The nine riders were: Cyril Gautier (AG2R-La Mondiale), Serge Pauwels (Dimension Data), Rafal Majka (Tinkoff), Andriy Grivko (Astana), Bartosz Huzarski (Bora-Argon 18), Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal), Greg Van Avermaet (BMC), Romain Sicard (Direct Energie) and Florian Vachon (Fortuneo-Vital Concept).
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Many spectators clearly believed some kind of pact had been made between the two riders: De Gendt to win the polka dot jersey in return for keeping the pace high enough for Van Avermaet to secure the yellow; as for the stage: the best man wins.
Defending champion Chris Froome and two-time runner-up Nairo Quintana finished in the main pack, while two-time victor Alberto Contador and 2014 champion Vincenzo Nibali fell out of contention. With the exception of Contador, nearly all of the GC favorites still look good and are closely placed on overall time. However it’s worth noting that despite the harder climb today, he conceded just 37 seconds.
For pre-race favourite Chris Froome (Sky), Nibali’s time loss came as something of a surprise: “I would have expected him to be coming here with his A-game”, the defending champion said.
Belgian Greg van Avermaet claimed the overall leader’s yellow jersey when he won the fifth stage of the Tour de France at the end of a long breakaway as Alberto Contador appeared to suffer from crash-related injuries on Wednesday. “You can’t write Contador off”.
Van Avermaet was part of an early nine-man breakaway and he methodically whittled down the group before accelerating past fellow Belgian Thomas De Gendt with 17 kilometers (10 miles) to go on the penultimate climb of the day.
Van Avermaet’s team mate Richie Porte, who lost two minutes to a flat tire in Stage Two, managed to gain back 15 seconds, but is still 1:45 behind the rest of the GC favorites. We said it from the start, Fabio is the one who matters. “I am going to enjoy it as much as possible tomorrow”.
With heavy legs the leading trio hit the first big climb of the race the 2nd category, Pas de Peyrol 5.4km at an average gradient of 8.1% and Grivko was quickly dropped under the pressure of De Gendt on the steep slopes. Romain Bardet (Ag2r) wasn’t one for the ceasefire though as he took off in the last few hundred meters of the climb to hit the final risky descent first and put some other GC men under pressure.
That was also where Sagan gave up his grip on the race leader’s yellow jersey as he was shelled out the back of the peloton, while 2014 victor and Giro d’Italia champion Vincenzo Nibali also found himself in difficulty.
Contador, who fell twice in each of the opening two stages, is 25th, 6:38 back.
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“I never give up, that’s the most important thing… in my career”, he said.
