Tour de France 2019: stage 10 – live!

107km to go: And Quick Step make laminated flooring. I knew that already.

110km to go: Curiosity finally having got the better of me, I have discovered that Deceuninck, of Deceuninck-Quick Step fame, make sustainable PVC windows and doors. By their own account, their “heritage flush and sculptured sash windows look great in any surrounding, from country cottages to modern townhouses. Their subtle charm and elegance will transform your home. The collection is ideal for period properties and for those who want to add or restore character to their homes with its unique, unrivalled, aesthetics and sympathetic symmetrical design giving a property perfect balance and harmony”. Yep, it’s come to this.

A new top speed: I’m going to go out on a limb and guess it was on a downhill, but it has emerged that Deceuninck-Quick Step rider Max Richez has set a new top speed for this year’s Tour, getting clocked at 96.7km per hour earlier in this stage. Crikey.

114km to go: The breakaway continue to pedal along at a fair old lick, 39.9km per hour, to be exact. The peloton continue to keep them on a tight rein, with the gap at 2min 47sec.

An email: “As a teacher I would never have been able to attend even a stage of the TDF,” writes KG. |So when the 1994 route included Dover-Brighton I took my chance. I formed a cycling club, quite a good one as it turned out. Next I contacted a deserving local cycling charity and formed a link. Next I went to the boss with my plan to go from Manchester to Brighton, three days, on a sponsored ride in support of the charity.

“Good publicity for the College. Good man, he agreed and we got to work. And it did work. A goodly sum was raised, the local paper featured it, we had a great time and there we were at L’arriveé of a stage. Everything into the back up van and home in time for Songs of Praise.The things you have to do!”

119km to go: I wasn’t quick enough to get a screengrab, but the camera just cut to Didi Senft, the trident-waving German super fan who dresses as the devil and is a regular on the roadside at the Tour and Giro. Aged 67, he was standing on a wall, gesticulating furiously as the peloton passed, risking life and limb with a drop of what looked like a couple of 100 metres behind him.

125km to go: The field is making its way up the third of four classified climbs today, the Cote d’Espalion. It’s a mere bump in the road, at just 603m above sea level, 5.2km in length with a gradient of 4.9%. I say a mere bump in the road, but I almost certainly wouldn’t be able to make it to the top.

An email: “Enjoying the coverage here in the Auvergne,” writes Andy Taylor. “Two points though – the site refers to today as a flat stage … not much, when I went along it last year! Up and down, big vertical relief. Other point is that today isn’t a traditional day off. Ordinary working day here as are all the breaks when Bastille Day falls at the weekend. Holiday season, certainly. No ‘pont’ between the holiday itself and the weekend.” I was misinformed.

139km to go: The stage may be ostensibly “flat”, but the terrain is very hilly and the weather is hot, around 30 degrees celsius. Michael Schar (CCC), Natnael Berhane (Cofidis), Anthony Turgis (Total Direct Energie), Odd Christian Eiking (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Mads Wurtz Schmidt (Katusha-Alpecin) and Tony Gallopin (AG2R La Mondiale) continue to pootle along in the breakaway, with a gap of 3min 03sec back to a peloton that is being towed along by Tony Martin.

A few wheels back, race leader Julian Alaphilippe is out of his saddle and having a bit of a stretch. I’m about to do much the same thing, while going back to my team care for some sustenance. I’ll be back in five minutes or so.

150km to go: The gap remains just below three minutes on a stage that is very low on excitement. Because today is a national holiday in France, in the wake of Bastille Day yesterday, so the riders have been forced out of their beds to race on what is traditionally a rest day. They’ll have tomorrow off instead, although all of them will probably still do 100 kilometres or so just to keep their legs from seizing up. A lot of the main GC contenders and big name sprinters will also have media duties to attend to. For the journalists covering the race, it’s a low pressure day that brings with it a welcome opportunity to do some much needed laundry!

168km to go: On Eurosport, the commentary team are citing a previous example of when a group of riders in a breakaway, in a similar kind of stage to this, put the word out, via their sporting directors, that if the bunch didn’t allow them a gap of at least 3min 30sec and at least a sporting chance of winning the stage, they would all sit up and allow the peloton to catch them.

This prompted panic from the teams of assorted sprinters in the bunch, who were worried about the prospect of having to defend attacks from other, fresher riders, so they acceded to the breakaway’s wishes. What chance the same thing happening today? Not much of one, by the looks of things, but our six-man escape party must be wondering what the point of their mission is beyond getting some publicity for their team sponsors.

169km to go: The gap from the six-man breakaway to the bunch is a shade under three minutes after almost 50 kilometres of “racing”.

An email: “For me the Tour always signals the transition into the summer holidays,” writes Jason Humphreys. “Working at a university, July means the lectures are over and its exam time. For me that means long days in the office, correcting exams, and tying up as many loose ends as possible to try and make the return to productivity in September a bit smoother.

“It also means more relaxed clothing, longer walks at lunchtime, and the daily companionship of the action from France via podcast, live ticker or a well-placed iPad on the desk – not to mention a spike in my Amazon activities. I was wondering what it’s like for you? You seem to get the gig every summer. Do you see it as a welcome break from football and the chance to get your teeth into something else, or do you find yourself returning a DHL parcel every other day?”

A good question, Jason. I really enjoy doing these liveblogs of the Tour. It is an always welcome palate cleanser that affords me the opportunity to almost completely ignore football transfer speculation, meaningless pre-season friendlies, which seem to get a lot of football fans very exercised indeed but barely interest me at all. Having said that, stages like today’s and last Friday’s, where almost nothing happens at great length, are a bit of a drag.

179km to go: The gap from Natnael Berhane (Cofidis), Anthony Turgis (Total Direct Energie), Odd Christian Eiking (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Mads Wurtz Schmidt (Katusha-Alpecin) and Tony Gallopin (AG2R La Mondiale) to the bunch is 2min 24sec as the escape party head up the second categorised climb of the day. Nobody’s working too hard in either group. Natnael Berhane is the best placed rider on GC in the breakaway – he’s 90th overall, 57min 13sec behind Julian Alaphilippe.

186km to go: The gap from our six-man breakaway to the bunch is 2min 35sec and Tony Martin is putting in the hard yards at the front of the peloton. As exercises in utter futility go, few can match being in an escape party that is being kept on such a tight rein. Back in the peloton, it’ll be another easy day for the GC contenders, while those unconcerned with the GC will be able to relax safe in the knowledge that we’re almost certain to have a sprint finish.

196km to go: The gap from the six-man breakaway to the bunch is out to 2min 33sec. The riders are tackling the first classified climb of the day, the category 4 Cote De Mallet, which is 2.2km in length with a gradient of 5.2% and is 907m above sea level.

Your breakaway: Michael Schar (CCC), Natnael Berhane (Cofidis), Anthony Turgis (Total Direct Energie), Odd Christian Eiking (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Mads Wurtz Schmidt (Katusha-Alpecin) and Tony Gallopin (AG2R La Mondiale). The gap is 2min 17sec.

206km to go: Sagan and Matthews, first and second in the green jersey standings, return to the bunch. Team CCC rider Michael Schar has bridged the gap to the breakaway, which is now six strong and 1min 48sec clear.

207km to go: The breakaway riders are still being held on a piece of elastic and are not away safely from the bunch yet. Today’s stage has yet to settle.

208km to go: Natnael Berhane (Cofidis), Anthony Turgis (Total Direct Energie), Odd Christian Eiking (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Mads Wurtz Schmidt (Katusha-Alpecin) and Tony Gallopin (AG2R La Mondiale) have escaped from the peloton and opened a gap of 19 seconds. Michael Matthews and Peter Sagan are trying to bridge the gap.

They’re racing on stage 10: Today’s roll-out is complete and a strung out peloton, led by Marcus Burghardt, is chasing down an early attempt at a breakaway.

Another withdrawal: Team CCC rider Alessandro De Marchi’s had a nasty crash yesterday and was taken to hospital in an ambulance. A key man in Saturday’s breakaway, the Italian suffered a broken collar bone, fractured ribs and a punctured lung after coming a cropper around 50 kilometres into yesterdays stage. De Marchi is the fifth rider to be forced out of this year’s Tour, leaving a field of 171.

Mitchelton Scott’s stage nine diary: The Aussie team won the stage on Bastille Day, courtesy of Daryl Impey. Here’s how they chronicled events for posterity.

Stage three review

Mitchelton Scott’s South African rider Daryl Impey won his first ever stage of the Tour de France on the back of a breakaway. Jeremy Whittle was in Brioude to see him do it.

From William Fotheringham’s stage-by-stage report: Long and hot, a scenic beginning before a 30km descent off the Cantal plateau for the 10th day of racing in a row, with the first rest day 24 hours later than usual. The script of early breakaway, late catch, scary sprint should be followed, but most of the riders will be just making sure they drink enough. All eyes will be on whichever sprinter has hit form early on, as Marcel Kittel did in 2017 and Mark Cavendish did the year before. The hilly route of this year’s first half of the Tour favours a lighter rider such as Elia Viviani.