Tour de France: Dumoulin wins stage 9 at Andorra Arcalis

Having been away in the break from the very first climb of the day, Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) took a superb solo victory in torrential rain and hail at the stage 9 finish of Andorra Arcalis. The Dutchman jumped away from his breakaway companions with 12km remaining. Riding in typically strong fashion, Dumoulin opened up a gap of a minute and eventually finished 38 seconds ahead of Rui Costa (Lampre-Merida) and Rafal Majka (Tinkoff), who led a vain pursuit up to the high-altitude ski station.

As Dumoulin celebrated in the downpour at the finish, the overall contenders set about each other in the deluge that inundated the closing kilometres of the super-category climb to Arcalis. Like the previous day, the instigator was Sky's Sergio Henao, who once again delivered a surprise attack as his teammates set the pace for race leader Chris Froome.

The Colombian's move triggered a long series of attacks in which Froome, Dan Martin (Etixx-QuickStep), Richie Porte (BMC Racing) and Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo) were all prominent. Ultimately, though, the gradient of the final climb wasn't severe enough to enable any of the GC contenders to open up a significant gap.

As a result, there was no notable change at the top of the order as Adam Yates (Orica-BikeExchange) led in a select group comprising Froome, Nairo Quintana (Movistar), Porte and Martin, with Romain Bardet (AG2R-La Mondiale), Mollema, Louis Meintjes (Lampre-Merida) and local favourite Joaquim Rodríguez another 19 seconds in arrears.

BMC co-leader Tejay van Garderen was another 17 seconds down, just ahead of Movistar's Alejandro Valverde and Tinkoff's Roman Kreuziger, who had inherited undisputed leadership of the Russian team after Alberto Contador abandoned the race on the second climb of the stage.

Having struggled with crash-related injuries through the first week, the two-time Tour winner woke up with a fever. Although Contador went on the attack on the first climb, he soon fell back to the bunch and consulted with his managers several times before deciding to quit.

How it unfolded

The sight of riders warming up on the rollers before a mountain stage always suggests a fast start is imminent, and the initial kilometres up the first-category Port de la Bonaigua fully lived up to that. A series of attacks resulted in 40-odd riders forming a breakaway group, the fast pace forcing Dimension Data's Mark Renshaw into an early abandon. The Australian was another to be struck by illness in the night.

Back in the peloton, the ailing Contador decided to test himself with an attack. Valverde marked the move for Movistar along with Henao. As this trio closed on the leaders, the front group split and Thomas De Gendt (Lotto-Soudal) forged clear. Contador and Valverde made it through the stragglers and up to the lead section, while Henao has dropped back to help pace Froome.

When the action momentarily settled, the 25-strong Contador and Valverde group had an advantage of 1-25 over Froome and the peloton. It soon became clear, though, that Contador was suffering. The two-time Tour winner was unable to hold the pace at the front and dropped back to be absorbed by the bunch.

That left the group heavily dominated by Movistar. As well as Valverde, Winner Anacona, Jesús Herrada and the Izagirre brothers had also made it into the move, along with Astana's Diego Rosa and Luis León Sánchez, Tinkoff's Rafal Majka and Peter Sagan (Tinkoff), Alexis Vuillermoz (AG2R-LaMondiale), George Bennett (LottoNL-Jumbo), IAM trio Mathias Frank, Stef Clement and Jérôme Coppel (IAM), Natnael Berhane (Dimension Data), Dumoulin, Thibaut Pinot (FDJ), Lampre duo Rui Costa and Tsgabu Grmay, Lotto-Soudal's Tony Gallopin and Thomas De Gendt, and Dani Navarro and Nicolas Edet from Cofidis.

Approaching the Bonaigua's summit, King of the Mountains leader Majka, his closest rival Pinot and De Gendt vied for the points. Pinot took the maximum available, ahead of De Gendt and Majka.

Although the break was pushing hard to increase its advantage, Sky kept the gap at around a minute, unwilling to allow Valverde any leeway at all. After some badgering by some of his breakaway companions and a word with his team car, the Spaniard sat up and waited for the peloton, which eased off, allowing the gruppetto to regain contact.

It was on the subsequent first-category ascent of the Port de Canto that Contador dropped back several times to his team car. After much discussion, the Spaniard stopped and climbed into a team car 102km from the finish.

At the top of Canto, where the break's lead had reached 6-29, Pinot, De Gendt and Majka once again dueled for KoM points. This time De Gendt held off Pinot, with Majka happy to watch their battle from behind.

The break's advantage rose to more than 10 minutes as the peloton eased off in the valley leading into Andorra. After Sagan had breezed through the intermediate sprint with barely a challenge to his quest to take maximum points and cut Cavendish's lead in the green jersey competition to just seven points, IAM's Coppel attacked on the early slopes of the second-category Comella, Lampre's Grmay bridging up to join him. But their escapade was short-lived as De Gendt came through to cross the climb first and then pressed on solo.

Back in the bunch, Sky's climbers took over from rouleurs Ian Stannard and Luke Rowe at the front on the Comella, the increase in pace quickly forcing almost 80 riders into the gruppetto and putting some GC hopefuls into trouble, notably Dumoulin's Giant teammate Warren Barguil. Up ahead, the first victim of the steep ramps on the first-cat Col de Beixalis was De Gendt, who almost came to a halt as the rest of the breakaway eased by him.

After De Gendt stalled, Pinot, Majka, Rosa, Frank, Dumoulin, Navarro, Bennett, Anacona, Costa and Herrada pushed on. New Zealander Bennett made three attempts to go clear, only to be chased down by Rosa on each occasion. Pinot was in close attendance too, and came by to take the KoM points at the summit of the Beixalis.

Approaching the final climb, the 10 leaders attacked each other again and again until, with 12km remaining, Dumoulin took advantage of a flatter section to power away, leaving his frustrated former companions to gesture at each other as all attempts at collaboration failed. On ramps that suited his supreme time trialling ability, the Dutchman never looked likely to be caught and added a Tour stage win to those he's taken at the Vuelta and Giro in the last year.

Until Henao lit things up it looked like it would be stalemate within the yellow jersey group. But over the final 5km, attacks came relentlessly. Martin led the initial chase across to the Colombian with Froome on his wheel. Then Froome accelerated away with Quintana glued to his wheel. Porte brought the rest of the GC contenders back up to this pair. Martin counter-attacked and then went again when the road did get a little steeper 2km from home.

In the end, though, the gaps between the favourites were negligible, which is just how race director Christian Prudhomme hoped would be the case at the end of the biggest day in the Pyrenees and going into the first rest day.

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