Tour de France Stage 7 recap: I don't know anything anymore
When I previewed this stage yesterday I said it would be boring. I am a stupid, stupid man. The peloton split apart at several points of the course, sending stage and general classification favorites backwards down the road. The result was the most end-to-end nailbiting Tour stage thus far.
Ineos selected the final group of about 40 riders that would contest the stage by taking over the front of the peloton with 35 kilometers to go and ramping up the pace. In the closing 500 meters, and with many of the pure sprinters left behind, Wout van Aert attacked from a buried position to outmuscle veteran hardmen Edvald Boasson Hagen and Bryan Coquard and win his second stage of this year's Tour.
Peter Sagan was involved in the sprint as well, but dropped his chain ahead of the line after colliding with another rider. In a separate incident, Julian Alaphilippe, now in the midst of a full-blown revenge mission, threw up an arm in protest after jostling elbows with Cristophe Laporte. It was exactly the finish that a chaotic day deserved.
From Kilometer Zero, Bora-Hansgrohe drove the peloton at a blistering pace, hitting 88 km/h at one point, in service of Sagan, who entered the day behind Sam Bennett in the green jersey competition. Then the crosswinds struck, creating splits that pushed the premiere sprinters off the back, including Bennett. His group was second on the road at one minute, 20 seconds back just 40 kilometers into the stage. Even farther behind, a group containing Stage 3 winner Caleb Ewan -- as well as other pure sprinters like Andre Greipel and Giacomo Nizzolo -- was three minutes down.