Jasper Philipsen of the Alpecin-Deceuninck team won the 10th stage of the Tour de France from Orleans to Saint-Amand-Montrond after outsprinting Biniam Girmay, riding for Intermarché Wanty, for his seventh career win in the race.
Philipsen, who has struggled to make his mark in this year’s race so far, was given an expert lead-out by his teammate Mathieu Van der Poel, the world road race champion.
Just as they had in earlier sprints, Mark Cavendish’s Astana Qazaqstan team hugged the right-hand side of the road on the approach to the finish, but as the speed increased the 39-year-old lost his teammates and finished out of the top 10. Ireland’s Sam Bennett had his best performance of the Tour so far, finishing sixth for the Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale team. Ben Healy has gone up one point to 19th in the overall standings from 20th.
With the Eritrean Girmay having won two stages and consolidated his lead in the green points jersey by hoovering up more points at intermediate sprints, the pressure on Philipsen to reprise his 2023 performance, when he won four stages, has been intense.
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In oppressive overcast conditions, the peloton had little appetite for battle and, aside from a brief flurry of high-speed racing, when crosswinds swept the route, it was a stage characterised by lingering images of chateaux and hay bale art.
With Wednesday’s mountain stage in the Massif Central on the horizon, most of the peloton were happy to take it easy on a stage that lacked a single categorised climb. But in the final 10 kilometres the pace increased and the race finally burst into life as the speeds nudged 60 kilometres an hour.
The Slovenian Tadej Pogacar retained the overall leader’s yellow jersey. - Guardian
