The Tour de France entered the first high-mountain stages on Saturday with a triple-hump trip over the Col de Menté, Port de Balès and Col de Peyresourde en route to Loudenvielle – the first true test for the overall contenders.
It was great a day out for the breakaway on the undulating opening hour as the GC teams gave 13 riders a long leash, letting mountains leader Benoît Cosnefroy (AG2R La Mondiale) sweep up more points and some non-threatening riders fight for the stage win.
In the end, it was Nans Peters (AG2R La Mondiale) who claimed a solo victory in front of French prime minister Jean Castex, soloing away on the Port de Balès descent.
Race leader Adam Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) looked to briefly be in trouble on the Peyresourde after several attacks from Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates), but managed to ride himself back to the group with Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) and Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) after the young Slovenian broke away.
The top three in the GC remain the same, with Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) slipping away to take two seconds and move up into fourth, and Tom Dumoulin dropping back after sacrificing himself for Roglič and plummeting down the standings.
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