Stage 14

The road

At the start

The Pyrenees, and the Mur de Péguère

Greipel took his third stage of the race by a wheel rim at Le Cap d'Agde and the standings are frozen: Wiggins, Froome at 2:05, Nibali at 2:23, Evans at 3:19. David Moncoutié abandoned yesterday with a broken collarbone. Today is the Tour's first day in the Pyrenees — the Port de Lers, and then the Mur de Péguère, a climb the peloton refused to ride in 1973 because the descent frightened them.

How it was won

1. 1141 km to go

   Fifty kilometres to make a break

   It takes an hour of attacking before eleven riders finally get away — Sánchez, Gilbert, Sagan, Casar, Izagirre, Kruijswijk and five more — and the moment they do, the gap skyrockets past a quarter of an hour. There is no argument about where the stage win is going.

2. 265 km to go

   Rain on the Port de Lers

   The rain arrives exactly as the leaders start the first of the day's two first-category climbs. They go over together, and back down the mountain the crowd is treated to the sight of the world champion, Mark Cavendish, riding tempo on the front of the peloton.

3. 342 km to go

   Sánchez lights the Péguère

   Three kilometres from the top of the Mur de Péguère, Luis León Sánchez attacks and Gilbert goes with him. Izagirre and Casar close it down, and Sagan — a sprinter, on a wall — refuses to be dropped.

4. 439 km to go

   Somebody has thrown tacks on the road

   Over the summit the punctures start, and they do not stop. Cadel Evans stands at the roadside for a minute and fifteen seconds gesturing furiously; his team-mate Cummings arrives with a flat rear of his own. Evans punctures twice more on the descent. Robert Kiserlovski crashes and leaves the race with suspected fractures. Photographs of carpet tacks pulled out of tyres go round the race, and Bradley Wiggins takes a precautionary bike change and holds the whole peloton at walking pace until the defending champion is back.

5. 511 km to go

   Sánchez goes on the rise

   Five leaders, eleven and a half kilometres left, and Sánchez uses a drag in the road to go alone. Nobody can hold it; the gap creeps out to forty-seven seconds and stays there.

6. 6At the line

   Rabobank's Tour, rescued in Foix

   Sánchez crosses in Foix a minute clear of Sagan and Casar. The peloton, having spent the afternoon waiting and puncturing, arrives eighteen minutes later.

The result