One hell of a stage. Hilly rated but surely more than an usual stage going up and down for most of the stage with the length of 215km.
Surely a stage to lose a lot or in other cases win a lot.
Breakaway appearance also can pay off here as we have a huge amount of mountain points over the route. Being in the group almost guarantees you to get the first positions in that ranking.
The first KoM sprint was already have 17km and it is won by todays breakaway. Well at least the first four as Wallays only jumped out of the peloton to grab the last points.
Cat.2
Kratochvila
10
López Garcia
8
Grabovski
6
Lebas
4
Wallays
2
So far so good for Taylor Phinney. His teammates control the early race. Later on he also will have nice support in Pinot and Talansky.
2 more KoM sprints were reached and it`s the Czech taking the big points:
Cat.4
Kratochvila
5
Grabovski
3
López Garcia
1
Cat.2
Kratochvila
10
López Garcia
8
Lebas
6
Grabovski
4
Wallays
2
Once again Wallays jumps out of the peloton for those 2 points. This time though he decides to keep going. Having 8min to the breakaway though and being the weakest climber might not be a good idea.
Wikipedia still controlling everything as we pass the sprint and the next two KoM`s.
Wallays closed the gap to 5min with the same gap to the peloton. But after the Cat.3 mountain he is losing again and might never make it.
Sprint
Lebas
6
Grabovski
4
López Garcia
2
Cat.4
Lebas
5
Grabovski
3
Kratochvila
1
Cat.3
Lebas
6
Kratochvila
4
López Garcia
2
The Cat.3 was steep enough to lead to a first selection leaving 115 riders in the front group with 75 being dropped. This mainly includes sprinters and helpers though but surely those have to be careful to come to the finish in time as the previously shown 2nd half is yet to come.
One rider seems to struggle the most. Zabel did crash and is in the last group not looking very well.
The first of 6 tough climbs is done and Wallays indeed is totally exhausted being back in the peloton with still a 8'30 gap for the group.
Cat.2
López Garcia
10
Kratochvila
8
Lebas
6
Grabovski
4
Wallays
2
The Spaniard is now really going stronger on the longer climbs as he clearly goes for the KoM jersey now.
Cat.1
López Garcia
16
Lebas
12
Kratochvila
10
Grabovski
8
Talansky
6
Pinot
4
Frank
2
The long Cat.1 saw all the top puncheurs like Froome, Ulissi, Diggle, Roux etc. dropping from the peloton, that is down to 79 riders.
Cat.2
López Garcia
10
Lebas
8
Kratochvila
6
Grabovski
4
Henao Montoya
2
The steepest climb of the day and only Lebas is able to follow the Spaniard while the others have a gap.
Henao Montoya coming in 5th here happens as he did attack the first. As 15th in the GC 7'18 down he needs to gain time somewhere to improve. And obviously todays stage is more for the climbers than the puncheurs as the Colombian surely belongs to the pure climbers.
Many riders immediately follow him inclurding the yellow jersey. Phinney Amador Schleck Pluchkin Sicard
Immediately other teams come to the front and working for the waiting leader. Those are Bouygues Telecom, Quickstep and Tinkoff in especially.
Santander and Festina surely should work as well as their leaders are still in the peloton.
And the Spaniards indeed do so a few kilometers later. Herrada and Valls are sent to the front slowly closing the gap to the attackers again.
This obviously is not ideal for their breakaway rider David Lopez Garcia, who is 4'40 ahead of the peloton.
Also Festina and Bacardi with 2-3 riders each are supporting them a bit later going up the first Cat.3.
Lopez Garcia is solo now 21s ahead of Lebas, 35s then to Kratochvila and Grabovski is almost caught already.
The 6 GC riders have still a 45s gap to the 63 rider peloton.
Cat.3
López Garcia
6
Lebas
4
Kratochvila
2
What a bad moment to puncture. Tenorio has to wait for the neutral mechanic and is dropping into a later group including KoM leader Boom or Levarlet. As 11th in the GC he surely is below his expectations already but todays stage can even drop him further.
In especially the Santander riders having to work for Madrazo to bring back the GC riders is obviously a bad news for Tenorio. But the no.1 leader has higher priority of course.
With 18km to go the group is caught and actually only Lopez Garcia and Lebas are still 1-2min ahead.
44 riders are left in the peloton having recently dropped Kunshin or Brenes.
Tenorio is 4min down!
Only a bit later the next GC attacks. This time by Sicard followed by many riders: Phinney Henao Montoya Pluchkin Amador Schleck Spilak
Actually it`s the same as before but with the addition of Spilak this time.
Seeing all other big climbers ahead and again missing the right moment, Madrazo has to do something now. In especially after his helpers were working for the last 25km.
Behind him more riders try to follow: Intxausti Kritskiy Fothen Marquez
with more in the front rows having a high pace now: Úran Dekker Kohl
Lebas is caught but Lopez Garcia keeps scoring and is going to wear the KoM jersey tomorrow with 67 collected points.
Cat.3
López Garcia
6
Phinney
4
Amador
2
The GC rider group became a bit bigger as we have 8 riders in front now as Madrazo were able to join them.
Solo behind then Taaramae, who was pretty anonymous so far ahead of the other mentioned riders.
Weaker leaders like Keizer, Monsalve or König really struggle today and are having a decent gap already.
And Tenorio is slowly coming closer again being a bit under 4min down and almost is reaching his team mates in the 24 rider "peloton".
And indeed 4 of those are accelerating as soon as Tenorio is in the pack.
This is of course also good news for other climbers like Keinath, Ratiy, Scarponi or Suaza, who are in that group.
Taaramae also joined the group after a strong solo and also Lopez Garcia is caught with 8km to go.
Behind Marquez is trying to join them as well while Monsalve created a gap to his direct opponents with Tenorio almost being brought to the Keizer group.
And here the Santander express comes. Not the best news for Keizer and König obviously, who had created a nice gap to those earlier, but due to Tenorio`s puncture everything changed.
Strong ride today by Marquez. The Spaniard is able to join the group wiht 5km to go.
53s to the next group already.
When Tenorio jumped out of the peloton almost reaching the Dekker/Kritskiy group, Scarponi and König followed him.
Keizer as only leader is not having the energy staying behind.
Tenorio surely looks strong today but still will lose huge time to the first riders.
Schleck again looks one of the strongest in the mountains as he attacks the group first. Taaramae and others try to follow but the acceleration was strong.
Tenorio dropped most other riders and is chasing Monsalve now. 30s behind him.
And about the same to the next group with the Bacardi duo, Kritskiy, Fothen, Kohl and Dekker.
In total only 2'20 behind Schleck, who has created a 30s gap already!
With Madrazo leading the group now some weaker climbers have problems. First is Marquez, but also Phinney and Sicard look exhausted in comparison to the others.
Flamme Rouge and still gaining time. What a ride by Andy today. Almost 1min for him.
A strong Henao Montoya today is starting the sprint first with Madrazo and Spilak also in a good position.
Amador and Pluchkin a bit behind them with Taaramae, Sicard and Phinney still hanging in that group.
But the clear winner is Andy Schleck. Great attack and deserved win for him gaining time in both mountain stages so far.
Spilak with a huge sprint opens a big gap to the next. He is losing 43s to Schleck, which is obviously not ideal but gaining 19s to the next is pretty good.
Pluchkin as 3rd takes last bonus seconds but comes in together with Amador, Madrazo and a strong Henao Montoya, who shows his top10 ambitions.
Sicard, Taaramae and Phinney all lose 13s to them but it still means, that the American keeps the GC lead 46s ahead of Pluchkin. But he is slowly losing time and many mountain stages are yet to come.
Also Thomas Dekker had a strong finish coming just a bit behind them losing another 20s.
Marquez was having a nice ride here as 11th just missing a top10. 13s behind Dekker and 1'48 after Schleck he is coming in together with Uran as stronger Bacardi rider today and Kritskiy. They lost time against other top10 contenders today but they have not lost too much.
Around the corner Intxausti comes next losing another 33s. Fothen within the same time while Kohl is 12s behind them. Also those will need better stages for a top10 finish.
Monsalve next with a decent ride today as 17th 3'16 behind Schleck.
And then already Tenorio, who got nice support by Lopez Garcia in the end. This was excellent team work by Santander today reducing the loss as much as possible. Still losing 3'27 is not very good if you want a top5-10 finish by him. But it`s far better than the actual 4min before he got team support.
20th today was Keinath who came in with Kolesnikov and Suaza +4'45.
Then a bigger group with +5'08 including Pinot, Solis, König, Talansky, Ratiy.
Scarponi coming in with +5'34 still ahead of Keizer, who was the weakest team leader today losing shameful 6'09 today. Is it a small sign of an injury after his crash on the 5th day or just a very, very bad day?
And last but not least we have the first abandons as some riders missed the time cut including two control riders and also the injured Rick Zabel unfortunately, who had a promising start to this Tour but now being the first sprinter to leave the race. The full list here: Navardauskas Vlatos Zabel Dillier Chtioui Vanbilsen
CON Zywer
CON Bruin
