Tour de France: Stage 9 finish line quotes

Rigoberto Uran on the stage 9 podium at the Tour de France

Rigoberto Uran on the stage 9 podium at the Tour de France

Rigoberto Uran (Cannondale-Drapac) - stage 9 winner

It's incredible. I was actually on my way off - I didn't think I'd won. In that crash with Dan Martin and Richie Porte I damaged my gears, so I was just looking to hang in there. So to win is a big surprise, it's incredible, I'm so happy about it.

Chris Froome (Team Sky) - overall leader

At the bottom of the Mont du Chat, my gears stopped working and I had to change bikes. Richie was quite instrumental in slowing that group down, saying this is not the time to attack the leader of the race, so thanks to Richie and I hope he makes a speedy recovery.

Alberto Contador (Trek-Segafredo) - crashed twice and lost 4 minutes

It's secondary to talk about pain. I wasn't how I'd hoped today, and that's it. I had good sensations this morning and in fact we put Bauke and Jarlinson up the road thinking about a possible attack. But then the legs didn't respond.

Fabio Baldato - BMC Racing team director

Dan Martin (Quick-Step Floors) - crashed with Porte

I guess the organisers got what they wanted. I don’t think anyone want to takes risks, but it was so slippy out there. Richie just lost it on one corner, locked his back wheel and there was nowhere to go. I was lucky to come away with what i did.

Dave Brailsford - Team Sky principal

Geraint has broken his collarbone, which is just devastating for him really. He had the crash at the Giro, then the rollercoaster of coming here and getting yellow, then the collarbone today. We can say 'dust down and bounce back' and everything, but the reality is that that’s tough. We’ll put our arm around him and help him back.

Jonathan Vaughters - Cannondale-Drapac manager

[Urán] came into to the race only doing Route du Sud for preparation beforehand, so he's not cooked. He should, in theory, continue to get better and better day to day. But of course you have to stay healthy, you have to stay out of crashes, you have to stay uninjured. All those things have to transpire. If he can do all of those, I don't see any reason why he could not be on the final podium.

It's interesting. The Tour usually has a lot of these grindy middle mountain stages. This Tour seems like it's either flat or we're doing like a Giro stage, where you're on these goat paths that are 23 per cent steep. It seems like that's the pattern the race is going to continue to keep. It's a different Tour than I think we've seen in the past. And the evolution of tactics, we're seeing massive breakaways go away. There's a little different feel to this one. They've definitely designed it a little bit strangely. So I think it will probably have an unexpected result.

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