The strategy has been working well so far, and he’s seven seconds ahead of Quintana, the Colombian climber who is in fourth place.
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But nearest challenger Yates is not ruling out a sensational bid to win the Tour after his spectacular start.
“It was a hard day for me”, said Quintana, who a year ago gave up 88 seconds to Froome in crosswinds on stage two to Zeeland – more than Froome’s final margin of overall victory.
Team Sky boss Dave Brailsford said he wants his riders to race less predictably this year and so far they are carrying out his instructions.
“Competing in only his second Tour, the 23-year-old Yates is leading the next generation of British cyclists”.
With Thibault Pinot out of contention, the French hopes of producing a first home Tour victor in 31 years hang on Romain Bardet’s shoulders.
“This year, [Froome] said that he had delayed his preparation to be stronger in the last week”.
“That was a tough stage and the weather made it even tougher”, Froome said. Based on what he did in the third week of last year’s Tour where he clawed back loads of time and nearly won the race, we know if he feels good he will take his chances later. Instead of forcing Froome’s main competitors to chase, Henao’s attack on the road to Arcalis incited a series of counter attacks, forcing Froome himself to chase.
Froome’s former team mate Richie Porte (BMC) of Australia, Yates and Martin also managed to hang on to the defending champion’s wheel. “We’re concentrating on effectiveness, there’s no prize for the one who attacks the most”, he said. “The selection process continues, and there are still many days left in this Tour, a lot of mountains in the final week”.
With Mark Cavendish still in the points leaders’ green jersey, British riders hold three of the four leaders’ jerseys with Frenchman Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) in polka dots as king of the mountains. I think they’re fantastic.
Today is a rest day on the Tour.
The Spaniard had actually attacked on the first categorised climb of the day, the Port de la Bonaigua, but once he had been caught he was soon in discussions with his team vehicle before eventually climbing in.
Froome won on Ventoux in 2013 on his way to his first Tour title and will hope a repeat performance can strengthen his presently narrow lead overall.
“But it’s going to be pretty hard knowing there’s a time trial the next day and it will be interesting to see who is going to go that deep for victory there”.
It was also handy to gain some time on some other riders and move up a few places overall.
For Team Sky’s rivals, the task is simple: attack early and often.
“There’s no reason why they shouldn’t be up there”, he said. But if they can prevent Froome from setting the pace by forcing him to respond to a series of repeated accelerations, they might be able to keep him in check-and perhaps even cause him to crack. His Movistar team insists there is still a long way to go before the race reaches Paris and that Quintana will have plenty of opportunities to challenge Froome, especially at Mont Ventoux or in the Alps.
Previously known as a more calculating rider who slowly wore down his opponents without any surprise moves, he constantly faced doping accusations en route to winning last year’s Tour.
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For Unzué, there were mixed emotions as he was forced to square the disappointment of losing an element of the parcours that played to his rider’s strengths, with seeing the race ogranisation take the sort of action he would have like to have seen on stage 11.
