Ireland’s Dan Martin has won stage nine of the Tour de France, beating Swiss rider Jakob Fugslang in a two-man sprint to the line after a dramatic day’s racing in the Tour de France from Saint Girons to Bagnes de Bigorre.
Martin of Garmin Sharp timed his acceleration well, shooting past Astana’s Fugslang on the straight to the finish line and claiming the win.
Michal Kwiatowski of Omega Pharma-Quick Step was third.
Martin’s win is reward for his Garmin-Sharp team who attacked early in the 168km stage and set a pace to punish British Team Sky.
Chris Froome finished in a group 20 seconds behind Fugslang that contained most of the other riders in the top twenty, but none of his Sky teammates, and retained the yellow jersey.
Cadel Evans had a much better day than in Stage Eight, showing good form to stay with the big guns and finish sixth on the day.
Alejadro Valverde (Movistar) is now second in the general classification, with Bauke Mollema (Belkin), Laurens Ten Dam (Belkin) and Roman Conziger (Saxo-Tinkoff) rounding out the top five.
Alberto Contador is sixth, 1min51sec behind Froome after finishing in the yellow jersey group in the stage.
Nairo Quintano (Movistar) took the white jersey after his aggressive day’s racing, with Peter Sagan and Pierre Rolland retaining the green an polka-dot jersey’s respectively.
The big loser of the day was Richie Porte, the Australian rider who rode so well for his leader in Stage Eight cracking early and finishing more than 17 minutes behind the leaders in 60th place, plummeting down the leader board in the process.
Porte started the day in second place in the GC but is now in 33rd position, more than 18 minutes adrift of Froome.
The Kenyan-born Briton caused some consternation after the race by not initially appearing at the podium for the presentations, the disappointment of his team’s disintegration a day after such success palpable.
He could he also have been facing the realisation that his team is not as good as he thought it was.
Sky, so dominant yesterday, could not replicate that form, unable to keep pace with those setting it up front.
The undulating course, which provided a category 2 and four category 1 climbs, was too much.
With 35km until the finish line, the peloton had been stripped down to a select group of riders, including a large enough contingent of Movistar and Belkin to control the race.
Quintano attacked and attacked, a lone Froome forced to counter every time to make sure he didn’t surge ahead, the young Colombian close enough in the overall standings to remain a threat.
Martin and Fugslang then attacked and, when Froome and co didn’t respond, managed to open up a gap of around a minute from the main group.
Quintana continued to attack Froome, but the overall leader would not let him go.
The Colombian is continuing a tradition of strong young riders from the South American nation, and has definitely shown the potential to be a future winner of the Tour de France.
At 12km, Belkin increased the pace in an attempt to close the gap between them and the two leaders, reducing it to just 25 seconds at the 9km mark.
The big surprise today, or maybe not in hindsight, was Andy Schleck, who had not been in the form of old since his crash in 2012 but rode beautifully to stay wheel for wheel with the yellow jersey.
There is absolutely no pressure on Schleck and, although perhaps not capable of winning the race, may just surprise with a stage win or two in the mountains.
With 2km to go, 30 seconds separated the two leaders from the chasing yellow jersey group and it looke like they wouldn’t be caught, setting up a sprint finish.
Into the final straight after nearly five hours of racing, the stage would come down to a sprint, Fuglang leading out with Martin waiting behind to pounce.
At 300m, he did and took the Stage win for Garmin-Sharp.
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