An early solo breakaway on a hot flat stage followed by an attempt to foil the sprinters for a stage victory. Unfortunately the sprinters were ready to contest the stage victory among themselves.
Route Description: The seventh stage was from Mont-de-Marsan to Bordeaux. The stage was run over a flat course on the first hot day of the this year's Tour de France. The stage had a sprint location and one category 4 hill over the pretty flat course that included long stretches of straightaways. The second half of the stage was run along and near the Garonne river. The finish included crossing over the Garonne river in Bordeaux, and a very techical turn inside the last 3.5 kilometers that had the potential to cause massive crashes. Therefore the race jury altered the typical 3 kilometer rule to 3.5 kilometers for this stage. The 3 kilometer rule applies to any potential time delay that could occur from being in a crash or being held up by a crash inside the final three kilometers. If a rider crashes or is held up by a crash they will be given the same time as the peloton or group that they were with at the time of the crash. In a practical application if a crash occurs at 2.99 km in the peloton the riders who hit the ground and anybody held up will get the same time as the peloton. The riders will in effect ride in to the line casually after this type of crash rather than having to take unnecessary risks to get around and back on their bikes. The rule will not give riders who have been distanced from the peloton the same time as the peloton even though they have been held up by the crash.
Race Summary and Analysis: The heat of the day and the anticipated sprint finish were two of the reasons why the racing was rather calm on this stage. Simon Gugliemi went off on a solo breakaway early in the stage. This was fine for all the yellow jersey contending teams as he is way down in the general classification, and giving him a five minute time gap would have no effect on the yellow jersey. With 40 kilometers to go in the stage Nans Peters of Ag2r-Citroen and Pierre LaTour of Total Energy broke away from the peloton and caught up to Gugliemi who was only 45 seconds ahead of the peloton at that time. The trio would never get over a minute and a half lead on the peloton, and eventually Gugliemi was dropped and returned to the peloton. The remaining duo would go on for several kilometers more and would be caught at around 8 kilometers to the finish line. The sprint teams would setup for the sprint finish in Bordeaux that would be contested without any crashes in the final four kilometers. The sprint was actually led out by Mark Cavendish with approximately 200 meters to the line, but he could not hold off Jasper Philipsen from taking a third stage win in this edition of the Tour. For all the yellow jersey contenders today was about avoiding being caught up in crashes or cuaght behind one. In this respect they all stayed safely on two wheels in the peloton.
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