Tour de France: Cummings solos to victory over Col d'Aspin

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Steve Cummings gave Dimension Data its fourth stage win of this Tour de France, soloing away from the day's breakaway on stage 7 before the Col d'Aspin and then surviving the climb to take the second Tour stage of his career.

"Of all my victories, I think it's the best one. The Tour is the Tour, it's special. I didn't need to win a stage this year. I had a different condition from last year as I started the Tour riding for Mark [Cavendish] who is such a winner and an inspiration. It's brilliant, it's fantastic," Cummings said.

Daryl Impey (Orica-BikeExchange) out-sprinted Daniel Navarro (Cofidis) for second on the stage, while Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) kept his race lead by going into the day's breakaway and coming in three minutes behind Cummings, well ahead of the chasing peloton that was waylaid by a collapsed 1km to go banner.

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Cummings was part of a 29-rider breakaway that went clear after a hectic start to the 167.5km stage from L'Isle-Jourdain to Lac de Payolle, one that started flat but kicked up into the Pyrenees, tackling the category 4 Cote de Capvern and the category 1 Col d'Aspin just 7km before the finish. Also in the group was race leader Greg Van Avermaet (BMC Racing), who took the initiative to protect his team from having to work after an attack-filled opening to the stage.

"It was a bit strange because they kept on attacking, and some big breaks were going off. My team was getting tired in the end, so I just wanted to take the pressure off my team and go by myself," Van Avermaet said. I think it was a smart decision to do this. They didn't have to work today and they still have the same at the end of the day. It was a pretty good day for BMC."

Cummings was also a man to take the initiative, forging clear on his own just before the intermediate sprint with 25.6km to go, then steadily building up an advantage over a chasing group containing Giro d'Italia winner Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), Navarro and Impey.

"I wasn't confident in that group with [Vincenzo] Nibali and [Dani] Navarro. The idea was that Navarro will cook himself before the climb, so I put pressure on Astana to chase behind. I felt if I can get in front with a smaller number of riders, I'd have more chances of winning. I cooked myself actually. I think I was riding on the flat quite a lot," Cummings said.

By the time he made it over the Aspin, Cummings enjoyed a minute's lead on the chasing trio, and was able to take the descent smoothly and cruise in for the stage win.

"The climb was 5 or 6 percent and that’s good for my characteristics. And when you’re on the limit and in a chase you never trust anyone except your own teammates," Cummings said. "So I just carried on, as you do.”

There were few fireworks in the chasing peloton of race favourites, as Chris Froome (Sky), Tejay van Garderen (BMC), Fabio Aru (Astana) and Nairo Quintana (Movistar) allowed the lower-ranked contenders to have their go.

The only one to suffer was Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) who was distanced on the Col d'Aspin and lost almost three minutes to the Froome group.

Van Avermaet continues in the race lead with 6:42 on Froome and the bulk of the rest of the favourites with two major mountain stages to come.

"I wasn't expecting a winning time today, I'm pretty happy with this. It was a smart decision to go in the break. At the end of the day I got what I wanted, I got an extra day in yellow. I will enjoy tomorrow, but I think it will be my last day tomorrow."

Yates on the attack

The white jersey changed hands at the end of the day, moving onto the shoulders of Adam Yates (Orica-BikeExchange), who also moved into second overall ahead of the overnight best young rider Julian Alaphilippe (Etixx-Quickstep), although the Frenchman accepted the white jersey during the stage podium ceremony.

Yates attacked over the Col d'Aspin and opened up a gap of seven seconds on the chasing peloton containing Alaphilippe, but between the time the leaders came through and Yates approached 1km to go, the inflatable red banner signifying the 1km mark had deflated, causing Yates to crash.

A protest from Orica reinstated Yates' gap at that moment, putting him second overall and top of the best young rider classification.

Tour de France stage 7 highlights video

How it unfolded

The riders complaining of the lackadaisical pace on the first of trio of 200km stages on Monday might have found themselves longing for those lazy days about mid-way through the frenetic first hour of Friday's 167.5km stage.

In previous days, the first attacks were met by little resistance, and the day's escape went pretty much from kilometre zero, but the fight to make the day's move was joined by first the green jersey contenders and then the maillot jaune himself.

With the day's intermediate sprint at the foot of the Col d'Aspin, 137km into the stage, four-time green jersey winner Peter Sagan (Tinkoff) went into the early move in an attempt to distance current points classification and triple stage winner Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data). But the Manxman was having none of it, and followed the world champion into the first nine-man escape of the day.

The pair were joined by a group or riders who would have been a perfect combination for the stage - climbers Gorka Izagirre (Movistar), Luis Leon Sanchez (Astana), Jarlinson Pantano (IAM Cycling) and Chris Anker Sørensen (Fortuneo-Vital Concept) with roulers Ramunas Navardauskas (Cannondale-Drapac), Jérémy Roy (FDJ), Cesare Benedetti (Bora-Argon 18), Rui Costa (Lampre-Merida), Nicolas Edet and Geoffrey Soupe (Cofidis).

But the presence of the sprint titans threatened the position of Marcel Kittel in the green jersey competition, and Etixx-Quickstep chased it back just 43km into the stage. Roy, Benedetti and Navardauskas tried to stay clear, and were briefly joined by Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data) but they could not prevent a regrouping.

In his swan song Tour de France, Fabian Cancellara (Trek-Segafredo) helped spark the next move, making an all-new nine-man move with Alexis Vuillermoz (AG2R-La Mondiale), Paul Martens (LottoNL-Jumbo), Oliver Naesen (IAM Cycling), Sebastian Langeveld (Cannondale-Drapac), Kristijan Durasek (Lampre-Merida), Jurgen Roelandts (Lotto-Soudal) and Pierre-Luc Périchon (Fortuneo-Vital Concept).

The maillot jaune himself, Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) was part of a group that bridged across to the new leading group that swelled to 29 riders and included Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), who had already scuttled his GC chances and was 14:06 down on Van Avermaet.

Only Tinkoff were absent from the group that also included Jan Bakelants (AG2R-La Mondiale), Borut Bozic, Luis Mate and Daniel Navarro (Cofidis), Simon Geschke (Giant-Alpecin), Daryl Impey (Orica-Bike Exchange), Tony Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), Tsgabu Grmay (Lampre-Merida), Sylvain Chavanel and Antoine Duchesne (Direct Energie), Jasper Stuyven (Trek-Segafredo), Alexey Lutsenko (Astana), Steve Cummings (Dimension Data), Cesare Benedetti, Paul Voss (Bora-Argon 18), Angel Vicioso (Katusha), Alex Howes and Matti Breschel (Cannondale-Drapac), with Vasil Kiryienka (Sky) and Gorka Izagirre (Movistar) patrolling the move for their team leaders.

As the gap to the lead group went over five minutes, Sky set a frantic pace and were joined by Movistar as the breakaway headed up the first climb, the Cote de Capvern, a category 4 climb that presaged the agony to follow on the Col d'Aspin, which crested only 7km before the finish.

Nibali jumped clear to take the mountain points atop the Capvern, but was quickly brought back by Tony Martin (Etixx-Quickstep), and the breakaway seemed poised to ride intact across the 25km of flat roads leading to the base of the Aspin.

Duchesne and Breschel decided otherwise, and forged clear with 42.5km to go. They were joined by Navarro and set a furious pace as the maillot jaune, indifferent, enjoyed a sandwich. However, when Cummings, Nibali and Langeveld attempted to bridge across, Van Avermaet took notice and jumped onto the speeding train. Cummings made it across solo to the move with 35.5km to go, while Van Avermaet settled into a group with Impey, Martens, Lutsenko, Howes, Perichon who were soon joined by Nibali and Langeveld, making an eight-man chase group.

Cummings, no threat to Van Avermaet's yellow jersey at more than 42 minutes down, sensed the approach of the maillot jaune group and attacked ahead of the intermediate sprint, taking the points with 25.6km to go, while Navarro relented in his chase and settled back into the now ten-rider strong chase group.

As the Col d'Aspin began to bite, only Nibali, Navarro, Impey, Howes and Van Avermaet were left, but the latter two would soon be dropped with 15km to go.

Behind, in the peloton, FDJ set the pace until Thibaut Pinot began to suffer on the Aspin, being distanced from the main bunch before attacks had even begun. AG2R's Domenico Pozzovivo stuck a knife into the Frenchman for Pinot's rival Romain Bardet with a dig off the front.

Navarro attacked and dropped Nibali and Impey, as Cummings crested the Col d'Aspin with a minute's lead on the chasers. The peloton behind picked off the remainder of the day's breakaway but not Van Avermaet, who stayed clear at the crest by two minutes.

The peloton were delayed by a collapse of the 1km to go inflatable, allowing Van Avermaet to finish with no panic, 3:05 behind the stage winner to keep his race lead.

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