The Queen stage is here, and Blythe is out for revenge, Vanspeybrouck is looking for the overall, and the third favourite is Visconti, who will be a real danger on the hills.
The drama of yesterday leaves us with an opportunity today for some real fireworks.
5 men in the break today: Kirsch, Westra, Martins, Rowsell and Schachmann
6 riders join them, and the gap quickly grows to 7 minutes, the peloton don't think anyone will be able to last all day today.
The new riders are: Lavery, Poulhies, Koep,Dumoulin, Veelers and Likhaya, with Dumoulin only 1'45" back
Kirsch wins the sprint, with Dumoulin flying through for second and Schachmann third
Veelers leads the break over the finishing climb for the first of ten times with the gap at 9 minutes and 123km to go
As the peloton splits when they cross the line, I'm thinking this will only get tougher.
Kirsch wins the first climb, Lavery and Koep follow him
Pokerstars are causing splits left right and center, this time Vanspeybrouck has missed it
It all comes back together on the next climb
Dumoulin is the only person who cares about the sprints, he is also the only person not working, so there is a correlation there, anyway he beats VEelers and Kirsch this time.
Karma, as Dumoulin punctures the next time up the climb. Now Pokerstars probably have to pull back the break, although they were doing so anyway
He has no hope of getting back, and is now 3 minutes behind the break and 2'45" in front of the peloton. No-mans land. 76km to go
Albert and Meersman attack to Dumoulin when his gap falls to a minute
They cruise across to the break, who are 3'18" ahead of the peloton with 62km to go
The two of them then attack clear to win the mountain points, Dumoulin is third, Meersman wins
With 4 laps to go the two late attackers and Veelers go clear
Albert leads Meersman and Veelrs through the sprint point
50km to go and the leaders have pushed up their lead to 4'18" the peloton needs to get their act together
3 laps to go and the front 3 are working well together
Coyot is leading the chase, the gap is still 4'10" and there are 40km to go
Albert attacks to get the climb, Veelers just getting second
Albert decides to push on, Vanspeybrouck has been a bluff by Bpost and they are now going for glory
Unicredit are now leading the chase for Visconti
Mohs is in real difficultly now, it's game over for our yellow jersey
Albert is caught by Veelers
Blythe attacks with 30km to go, Van Impe tries to follow
Albert goes through the finish line with 2 laps to go
1'48" later Blythe leads through Van Impe
With Coyot leading through the peloton a minute later, this is starting to look good for the break
Coyot has got the group down to 9:
Coyot, Haussler (Trilux)
Van Poppel, Bernucci and Visconti (UniCredit)
Vanspeybrouck (Bpost)
Geslin (Pokerstars)
Langeveld and Traksel (Koppert)
who else but Gaudin pulls the group back
Langeveld and Geslin now attack
They make it up to Blythe
Meersman beats Albert to the climb
Bernucci gets some of the peloton up to Blythe, 2 minutes off the lead
Veelers cracked, and is now a minute off the leaders
16km to go and Vanspeybrouck attacks, he needs to shake Haussler to win the overall
Langeveld, Blythe and Van Impe try and follow
Albert is still pushing on, trying to crack Meersman
And Albert gets the gap over the top, the two favourites for the GC are Albert and Vanspeybrouck now, and they are racing against one another!
Langeveld, Vanspeybrouck and Veelers are 1'27" behind Albert as they cross the line for the penultimate time.
With the peloton another 30 seconds back
Langeveld and Vanspeybrouck attack past Meersman as Veelers is caught by the chasers, just 10km to go
Vanspeybrouck is going for it, his team mate is in sight
Albert wins the climb, to take the KoM jersey
Vanspeybrouck, Langeveld and Viscnti are next
Then Meersman
And the peloton of 7, 1'27" back
with 5km to go, no one wants to pull Vanspeybrouck to the line, but he is happy to let Albert win, so the gap is 45 seconds. If they gap Vanspeybrouck, Visconti and Langeveld don't need to catch Albert to win the overall
They wait to long, and now Albert has over a minutes gap and is in virtual yellow
And the peloton catch the chasers
The finishing climb starts
Langeveld and Vanspeybrouck attack again
They start to sprint
Langeveld is in the lead, but he needs to gap Vanspeybrouck to win
Albert gets the stage
Bpost gets a 1-2 as Vanspeybrouck passes Langeveld to get the yellow jersey
Visconti and Geslin are next
And Blythe leads in the rest of the bunch, very dissapointing tour for him.
So, Vanspeybrouck gets the lead, Langeveld 2nd and Albert 3rd as well as the KoM jersey. This is a great tour for Bpost.
