Biniam Girmay has taken his third stage win of the Tour de France, continuing his dominance in the sprints while behind him Primoz Roglic’s attempt to win the overall classification was all but over.
Girmay beat Wout van Aert in a somewhat chaotic sprint on stage 12 to Villeneuve-sur-Lot, which saw Arnaud Demare and Mark Cavendish drop from third and fifth places respectively.
But then Roglic had to wait more than two minutes for the finish after the Slovenian crashed about 10 kilometers from the finish and fell almost five minutes behind leader Tadej Pogacar in the overall standings.
Pogacar continues to lead by 66 seconds over Remco Evenepoel, with defending champion Jonas Vingegaard a further six seconds behind in third. Roglic dropped from fourth to sixth place and is now four minutes and 42 seconds behind.
Jai Hindley remains Australia’s leading rider, sitting in 19th place, 19 minutes 25 seconds behind the leader. Jack Haig is two places 1 minute 07 seconds behind him.
Girmay was already the only rider in the race with more than one stage win in this Tour, and he managed a hat-trick on the 204km Aurillac stage.
“I knew I could get good results with the right wheels and I proved in the last three sprints that I can win,” said Girmay.
The win puts Girmay in a leading position in the points classification and with Friday’s stage to Pau one of only two real opportunities for the sprinters, it seems he will keep the green jersey if he makes it to Nice.
“Since I’ve been wearing this jersey, I feel somehow super fast, especially in my mind,” Girmay added. “I just believe that I can prove that I’m the best.”
This was supposed to be a day for the general classification contenders to take a breather after Wednesday’s battle in the Massif Central, but a crash 10 km from the finish changed everything.
Alexey Lutsenko crashed over an island in the middle of the road and several riders ended up on the ground as a result of the incident.
Among them was Roglic, who also crashed in the final meters of Wednesday’s stage but managed to avoid losing time as it happened within the last three kilometers.
His Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe teammates had gathered around him when racing resumed, but their behaviour did not reflect that of a team desperate to catch up as Roglic fell down the rankings with a torn jersey and a bloody right shoulder.
It was another grueling day as reports and rumors of illness in the race continued to circulate.
A day after the ailing Fred Wright missed the time limit, Bahrain-Victorious also lost leader Pello Bilbao, who got into the team car mid-stage, shortly after Fabio Jakobsen also retired.
Astana-Qazaqstan announced before the race that Cavendish’s lead rider Michael Morkov had withdrawn from the race due to Covid. Cavendish said he believed other riders were also Covid-positive.