His lack of experience might play against the 23-year-old as a gruelling third week of racing, which often favours seasoned riders, is looming, but Yates is not be anxious.
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After losing time on Saturday’s stage, he said: “My body isn’t responding as I would have liked”.
The two stages following today’s first rest day seem unlikely to have much of an impact on the GC, but things change after that. “We actually got an email from the UCI yesterday saying thank you for being the most cooperative team out of everybody in the bike checks. Couldn’t be in a better place right now”.
No other nation has won more than one stage this year.
After a big climb early on, the stage flattened out to suit a breakaway win and there were few opportunities for the main contenders to potentially take time off of Froome – who leads fellow Brit Adam Yates by 16 seconds in the overall standings.
The attack caught Nairo Quintana, Fabio Aru et al by surprise, and the Sky leader’s use of a slightly higher gear to help him gain time on the final descent was a clever bit of forward thinking.
Yates is 16sec back from Froome with Martin third at 19sec and Quintana fourth at 23sec.
The conditions contributed to the challenging day. It was a tough day out there.
“One minute we’re pouring water over ourselves, it’s 35 degrees (Celsius), hot, humid – we’re suffering in the heat”, said Froome. They would chase us down and then just look at each other.
“Ventoux was kind to me, but when I got to the top last time I had to get straight on to oxygen support I was so exhausted”, Froome said. It wasn’t quite hard enough for big gaps.
Asked about the wet weather, Thomas added: “It’s actually quite nice”.
Froome paid tribute to his great rival Contador.
Quintana admits he could lose time to Froome in Friday s 13th stage time-trial but says he s happy with the position he finds himself in.
The Briton’s Tour has been better than expected so far, while Alberto Contador could not have fared much worse.
Two-time champion Contador was forced to abandon the race during stage nine on Sunday as he struggled with illness.
The escape group fragmented on the penultimate climb, the Col de Beixalis, with Dumoulin making his move in the valley before the concluding ascent.
“There’s still a long way to go in this Tour – you must attack when it’s your real time”.
Or, is he waiting to make a late charge for victory in the Alps in week three; but then risk leaving his run too late, as he did previous year on stage 20 to l’Alpe d’Huez where he was second.
Portugal’s Rui Costa took second 38sec back with Rafal Majka of Poland third. The touch paper was lit by Froome’s team-mate, Sergio Henao.
But over three Pyrenean mountain stages, Quintana failed to attack Froome, leaving the Briton and his team perplexed.
Richie Porte (BMC), Martin and Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo) all accelerated, as did Yates. That win moved him into the yellow jersey by 1:25 over Alejandro Valverde (his teammate Porte was second).
Froome had to respond to any acceleration and answered every question posed.
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Already in the race lead, Froome’s Team Sky squad were content to allow a large breakaway group, without any genuine overall rivals, to form.
