The weather was windy on the roads of the Tour and violent gusts of up to 70 km per hour hit the yellow caravan: so the stage after the rest and on the eve of the two days in the Alps - today the Croix de Fer and the legendary Galibier before the dive on Serre-Chevalier a, tomorrow the Vars with the arrival at the top of the Izoard - risked turning into a trap for many when Froome, taking advantage of the "bordures", which opened holes and fans in the group, unleashed in a forcing at full speed about fifteen km from the finish line in Romans-sur-Isère.
Aru was good at not getting caught like Rigoberto. Not even Uran, the yellow jersey's most feared opponent since he goes fast uphill and is an excellent time trialist, didn't fall into the net. A big fish like Bardet was instead about to be swallowed in the rear, if he hadn't had the help of Oliver Naesen, the Belgian champion, who steered him into the wind. Meintjes and Daniel Martin lost their wheels just enough for the Irishman to drop from fifth to seventh place overtaken by Landa - the Basque who never misses a beat and if he could run free from the relationship of subjection to Froome he could really play for the Tour - and by Simon Yates, always in the white jersey as leader of the youngsters with 3'58” on Meintjes.
Froome's acceleration also cost Contador dearly as he sadly dropped out of the hard-earned top ten with his proud breakaway in the Foix stage. The Pistolero comes out, protagonist of his worst Tour ever, another flop of this Grande Boucle peeps out again in tenth place, Nairo Quintana, unrecognizable Condor, who yesterday saved face arriving with the first group after the heavy delay in the previous stage in Le Puy-Velay.
If for the yellow jersey in the end the windy stage did not produce any changes in the top four of the standings – Froome, Aru, Bardet and Uran – always enclosed in 29” before the sentence in the Alps and Saturday's time trial, for the green jersey , the one that distinguishes the leader of the points standings, the arrival of Romans-sur-Isére has reopened the match that until a few days ago seemed completely closed in favor of Marcel Kittel, thanks to his five stage victories.
All thanks to Michael Matthews, the Australian from Sunweb, who after his victory in Rodez scored an encore yesterday, burning Boasson-Hagen and John Degenkolb by a few centimetres. Angry sprint, with a good dose of sly malice from Matthews who squeezes the two rivals to the barriers making them furious, especially Degenkolb who felt strongly damaged. With Kittel lost in the wind and very distant at the finish line, Matthews took the opportunity to fill up on points by climbing to 344 points, 29 lengths behind the German.
In just one day Kittel lost the certainty of arriving in Paris in the green jersey and saw the possibility of equaling the record held by Charles Pelissier, Merckx and Freddy Maertens vanish with 8 stage victories. For the yellow jersey there are still three decisive stages, for the green jersey just two, Friday's in Salon-de-Provence and Sunday's final catwalk on the Champs Elysées.
