Cavendish, who was 29th in the road race on the opening day of the London 2012 Olympics, said: “To leave a race and organisation that I hold so much respect for and a team that I have such a special bond with, has not been an easy decision at all”.
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Froome kept his 1-minute, 47-second lead over Dutch rider Bauke Mollema, with Britain’s Adam Yates in third, 2:45 behind.
“We’ve only had one real mountain-top finish so far, on the Mont Ventoux, and we all know what happened there”, said Froome, referring to his desperate run uphill after crashing heavily and breaking his bike.
“Coming into this last week, myself personally I feel more ready for this third week than in previous editions”, he said. I don’t think we have ever been at this point in the race and still had nine riders left, so that’s a great advantage for us.
The Slovak, who won his third Tour stage this year and seventh in total, said it was a technical mistake that cost Kristoff what would have been his third stage success at the race after two in 2014. “It is at the back of everybody’s minds, these next four days are just so hard any energy spent until now that’s unnecessarily spent, that’s going to take away from what we have to spend these next four days”.
The 208.5km stage from Montelimar had finished with a three kilometre straight directly into a headwind which broke up the sprint trains, and Cavendish bided his time as he lurked behind the big frame of Kittel.
It means he will not be present to contest cycling’s most prestigious sprint, on the Champs-Elysees in Paris on stage 21, on Sunday.
“Last year Nairo made up a lot of time in the final week”, Froome said.
Quitting the race before the Alps was always a likely scenario for Cavendish once he had completed the stages that he could realistically compete in.
On a day featuring hardly any flat stretches, there were plenty of attacks but only a few skirmishes between the main contenders.
Cavendish said he had no idea there was a problem until he was waiting to speak to television reporters after the finish.
Team Sky rider Froome is a two-time Tour victor and during his victories in 2013 and 2015 he had to contend with consistent allegations of doping. He chooses when he wants to go in a breakaway, how he wants to ride the finish. “I’m the underdog, Quintana has won [a] grand tour”.
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The peloton stopped for a minute of silence at the start of the stage in honor of the 84 victims of the truck attack in Nice.
