Awesome ride from Froome, paced it perfectly. I wonder what Richie would have on a TT bike???

Top 10 on the stage:

By my back of a fag packet GC calculations…. 1-6 still all in the same order, but 2-6 have closed up dramatically with Mollema, Yates falling back, Quintana getting a bit closer, and Bardet and Porte moving a lot closer. Aru ahead of Valverde now too.

mrblobby, your calculations are correct.

Blimey, 1’08” covering 2 through to 6.

Quintana may as well go home!

Quintana may as well go home!

21 seconds from the podium.

and seriously money on Porte for 2nd, he will do it. Come on you tassie legend 🙂

Porte will move up to the podium and I think both Mollema and Yates look stronger than Quintana atm.

Porte will move up to the podium

Only 44 seconds from a podium. He’ll fancy that. Should make for a great couple of stages coming up.

Mollema and Yates look stronger than Quintana

I think so too despite them both losing time to him today.

The GC after that suggests they’ll all give up on trying to attack Froome (if they were capable of doing so before) and the rest of them will just be aiming for podium places – whether that means attacking each other or defending.

Wouldn’t be surprised to see Froome bag a stage win tomorrow as everyone else marks each other.

Dominant from Froome. Mollema was gracious too in taking second.

Podium battle will be fascinating, I am hoping Yates can take second.

and some bloke turning out for his local mountain bike race with his mates

I think the closeness of the rest of the GC will worry Froome. It means people will need to attack, and attack hard, that means that Froome will have to keep his eyes open.

Yes but it should make for a fascinating last few days. Froome just needs to stay out of trouble and defend, everyone else will have to come up with some sort of game plan as to where they think they can be on the podium, how they get there and the alliances they have to form to do it.

It’s not just the gap though, it’s that everybody knows that unless he has a really bad day he’s got the legs to cover anything. Nobody’s going to be doing a long range assault on the yellow jersey when the chances of success are low and they risk losing a podium place. The time people need to take to make the podium can be made on the final ascents where it’s easy enough for Froome to cover.

I think Porte will be an honorary Sky member, he’s not got the legs to overhaul Froome but could work with him to get on the podium.

I thought he was an honorary Sky member yesterday. Porte attacks, Froome lets him get a bit of distance, bridges across and then the pair put a bit of time into the rest of the GC.