Tour de France stage 4 – Live coverage

Hello and welcome to the Cyclingnews live coverage of stage 4 of the Tour de France, the first summit finish of the race to  Orcières-Merlette.

We're around 35 minutes away from the start of the stage in Sisteron. The start festivities are underway, while the start proper will be called at 13:30 local time, five minutes after the roll out from the town.

Lotto Soudal sprinter Caleb Ewan won yesterday's stage into Sisteron with a dazzling sprint finish. He's still pretty pleased about it, but today is far from a day for him.

If you missed yesterday's action then we have a comprehensive stage report here as well as a look at the stage 3 highlights. 

Today we'll have five climbs on the menu, culminating in the first category summit finish.

Col du Festre: 7.6km, 5.3 per cent

Côte de Corps: 2.2km, 6.3 per cent

Côte de l’Aullagnier: 3km, 6.4 per cent

Côte de Saint-Léger-les-Mélèzes: 2.8km, 6.8 per cent

Orcières-Merlette: 7.1km, 6.7 per cent

Today will be the first big chance for the GC favourites to make their mark. Early summit finishes are usually quieter affairs than anticipated, with a large group of GC men crossing the line together. Will things be different today?

A bit of a downbeat look at the day from one of them, Arkéa-Samsic's Nairo Quintana...

We're about to get underway in just a few minutes now.

There's a 2.5km ride through the town of Sisteron before the flag drops and racing gets underway.

160km to go

And here we go. Christian Prudhomme drops the flag and the director's car is away.

Five riders have jumped away immediately. Krists Neilands and Nils Politt (Israel Start-Up Nation) are up there, as is Tiesj Benoot (Team Sunweb).

Alexis Vuillermoz (AG2R La Mondiale), Quentin Pacher (B&B Hotels-Vital Concept) are there too, while Mathieu Burgaudeau (Total Direct Energie) also made it across.

156km to go

The six-man group is already a minute up the road. Not much of a battle for the break, then...

3:30 for the breakaway now. Those are certainly our six for today.

A good job by Israel Start-Up Nation to get two men in the break here, at their first Tour de France. Hard to imagine this group has a chance to stay away until the end, though...

Deceuninck-QuickStep are up front with two men leading the peloton. Their team leader Julian Alaphilippe wears yellow today.

144km to go

3:50 for the break. It's a sunny day in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence department.

Tim Declercq and Remi Cavagna are the men on the front for Deceuninck-QuickStep. Jumbo-Visma lurk right behind the duo.

Vuillermoz, who lay 3:53 down on Alaphilippe this morning, is now the virtual leader of the race. The break are 4:10 up the road at the moment.

Julian Alaphilippe at the start today:

"It’s a nice stage today and another day for me to enjoy wearing the yellow jersey. The finale won’t be a walk in the park but I’ll give everything to retain the yellow jersey.

"Some favourites for the GC would be happy if I’d stay in the lead for longer but others like Adam Yates who is only four seconds down would love to take over from me. Anyway, the end of the Tour is still a long way away…"

UAE Team Emirates are next in line behind Deceuninck-QuickStep and Jumbo-Visma.

134km to go

There's not a ton going on right now. The intermediate sprint comes with 109km to go.

Some analysis of yesterday's stage courtesy of our colleagues at Procycling magazine:

Tour de France stage 3 analysis: Ewan proves 2019 was no fluke

The wind is blowing on these flat roads and the peloton is all strung out in single file under the high pace up front.

The wind isn't too strong though, so there's no danger of big splits in the peloton heree.

Riders are peeling off from the peloton for nature breaks. No worries in the main group.

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121km to go

3:25 between break and peloton. There's 11km to go until the intermediate sprint, so we should see Sagan and co jump away from the peloton there.

Tour de France's first summit finish: a power climb – Preview

While Orcières-Merlette has the honour of being the 2020 Tour de France's first summit finish for stage 4 on Tuesday, in one sense it wouldn't matter much if it were missed off the route for another two or three decades. And that's because whatever happens today, when it comes to the sheer scale of the events there back in 1971, it's very, very unlikely to match them.

111km to go

2km to go until the sprint now. 3:10 between break and peloton. No real change in the situation.

Politt led the break over the sprint ahead of Burgaudeau and Benoot.

Nine points down to one point on offer for the peloton.

Sam Bennett and Peter Sagan are up towards the front of the peloton in anticipation of the sprint.

Total Direct Energie lead the way to the sprint. Sagan sits on Bennett's wheel.

Bennett takes the nine points for seventh place. Sagan was only the sixth man over the line in the peloton after a wild effort ended with him being boxed in. Four points for him, then.

Nizzolo, Coquard and Trentin also grabbed some points. A number of riders – Ewan, Greipel, Bol – were nowhere.

Looks like Bennett will take green off Sagan then. He was five points behind the Slovakian but made up those points there.

103km to go

Bennet hit 70kph in that intermediate sprint after jumping from Michael Mørkøv's wheel. It was a fast one.

A quick video highlight of that intermediate sprint from the peloton:

The break are about to start the Col du Festre (7.6km, 5.3 per cent) now, the first climb of the day.

100km to go

The breakaway passes the 100km to go mark shortly after starting the third-category climb.

The Deceuninck-QuickStep duo and Jumbo-Visma remain planted on the front of the peloton.

This six-man break is hardly made up of star climbers, but so far they're all sticking together on this Cat 3 climb. Three minutes back to the peloton.

The two Israel Start-Up Nation riders lead the way in the break.

96km to go

The break are 3km from the top of the climb now. Only two and one point available up there, by the way.

700 metres from the top and Pacher goes on the attack from the break.

The Frenchman has a decent gap on his breakmates and looks like leading the way over the top.

Pacher takes the two points at the top. Politt led the rest of the break over.

The peloton will cross the top of the climb in 2:50.

89km to go

A short downhill before another kick up and a longer descent before the next climb. Politt has gone off the front of the break.

The fourth-category Côte de Corps comes in around 25 kilometres.

Politt is really going for it here. He has a handful of seconds on the rest of the break in the downhill.

82km to go

12 seconds between Politt and the break, 3:20 back to the peloton.

The full Deceuninck-QuickStep team has taken to thhe front of the peloton now, in addition to Declercq and Cavagna, who have been there all day.

73km to go

Politt is still out there, just 10 seconds up the road. His teammate Krists Neilands is hanging in at the back of the break, not doing any work obviously.

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Politt is back with the break now. 7km to go until the next KOM – the Côte de Corps: 2.2km, 6.3 per cent.

Now Vuillermoz has slipped off the front of the break. 

A rather large group has split from the rear of the peloton on the descent. Shouldn't be any worries to make it back fairly quickly though.

The break close in on the top of our second climb of the day. Only one point on offer up there.

Here's a look at today's six-man break:

Pacher leads the break over the top of the climb. Another point for him, so three in total now.

60km to go

25km to go until the next climb of the day, the third-category Côte de l'Aullagnier.

55km to go

Pacher, Vuillermoz and Politt have taken over the lead of the race after a split in the breakaway. 2:40 back to the peloton.

Politt drops back to help his teammate Neilands, however.

The move didn't last long at all. The break is all back together now.

50km to go

Still no change in situation at the moment. It's an uphill drag to the next classified climb.

Roll on the finale...

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The breakaway now has 10km to go til the next climb of the day. The gap is 2:30.

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