Welcome! Either this stage will be a GC battle where the more Punchy climbers will get a chance to take time before the Final Mountain TT at Col d'Eze tomorrow. If not we have some skilled sprinters with good sprinting stats present in the pack and we will have to see what scenario is the real one. We can say that Arnaud Demare will have to deliver on home soil and what better place than here in Nice!
The condition for making the break today is to go for the stage itself, which have lots of hills to maneuver in and a discouraged field after both crashes and a one rider dominance, the confidence is not high among the riders today.
Juan Gallego Martin Mathieu La Lavandier Rohan Dennis Tyron Giogieri Tim Kennaugh Mwangi Samwel Andrei Sakalou
Roman Kreuziger Merhawi Kudus
are desperate to leave here with something in their hands and goes into the break for a stage win
We jump to 33 km goal where the final KoM sprint is taken by P.Schelling who joined the break shortly after Kudus and Kreuziger. After this we can announce Dennis wins the KoM competition with 74 full points, where most are taken from todays stage. The break doesn't have the biggest gap down to the chasers
We also see that Sicard is desperate getting something from this stage race and attacks on the flat! Madrazo jumps on the bandwagon and tries to follow the French GC rider. They have a minute up to the break!
Sicard and Madrazo has to conceed here with 6 km left of the stage and an small applause has to be given to them for trying to attack on a flat strait. Some might call it a stupid call, but they were close at reaching a point of danger. Kris Boeckmans is spotted in the break and will be looking for another stage to his tally!
Now we see a small leadout train led by Arndt going past the two attackers, he is leading out his leader Demare, who is in a good position. Among him we find that Enger and Van Avermaet are on his tail. No sign of Boeckmans though!
Arnaud Demare wins the 7th stage here in Nice in front of his home crowd! He wins ahead of Enger and Van Avermaet to give Arndt a 4th place. Schleck actually went for fun to secure the points jersey too to get 5th place on the stage! Boeckmans comes in 9th and was too far behind at the start of the sprint
