.