Stage 6

The road

At the start

The longest day, to Lisieux

Yesterday cost the Tour Janez Brajkovič, put Alberto Contador on the tarmac again and left Tom Boonen barely able to hold his bars — and Cavendish still got his win. Nothing moved overall: Hushovd leads Evans by a second and Fränk Schleck by four. Today is the longest stage of the race, more than two hundred and twenty kilometres across Normandy to a finish that rises into Lisieux. Rain is forecast.

How it was won

1. 197 km to go

   Through Vassy, still seven minutes

   The peloton spent the morning licking its wounds and let the five go clear to eleven and a half minutes. Now HTC and Garmin are getting serious, and nearly three minutes come off inside fourteen kilometres.

2. 250 km to go

   Westra and Malori jump

   Fifty kilometres out the two leave Hoogerland, Roux and Duque behind, and it is a gutsy call: the other three are swallowed by the bunch almost immediately while the leading pair hold two and a half minutes.

3. 33 km to go

   Caught at the foot of the climb

   Malori has been alone in the downpour since Westra cracked, and the Italian time trial champion is taken 2.7km out, right where the road tilts up towards Lisieux. Voeckler and Vanendert go straight over the top of him and are done by the flamme rouge.

4. 4At the line

   Sky's first

   Geraint Thomas delivers a perfect lead-out on soaking Normandy tarmac and Edvald Boasson Hagen times it immaculately, beating Matt Goss and Thor Hushovd. It is the Norwegian's first Tour stage and his British team's, at the end of two hundred and twenty-seven kilometres of rain.

The result