[ritchiebaby]

A much better day's racing with a strong 8 rider breakaway for most of the stage, which later on went down to 6, then 2 with 14km to go. By the final 4 km both Phillippe Gilbert and Jan Bakelants had been caught and left in the wake of the peleton. Most of the favourites for the Yellow Jersey were now at the front of the race and it came down to Fabian Aru to attack on the final climb and hold his advantage to win by 16 seconds from Dan Martin, with Chris Froome a further 4 seconds behind. Richie Porte was just behind Froome in the same time.

The upshot is that Chris Froome is now the overall leader, taking over from second-placed Geraint Thomas, with Fabian Aru, Dan Martin and Richie Porte close behind. Simon Yates, Romain Bardet, Alberto Contador and Nairo Quintana are the only other riders within 1 minute. Only Froome and Thomas remain from yesterday's Top Ten.

In the Polka Dot Jersey competition, Fabian Aru leads the rest and the Green Jersey competition, where the points are scattered around like confetti, is led by Arnaud Demare. The leading Youth rider is Simon Yates and the Team rankings are unsurprisingly led by Team Sky.

For tomorrow's stage from Vesoul to Troyes, we're back to the pedestrian style of racing, with the chance of another big stramash at the end to signal the chance of the sprinters to gain another stage win. Heading in the general direction of Paris, the stage features 2 Category 4 climbs and an intermediate sprint. With 2 of the main Green Jersey protagonists out, this has now become a wide open competition, so expect lots of action for sprint points, with Marcel Kittel, who got into a bit of a mess yesterday, and Andre Greipel my picks. We've seen very little of Steve Cummings so far, and I expect a stage win from him. Could tomorrow be the time to shine with a long range attack?